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- The Guardian,
- Friday July 26 2002
American alto saxophonist Greg Osby tends to prefer the long-lined, dynamically narrow shapes that younger funk-influenced developers of the bebop tradition deploy. But he loves Charlie Parker, Ornette Coleman and Thelonious Monk, and wants more than anything for their radical attitudes to music-making to survive. "This is a player's record," Osby says of Inner Circle, and he's right. The support is the saxophonist's regular group, a piano trio led by the brilliant Jason Moran, but it also features Stefon Harris on vibraphone - an addition that works well in its glowing purity with the leader's arching, soulful sound.
Rhythmic tautness is also brought to the band by the presence of Eric Harland on drums, a musician who recently proved, with McCoy Tyner in London, that he's a coming giant. The music sometimes suggests hard bop fitfully heard through an opening and closing door, like the bursting phrases of the track Entruption. Stride Logic is also boppish in its phrasing, though against twisted harmonies. The band occasionally hints at the 1960s jazz/contemporary classical experiments of the Third Stream movement. A fascinating set, often surprisingly mellow - and Osby's sound on slow sections is wonderful.
