Benevento-Russo Duo Best Reason To Buy The Sun CD

Live Recording

Benevento/Russo Duo: Marco Benevento (organ); Joe Russo (drums).
Audio Mixers: Joey Waronker; John Paterno; Danny Blume.
Recording information: Sound Factory, Los Angeles, CA.
Illustrators: Thomas Schmid; Adrian Cunningham.
A couple of guys on the neo-jazz scene who have been building massive followings have finally put out an album with Best Reason to Buy the Sun. It's a Wall of Sound approach, with organ, bass, drums, and samples pounding out simultaneously. At times slick and funky, at times domineering and forceful, the album moves around the duo's influences, foremost of which would appear to be the city of New York. The sound is busy, frenetic. Program music displays the life of the city, the movement through crowded streets, subway window etchings. The components of the pieces are relatively simple in general: basic basslines, repeating hooks. The fusion of the components, though, is where the magic happens, with grandiose organ buildups and wild saxophone cameos. This most certainly isn't your father's jazz, but they've certainly listened to your father's jazz, and digested it before ceremoniously thrashing the old records. ~ Adam GreenbergMojo (Publisher) (p.96) - 3 stars out of 5 - "[They] whip up an impressive racket....When the pummeling riffs threaten to overwhelm, Benevento lightens the mood with some sharp acoustic piano."