Ipos by The Dreamers
Sunlight | New York City | 04/03/2010
(5 out of 5 stars)
"This is the third CD by The Dreamers, and I think it is their strongest presentation to date. They have obviously been playing together and the band is tighter than ever. All of the six players are virtuosos in their own right, but know Zorn's work intimately and play together as a band under his leadership, coming forward when they need to, staying in the background when they need to. There is plenty of killer soloing from Ribot, Saft and Wollesen, and plenty of tricky Masada lyricism and Dreamers charm. With ALL of Zorn's music, there is a high level of musicianship involved, and a high degree of LISTENING between the players.
Since all the compositions are from the Masada songbook, Ipos has a special kind of focus, and the sequence works really well. The arrangements are incredibly varied. The cd begins and ends with dynamite surf tracks, and in between are loopy minimal pieces, beautiful piano jazz, moody exotica pieces, in fact all the mixture of styles that make The Dreamers cds so much fun to listen to. The hypnotic track Ezriel is one of my personal favorites, but all the tracks are amazing, Galizur, Oriel, Zortek and Qalbam have incredible Ribot solos, in fact he is really on fire throughout this album so if you are a Ribot fan this is an absolute MUST.
Highly suggested that you get the CD on this instead of a download. The artwork is gorgeous, and included as a bonus is a beautiful card in the style of the previous Dreamers releases by Tzadik designer Heung-Heung Chin who continues to prove herself one of the best and most creative graphic designers working today."