Luke Stewart Silt Trio

Unknown Rivers

Pi Recordings

Unknown Rivers is bassist and composer Luke Stewart’s debut for Pi Recordings and for this magazine. Stewart is a force in the creative music scene as co-leader of such bands as Irreversible Entanglements, Exposure Quintet, Blacks’ Myths, Heart of the Ghost, and Heroes are Gang Leaders. If you’re not familiar with any of those ensembles, you should know that Stewart has performed with David Murray, Nicole Mitchell, James Brandon Lewis, Moor Mother, Nate Wooley, and many others.  He is a curator of multiple concert series in New York and D.C. and wears multiple hats as a writer, activist, producer, and D.J.

His Silt Trio is to the naked ear a bassist led saxophone trio with Brian Settles on tenor and drummers Trae Crudup on four studio tracks and Chad Taylor on three live tracks. Settles leads his own trio and has long been a stalwart on the D.C. scene, renowned for his quiet intensity and expressive soloing.  Crudup has long been Stewart’s rhythm mate, having logged time in D.C.’s go-go scene and recent collaborations with James Brandon Lewis and others. Taylor is probably best known as co-founder of the Chicago Underground Duo with trumpeter Rob Mazure, and a subsequent trio with guitarist Jeff Parker. A professional on the Chicago scene (now residing in Philadelphia) from the age of 16, he became the beat keeper for many of the most celebrated artists in improvised music, including Fred Anderson, Pharoah Sanders, Nicole Mitchell, Matana Roberts, Ken Vandermark, Darius Jones, James Brandon Lewis, the late Jaimie Branch, Derek Bailey, Marc Ribot, and the late Peter Brötzmann.  Taylor leads both the Chad Taylor Trio with Brian Settles and Neil Podgurski and Circle Down with Angelica Sanchez and Chris Lightcap.

The trio kicks off with syncopated, angular “Seek Whence” with Stewart’s robust bass driving Settles to play with a determined approach that stays ‘in the pocket’ with plenty of riveting clusters but free of shrieking and squawking, essentially surfing on the percolating rhythm bed, easing out rather quietly, riffing with Stewart. Stewart leads the trio into “Baba Doo Way,” establishing a repetitive vamp with Settles digging in more fiercely as Crudup’s dense polyrhythms together with Stewart’s drive give this one a harder edge. Shortly after the four-minute mark Settles takes in down a couple of notches over the unrelenting groove only to power up to a dynamic close, capped by the bass-drum tandem. “You See?” initially moves into more contemplative, explorative territory with Settles alternating short and sustained bursts. It proves to be a feature for drummer Crudup, who is all over his kit, driving the saxophonist to intense, impassioned blowing toward the latter section of the piece. Stewart carves one of his signature deep grooves for “The Slip,” with Settles delivering a more sensitive improvisation, again gradually building into a more aggressive posture, before surrendering to his rhythm mates to take it out.

Naturally, the live session commences with more palpable energy, through a long drum intro from Taylor on “Amilcar.” Stewart joins in developing this Afro-centric rhythm bed, launching Settles into a vigorous dialogue of long floating lines, quick bursts, and ferocious clusters. This segues directly to the album’s longest track, “Ducu” as Stewart and Taylor develop an intriguing bass-drum dynamic with Stewart’s arco bass as Settles is content to just color and continually brighten the fuzzy picture.  The saxophonist breaks out but then settles into a calmer searching mode as the rhythmic current ebbs and flows.  Taylor stirs it up again and these conversations grow more heated as Stewart keeps stoking the fire underneath, segueing seamlessly into the closing title track, played to insistent beats and some of Settles most unrestrained blowing in the set. The trio stamps their trademark vamp as they go out, leaving us wanting more.

Stewart’s Silt Trio is a focused unit, by turns subtle and explosive, and continually gripping. Dive right in.

• Jim Hynes

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