Morte Plays – Postapo (2017)

Morte Plays

Marcin Łukasiewicz - guitar
Patryk Mott - saxophone
Marek Styk - bass
Marek Wesołowski - drums

Postapo

SOLITON 763



By Adam Baruch

This is the second album by young Polish Jazz quartet called Morte Plays, led by guitarist/composer Marcin Łukasiewicz with saxophonist Patryk Mott, bassist Marek Styk and drummer Marek Wesołowski. The album presents eight original compositions, all by Łukasiewicz.

The music is a pretty unique kind of Jazz-Rock Fusion with a nonchalant attitude close to Punk and somewhat similar to Polish Yass, which was popular on the local scene a few decades earlier. Apart from the element of improvisation the music could easily be considered as Rock, especially due to the harsh distorted guitar sound, the electric bass and the rhythm section's clear-cut Rocky attitude. The melodies are pretty basic as well, again sort of Punkish, but make perfect sense in this specific musical environment and present a coherent statement by the group, which obviously means to precisely make a statement of this kind.

Most Jazz purist will probably dismiss this music as being outside of the mainstream Jazz idiom, but that does not mean that this music has less to offer than most of the music made within mainstream Jazz. Personally I have quite enjoyed this album because it is different, raw and honest; definitely not trying to pretend to be something it is not. Such musical honesty is more important in my view than superb technical abilities that produce mundane music.

Since this music should have an appeal to both Jazz and Rock audiences, it will hopefully get the attention it deserves. Once the listener gets used to the harsh sound, the contents below the external layer is quite tempting. Definitely worth investigating!