Search - Cecil Taylor :: Indent

Brilliant Solo Album

Christopher Forbes | Brooklyn,, NY | 08/09/2002

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Indent and Silent Tongues are Cecil Taylor's best solo piano albums I think. I bought Indent as an LP back when Arista was still releasing avant-garde music. The album was a revelation. Taylor's music is highly structured, even though on first aquaintance it seems formless. His music is based on the gradual obsessive development of small motives, most of which are based on modal scales. These motives are played at a frenetic pace, which adds to the mistaken idea that this is "free" playing. Cecil can blow free with the best of them, but his music is always controlled and his chops are unequaled.The solo work doesn't have the complexity of structure or instrumental timbre that you would find in Taylor's group work. But the solo stuff is indispensible, especially for pianists. If you are a jazz player, you cannot understand all of the music until you come to terms with this seminal innovator. Love him or hate him, Taylor is a force to be reckoned with."