Ian Patterson reviews The Sweetness of Things Half Remembered. ‘Karlen’s music is both cerebral and emotive. It’s music that’s difficult to box and therein lies a great part of its undoubted appeal.’
Author: Ian Patterson
Ian Patterson is A Senior Contributor at the multiple award-winning webzine All About Jazz, for whom he has written over 500 articles. For five years Ian worked as a social/environmental researcher in Laos. Currently based in Ireland, Ian covers the arts for various papers and magazines. His writing has been published in national newspapers, travel magazines and guides, academic journals, CD liner notes, tour and festival programs and specialist arts magazines. He is coping hopelessly with an addiction to live music.
If there’s one complaint is that the forty plus minutes seem a little short – a sure sign that this duo is pushing all the right buttons.
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There’s perhaps more of Sheens the Downbeat poll-winning pianist this time out but significantly Untranslatable ups the ante compositionally, with the Yanni Burton String Quartet leaving an indelible stamp on a third of the tracks.
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Inevitably, the different currents converge and the trio voice flows freely. Unrelenting cymbal and bass bomb patterns, sawing arco and swirling piano create a heady maelstrom, with Abrahams alternating sharply between staccato patterns fashioned by two and then ten fingers.
