HARRY BECKETT — Flare Up (review)

HARRY BECKETT — Flare Up album cover Album · 1970 · Fusion Buy this album from MMA partners
4/5 ·
Sean Trane
Despite the Barbados-born tumpetist being a permanent fixture on the British jazz-scene (since 54), he had to wait until 70 to be able to record his own debut solo album, while having paid his dues in the Graham Collier outfits and in The New Jazz Orchestra, the Hartley, Westbrook and Surman combos and more. After talks of an initial live project album fell through in 69, a second try the following year produced the present album, but with a very different line-up than the original project had planned, but he brought in musicians and composition from the Collier and the Surman crowd. But what a debut album it was: a typical album that was seeping from the London-scene, with the likes of Skidmore, Osborne, Surman, Ricotti and Taylor, just to name those.

Opening on the furious but rather-standard Beckett-penned title track (sounding like a Lionel Hampton tune), the album shows quite a vast spectrum of moods and influences, especially with the following Go West (one of four Collier compositions) which could’ve found a space on either Down Another Road or Song For My Father, and features a rocking rhythm (you’d swear this is Marshall on the drum stool, but it’s John Webb) with amazing solos from Harry, the Surman, then both with Skidmore in a slightly dissonant improv, until Taylor ends it all. The much calmer typical Surman track When Fortune Smiles (from his same album) deepens the exploration of gentle dissonance, but nothing to be afraid about. The shorter tracks are succeeding each other in a variety of climates, but Collier’s Third Road (again with some awesome drumming and Taylor’s Rhodes) and climaxes

Over on the flipside, the Beckett-penned 100-mph Flow Stream is again in the more standard-jazz mould (like the album’s title track), where Ricotti’s vibes are echoed by Taylor’s Rhodes, both underlying Beckett’s wailings. Next to that, the slow ballad is rather pretty and beautiful and bringing yet another shade to the album. But this writer prefers much more the instantly-recognizable Collier mid-tempo Rolli’s Tune, which again brings much depth to the album. The closing Fool’s Play hovers between Harry and Graham, but the horn chorus gives away Beckett’s paw (his best composition on the album), even if the solos would almost dispel it., but the album’s ending is a little unexpectedly “stange”.

While calling it a JR/F album would be quite a stretch, FU is one of those few discs that made the line rather blurry between the jazz and the rock idioms, even if there is no doubt it is closer to the former. If Flare Up is a pretty damn album, it owes it much to Collier’s (and Surman’s) more adventurous compositions than Beckett’s more standard-y songwriting. You could no problem file this album right next to Collier’s: it is definitely worthy of the prestigious proximity.

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