By Don Phipps
Rob Mazurek’s solo album Nestor’s Nest is a creative sonic adventure that runs from Native American drum chants to imagined extraterrestrial settings. Known for his trumpet playing and composing skills, Mazurek jettisons bandmates on this go round, choosing instead to create his own soundscapes using Modular Synths, a Moog Sub 37, a PolyEvolver (another type of synthesizer), bells, flutes, and his own vocals.
The first cut, “Star Fruit,” serves as a kind of short celestial introduction to the explosive, propelling rhythm of “Banana Fruit,” a piece which features syncopated beats beneath an ethereal vibraphone-like voicing. The vibraphonish sounds float above rhythm and what might be described as a bit of DJ scratching. Burbles and baubles bubble up from the deep like an ocean geyser. Late in the number, Mazurek uses striking trumpet injections – his lines slicing through the rhythmic polyphonic intensity like a samurai sword through bamboo. As the music concludes, he brings what sounds like Native American chants to the maelstrom.
The short “Under the Papaya Tree” offers up a bird call flute before breaking into the funky safari of “Mango Fruit.” The music here is an elephant ride along a jungle coast, the white sand stretching outward interspersed with palm trees. The electronic legato mix hangs atop syncopated beats before progressing to a cubic light show generated by a whirling, sound-spinning decahedron.
“Papaya Fruit” is perhaps the most surprising of all the cuts. It begins like a 1950s space movie soundtrack – is this Mazurek replicating the hum of the universe? The piece migrates into an African-inspired funk. Mazurek enters on trumpet, fluttering, trilling, and roller-coasting up and down – his fantastic technique never wavers as it twists and turns. Voice and bells enter – the number radiating a galloping heat, the thunder of hooves on dry clay. As it winds down, one hears percussion instruments Art Ensemble of Chicago-style.
The music of Nestor’s Nest is clever, flamboyant, challenging. It retains a sense of immediacy – the action non-stop, the atmospheres created diverse. Mazurek pushes his listeners to confront a variety of musical environments. The strange and surreal mind travels generated here will keep most on edge. Fun stuff. Enjoy!
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