Search - George Adams, James Blood Ulmer, Sirone :: Original Phalanx

Like the New York Art Quartet had done two decades before, Phalanx came and went in the mid-1980s, an ad-hoc supergroup that thrived and disappeared. Original Phalanx captures the quartet in a rumbling, springy glory, alight through James "Blood" Ulmer's craftily detuned guitar and the build-it-and-wobble-it rhythmic playing of bassist Sirone and drummer Rashied Ali. The star, though, is the late George Adams. His playing is inspired, swinging so hard and high that the musical registers turn to blurs. The band's tunes are vaguely Ornette Coleman-ish, in that they build off quick, melodic statements that sound at times like four-way solos. Then the band's off, Ulmer and Adams pursuing solo logic on one plane, the rhythm section on another. They peak on Adams's "Playground," which rings with poignancy and punch-it-up power. But Sirone's minor-key, episodic "Free Spirit" is likewise a work of genius, achieving a stellar balance of passion, intellect, and gusto. --Andrew Bartlett