Brad Mehldau

I used to follow Brad Mehldau's releases pretty closely, but after a while decided it wasn't really worth the time and money to keep up any longer. His experimental Largo didn't do anything for me. In fact, I thought it was a perfect example of a self-indulgent recording that alienates fans (not that there is anything wrong with that). His live double CD Progression was also a bit overwhelming. It wasn't bad, I just didn't see myself sitting down and listening to it repeatedly. And in any case, I already had enough excellent Mehldau in his early records to last me a few years, so I stopped.

Well, a few years have gone by, during which he switched record companies, recorded a disc of songs with Renee Fleming of all people, did a live solo album (by all accounts sublime) and, most recently, replaced his longtime drummer Jorge Rossy with Jeff Ballard. He also did an album of duets with Pat Metheny, which I did pick up, in equal measure for Mehldau and Metheny, and liked a lot. On that record, there were two quartet tunes (the trio plus Metheny) that were the only tunes I didn't care for – far too funky. Now, however, he appears to be back to steady work with a trio, and on a whim I decided to check out their most recent Live.

As the name implies, it was recorded live, at the Village Vanguard in New York, and like Progression, it's a double set. After hearing it a couple of times, I struggled with whether I liked it or not, but finally decided that I did, with a few important caveats.

It has been said countless times that jazz is essentially a live art form, that anyone's live gig is by definition better than the same musician's studio album, or at least a more accurate representation of the real essence of his music. The latter may be true, but I also think that record-making has become sophisticated enough over the decades that even in jazz, there is now a difference in focus between the stage and the studio. Music preformed live is meant to be heard live, and its message risks being lost, diluted or, worse, misinterpreted, when it is recorded and played back long after the event. A little bit of this happens on the Mehldau disc.

I don't doubt for a second that hearing the trio on stage, especially in the intimacy of the Vanguard (the only real jazz club left in New York, for my money), was a transforming experience. On record, however, it can get a bit much unless consumed in well-regulated doses. Mehldau likes to stretch out – really stretch out – when gigging. Most of the tracks here are well over ten minutes long, and the apparent piece de resistance of the set, the cover of Soundgarden's "Black Hole Sun," more on which in a moment, clocks in at close to a half-hour. With only three instruments, this takes real commitment both on the part of the band and the part of the listener. Thankfully, Mehldau is a mind-bogglingly inventive soloist, so no matter how long he chooses to deconstruct and reconstruct a song, you're never bored, and when he is finally done, you feel like you've been taken to some far-away places, but then returned home in one piece. Do a few of these back to back, however, and after a while you're quite simply tired of focusing so intensely for so long. In performance, there is a visual element that helps both to enhance and to break up the intensity, and in any case, a listener's senses are always heightened by the excitement and anticipation of a live show, compared to slouching in his living room chair, but at home the tunes are best taken one or two at a time.

Then there is Ballard. He is a phenomenal drummer, but a phenomenal drummer is a dangerous thing. Mostly, it is the contrast with Rossy that took a lot of getting used to. Rossy was as understated and self-effacing as it is possible to be in today's jazz climate. He was, first and foremost, an accompanist. I loved that and, not to put too fine a point on it, thought that that's what a good jazz drummer ought to be. Ballard is far busier and orders of magnitude more intense. This is natural – most jazz musicians playing in small groups today want equal partners, not accompanists, and drummers do not want to be accompanists any longer. That's simply what you do as improvising musicians in 2008. So I don't begrudge Mehldau his choice. I do, however, miss the slightly more relaxed atmosphere of Mehldau's original trio. I know, I know, not better, just different and all that stuff, but hey, we all have our biases, and these are mine.

In fairness, I should point out that Ballard can swing like mad. He is totally out of the Tony Williams school in that respect. Some drummers in jazz today are basically rock drummers who can read music. Not so with Ballard. He is loud and busy, but never plodding. He also can be understated when he needs to be. On “The Very Thought of You,” he lightly brushes the cymbals for the entire time, a consummate professional.

Finally, there is the material. It is well known that Mehldau is a fan of pop and rock music, including some recent stuff, and he is not shy about trying to play it. If you think about it, this makes total sense. Pop music provided the raw material for jazz for most of its history, so why not now? Do all jazz musicians have to be high-falutin' composers nowadays? The answer to that, some will say, is that back in the day, and I mean way back – Tin Pan Alley, early Broadway musicals, etc. -- pop songs were good. Today, not so much. My knee-jerk reaction is to agree, but I admire Mehldau, himself a prolific composer it so happens, for having the guts to try to prove otherwise. His early attempts – Radiohead's “Exit Music (for a Film)” and Nick Drake's “Riverman” were surprisingly successful. Now, he is going further, with Oasis's “Wonderwall” and Soundgarden's “Black Hole Sun.” I admit that I didn't have either song at my brain's fingertips, as it were, but maybe that's a good thing – I had to take them on their own terms, and focus on the melodic and harmonic essence of the tunes, instead of trying to evaluate whether they were good covers of the originals. I am forced to admit that they work. Once you strip away the crunchy guitars and the pounding drums and the whining vocals (I assume – like I said, I don't know the originals off the top of my head), there really is genuine music under there. Kudos to Mehldau for proving this to doubting thomases like me. "Black Hole Sun," in particular, is quite an achievement. He deconstructs it completely and takes it in all kinds of directions it wasn't meant to go, but it's fascinating the whole way, even though I did eventually forget what I was listening to, and just absorbed each note and chord as they came, too far away from the original melody to stay connected to it in any meaningful way.

The rest of the material is relatively evenly split between standards and Mehldau's originals. The originals vary in quality, and to my ears, on the whole fall short of the best of his earlier tunes, especially his stuff on Places, my personal favorite. The best ones, however, “Buddha Realm” and especially “Secret Beach,” are very nice. “Secret Beach” makes for a nice, sparse, almost ECM-ish vamp. The standards provide a nice foil. The set closes with Coltrane's “Countdown” taken at such breakneck speed that Coltrane himself would have been impressed.

All in all, Live was a good way to return to Mehldau after a hiatus. Maybe I'll check out some of the interim albums I missed, and will definitely keep my eyes, and ears, peeled for new recordings.