| "For better than a quarter-centure, the august bassist Cecil McBee has brought exquisite time and pulse to bands led by the likes of Sonny Rollins, Wayne Shorter, Miles David, McCoy Tyner and Joe Henderson. On Unspoken he leads his own band (a real working band around New York) on a program of his compositions. McBee's fifth album overall, Unspoken is his first in 12 years, during which time he has stockpiled an assortment of interesting pieces, including the eight here. As befits a timekeeper for the giants, McBee the composer pens tunes that are passionate, thoughtprovoking and challenging for his players. His bandmates are up to the challenge: up-and-comers James Zollar on trumpet, Randall Connors on alto plus pianist David Berkman, an alumnus of bands run by Sonny Stitt and Tom Harrell, and the excpetional drummer Matt Wilson, whose 1996 Palmetto CD, As Wave Follows Wave, was among the year's best. Save for the 8:57 title track, the tunes on Unspoken fall in the five-to-seven-minute range, and all are rendered with crackling precision, depth of meaning/feeling and a postbop insistence on playing something new. Well done."
-Gene Kalbacher, CMJ |