The "organ trio" - jazz shorthand for a guitar, Hammond organ and drums combo - was once felt to have peaked due to the Hammond being superseded by more readily transportable keyboards.
Players such as Phil Robson, however, are pointing the way forward, and this fourth album from one of the current scene's finest guitarists, while capable of revelling in the soulful glories of the format's more conventional approaches, is packed with fresh statements as well as presenting a deeply satisfying variety of moods. All bar one of the tunes are Robson's, the exception being a tough, hard-edged groove through Dave Liebman's Dimi And The Blue Men, but while his "voice" is strong as it ranges from warm, personal ballad phrasing to urgent excitement, this is very much a three-way conversation with the equally resourceful Ross Stanley on Hammond, and the ball of superbly honed energy that is drummer Gene Calderazzo. By turns funky, atmospheric and angular, it's consistently direct music that doesn't waste a note.
Rob Adams
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