Nothing Remains Unchanged

Nothing Remains Unchanged is Ross McHenrys fourth leader date for First World Records. Previous to his solo outings, McHenrys electric bass was celebrated as the rhythm engine in the jazz-funk outfit the Transatlantics, and later as a member of Aussie Afrobeat ensemble the Shaolin Afronauts. Since he started releasing jazz recordings with 2013s Distant Oceans, McHenry has won over Australian and New Zealand audiences sure, but also New York jazz musicians. Distant Oceans and 2015s Child of Somebody showcased a plethora of experimental ideas firmly rooted in the modernist jazz tradition, thanks in no small part to the high-caliber players in the bassists septet: Mark de Clive-Lowe, Corey King, Marcus Strickland, and Myele Manzanza among them. For 2017s The Outsiders, he pared down the lineup to a trio, with Australian-born, New York-based pianist Matthew Sheens and drummer Manzanza. More formalist in conception and compositions, this outfit revealed the depth of emotion in McHenrys tunes, even as they were voiced in post-bop and post-classical music, placing notions of movement and sonance at the forefront. Nothing Remains Unchanged was recorded in New York with Sheens, drummer Eric Harland, and saxophonist Ben Wendel. Written at the Leighton Artist Colony at the Banff Centre for Creativity in the spring of 2018, the album was strongly influenced by the majesty of the setting. The environs provided McHenry the solitude and space for reflection on the present and the past. As such, the nine compositions here meditate on the tension that exists between our turbulent, panicked present, and the innocence of the past. The band waste no time; they sprint out of the gate on Complicated Us, with knotty modal chords from Sheens, rumbling ostinatos from McHenry, Harlands double-time improvisation, and Wendels rowdy, soulful blowing. The tunes driving force situates it at once in the bedrock of 21st century post-bop while looking in the rearview at the progressive jazz of the 60s a la the Clarke Boland Sextet, Basso-Valdambrini Quartet, and Keith Jarretts and Jan Garbareks early ECM albums. Adelaide is at once majestic and knotty with a compelling earworm of a melody and canny interplay between Sheens and McHenry during the middle eight. Forest Dance is another. It commences as an expressionistic ballad with Wendel and Sheens claiming alternate parts of the frontline and moves afield with lithe swing, meaty soloing from Wendel, and bright, driving breaks and fills from Harland. It recalls the music on Pat Methenys 80/81 with Michael Brecker. While Processional begins somberly, it gradually sprawls into cathartic avant-jazz. This I Give to You begins as a ghostly lounge ballad, with bluesy playing from Wendel, who moves through and around the melody as Sheens accents the changes. During its ten minutes, it hushes itself into a whisper before unexpectedly adding rockist piano chords and bass vamps, as the tune expands, then explodes, in a swirl of flamenco-inspired modal jazz around Wendels careening solo, as McHenry and Harland play around him in support. The set closes with funky, souled-out, pastoral gospel tune Highway Morning that sounds like nothing else on the set. Nothing Remains Unchanged is, thus far at least, McHenrys magnum opus; its a fully realized conception of jazz that approaches the sublime with equanimity and aplomb. ~ Thom Jurek