Artist:     The Bad Plus

Album:     Never Stop II

Label:     Legbreaker Records

Release Date:     3.15.18

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BUY PHYSICAL

Laying to rest any concerns about upsetting band chemistry, new pianist Orrin Evans has assimilated the experimental, uniquely creative culture of The Bad Plus with ease. His deft inside-out runs, delicate touch, dazzling unpredictability and nuanced melodic sensibilities come to the fore on Never Stop II.

A long time coming, considering they’ve been around since the turn of the century, Never Stop II is the well-established instrumental trio’s debut album. The wait was worth it – even if the arty “Boffadem” is insufferably self-indulgent. Having already gained a reputation as a slick, fearless live act, with formidable chops and a tendency to push boundaries to their breaking points, The Bad Plus adds to their reputation as innovative, modern jazz explorers on Never Stop II, where the stylish, bruised beauty of “Salvages” and the equally wistful, deliberately rendered bonus tracks “Kerosene II” and “Seam” seem like crumbling shelter from the electrical storm of complete and utter mania that is “Lean in the Archway.”

Always sophisticated, calculated and clever, The Bad Plus revel in subverting expectations, as “Hurricane Birds” and “Trace” dart this way and that, making enigmatic puzzles of thoroughly inviting and elegantly designed compositions and throwing away the blueprints. The constantly shifting, industrious rhythm section of drummer Dave King and bassist Reid Anderson prowls and blusters, at once offering quiet support for Evans’ wandering travels and then threatening to blow them into oblivion with great flourishes. These are skilled technicians and imaginative collaborators touched by madness.

—Peter Lindblad