By Adam Baruch
This is the debut album by Polish trio called Polski Piach, which comprises of guitarist Patryk Zakrocki, clarinetist Piotr Mełech and percussionist Kuba Falk (a.k.a Kuba Falkowski). The album presents ten (assumably) original compositions, which remain uncredited on the album’s artwork.
On the album’s artwork we can find the following statement: "The Polish Sands project delves into the spiritual bonds which bind the sands of the Mississippi Delta, the Sahara Desert and the Wisła River", which roughly describes the music included on this album, which is mostly Blues influenced, which in turn is a spiritual ancestry of African origin, combined with Slavic melancholy and spiced with Jazz improvisation.
Zakrocki, who is primarily identified with playing violin on Improvised Music recordings, plays an alter ego role on this album, playing deeply melodic and completely docile acoustic guitar. Mełech, on the other hand, is less surprising, playing a beautifully sentimental bass clarinet parts, for which he is known (among other things). Falk who is completely out of nowhere, is rather less prominent here, but his mouth harp playing and percussion fit the bill perfectly.
It is rather difficult to describe the music precisely, which of course is not really necessary, but I really enjoyed the music immensely, for some strange reason. Although the basic Blues riffs are nothing out of the ordinary, the overall atmosphere and Mełech’s superb playing simply won me over, and the music managed to engage me more on a subconscious level than as an analytical attempt to get into it. The Blues is after all a universal music, as this music is trying to demonstrate, so after all I am not surprised. I am sure it also sounds great live.
Overall this Blues/Jazz-World Music exploration is a nice and original idea, which is a great fun to listen to, surely on the debut album; I am not sure if it has the stamina to last for more albums though. Definitely worth investigating!
