With a few rare exceptions, I'm not the world's biggest accordion fan. Harri Kuusijärvi is now one of those exceptions, due to his efforts to take this most traditional of instruments in new electroacoustic directions and make it fit for the new millennium.
"Aallot" is the title track, and my ethereal pick from his excellent new LP he's recorded with Jori Huhtala and Mika Kallio, with the trio regularly entering cosmic jazz realms, quite the feat for only a trio with no keyboard player. The vibes are certainly helped by Kallio's textural ability on percussion, well when he's not propelling the more space bound tracks up into the stratosphere that is, ably aided by Huhtala's impeccable bass playing which wavers between succinct minimalism and hard grooving when required.
I'm not exactly sure how - I'd love to get a closer look and understanding of the augmented accordion, but the icing on the cake is Kuusijärvi's playing. He not only takes the traditional sounds of the squeeze box into jazz realms - in and of itself unusual, but also coaxes all sorts of sci-fi soundtrack and interstellar electronic noise and nuance to the recording from his instrument, giving the LP a TSMM cosmic seal of approval. It's one of the freshest jazz LPs you'll hear this year and I highly recommend you get with the Finnish space program.
Playlist Companion
Find this trippy trio with other forward looking company in the Slow Jazz Playlist.
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