William Hooker:
Cycle of Restoration
FPE Records
Though William Hooker's discography includes more than seventy albums as a leader or performer, it's probably safe to say none sounds anything like Cycle of Restoration. Neither free jazz nor free improvisation, the drummer's inaugural release for FPE presents an hour-long work that builds from near-silent beginnings into a turbulent colossus. Leading a new trio, Hooker's joined by trumpeter Mark Kirschenmann and bassist Joel Peterson on the date, a live set recorded in one take at Trinosphes in Detroit, Michigan on May 16, 2018. With the music credited to all three, Cycle of Restoration is very much a collective creation.
Though it plays like a single large-scale work, it's comprised of eight, distinctly titled parts, the indexing providing signposts for the trip's stages. The journey gets underway in “Unpolished Diamonds” with gong-like cymbals establishing a ground for explorative murmurs and bowed wails by the trumpeter and bassist, respectively. No one seems rushed here, all three committed to letting the material develop methodically. Kirschenmann's horn at certain moments sounds almost synth-like (I'm guessing it's effects-laden) whereas at others the familiar timbres of the instrument come through. As his partners engage in dialogue more suggestive of woodland creatures than humans, Hooker adds to the ambient hum with cymbal strikes and, after the second part, “Voluntary Realization,” begins, bass drum punctuations.
During the early stages, listening anticipation grows for the expansion one expects will arrive, which, in fact, happens when the ceremonial character of the second part gives way to “Bridge,” the escalation announced by aggressive contributions from Kirschenmann and Peterson and detonations by Hooker. With acoustic bass lines providing a regulated pulse, the trumpeter evokes the roar of a low-flying plane passing nearby, until “Magnets” sees Peterson returning to bowing and Hooker generating tom rolls and cymbal washes. Wails of a somewhat guitar- and synth-like type bring the movement to a tumultuous end, after which “Panchromatics 1” brings a scrabbly episode to the proceedings, the drummer on brushes and Kirschenmann unleashing wah-wah-styled fire, his wail, here and during the closing “Astral Debris,” calling Miles's electric attack to mind. By this stage any trace of the work's meditative origins have been left long behind, the three now engaged in freeform interplay and vocal yelps accenting the roar.
While Hooker has but one formal drum spotlight (in “Panchromatics 2”) on the recording, the argument could be made that he, like the others, solos throughout, even if the trio generally adheres to a script designating the route to be followed. I certainly can't claim to be familiar with his entire body of work, but I'd be willing to wager it contains little else quite like Cycle of Restoration.March 2019