The effect of this first solo release from Damon Locks is akin to driving late at night and hearing snippets from a cool underground radio station. The station drops out at times, but snatches of rhetoric, polemnic, jazz, and poetry come through loud and clear. List of Demands is then a new kind of concept album, and a peak in Damon's climb to reshaping jazz into new forms.
Of course, through spoken word samples, and found performance pieces, Locks is bringing other voices into his vision. These include label-mates Ben LaMar Gay, whose plaintive cornet adds a second voice behind Locks' in "Holding the Dawn in Place (Beyond, Pt. 2)", a real gem here. Further on, Macie Stewart (Ohmme) adds violin to the lovely "Distance", a more straightforward number. Elsewhere, the riot of noises in "Everything's Under Control" segues nicely into the lumbering "Isn't It Beautiful", a number held down by Ralph Darden's drums. Those drums seem to carry the weight of the ages in them, with the hits counting out a weary journey forward. Locks adds poetry and musings as samples and swatches of backwards sounds rattle around behind him. It's a trippy cut, and a real highlight here on a record full of them.
List of Demands is a risky record. It's less jazz than almost anything I've heard on International Anthem in some time. And yet, it is entirely a jazz record. The concerns here, the approach, the sense of risk-taking are all rooted in jazz. That Damon is using more modern methods to get out his vision is deserving of praise. List of Demands is a noisy, busy release, one which should reward listeners who have followed Locks from his punk days to his jazzier ones. It's also the kind of record that surprises and makes an effort to at least attempt big, bold gestures, and move the needle forward. For that reason, it's one of the best releases in recent weeks.
List of Demands by Damon Locks is out now via International Anthem. Details via the link, and Bandcamp below.
[Photo: Jamie Kelter Davis]