Largo

Brad Mehldau | Format: Audio CD

Product Details

• Audio CD (September 20, 2011)
• Number of Discs: 1
• Label: Nonesuch
• ASIN: B000068WXL
• In-Print Editions: MP3 Music
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (45 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #49,475 in Music (See Top 100 in Music)

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com

Having essayed "the art of the trio" on several albums boasting that same tag, pianist Brad Mehldau opens up his style here to embrace horns and strings, electronics and robo-beats. Produced by popmeister Jon Brion (Aimee Mann, Fiona Apple), whom he hooked up with at the Largo nightclub in Los Angeles, Largo the CD is thick with atmosphere: titles such as "When It Rains" shouldn't be taken lightly. But its studied romanticism, while cutting back on the pianistic posturing that has turned off some jazz critics on Mehldau (while intensifying the devotion of others), is ultimately thin in substance. At its best, as on the freewheeling "Paranoid Android," the music attains a kind of hermetic intensity. At other times, it recalls the acoustic experimentation of Medeski Martin & Wood with its decorative grooves and empty claims on free expression. Cocktail music is but a few degrees of banality away, which, depending on your taste, is either reason to stay away or reason to make Mehldau even more of a hot property. --Lloyd Sachs

Product Description

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Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 25 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars The way ahead March 11, 2003

By Jan P. Dennis VINE™ VOICE

Format:Audio CD

When an artist as young, accomplished, and highly regarded as Brad Mehldau strikes out on a new path, he's bound to be criticized. And he's gotten his fair share of dissing on this site and elswhere.

Let's get a few things straight. First, Mehldau has lost none of his pianistic brilliance. If you think so, give a listen his outro solo on "Dropjes." Secondly, he most certainly does know how to inject his unique pianism into Jon Brion's soundscapes. Check out how integrated and wonderful-sounding his piano is on "Paranoid Android," which showcases everything that's great about this record--the seemless integration of jazz and pop elements, the extraordinarily clear piano sound, the discrete use of electronics, the perfect translation of a pop sensibility into an authentic jazz setting. Third, there's noting wrong with Melhdau's vibes playing. It's a little naive and ideosyncratic, but so what?

Mehldau has always been a master of moods. Nothing has changed here; what he's done, in my view, is just brilliantly expand his musical/emotional palette. This, quite naturally, doesn't sit well with everyone. Tough luck.

If you're down with Dave Douglas' Freak In, The Bad Plus, Happy Apple, Chris Destrin, etc., you'll dig it. Otherwise, probably not.

14 of 15 people found the following review helpful

5.0 out of 5 stars Song: Alvarado March 16, 2005

By Luciano Pedota

Format:Audio CD

I am very surprised none of the reviewers below mentioned anything about the song "Alvarado"; it is so well accomplished that I found it equal to the performances of great pianist such as Gonzalo Rubalcaba, Keith Jarret and Danilo Perez. Also, be carefull when judging sounds that our ears are not YET used to hearing. How many CD's have taken a few rounds of listening before getting to love them? If you are a true music lover, who is always seeking for new and different music, I know the answer is"many".Is "Largo" one of those CD's that require several listenings due to its innovations? Listen to "Alvarado" and find your own answer.

20 of 23 people found the following review helpful

3.0 out of 5 stars Our boy's left home . . . August 15, 2002

By A Customer

Format:Audio CD

Several months ago, I saw the Brad Mehldau Trio perform at Chicago's Old Town School of Folk Music. The music was as wonderful as it was familiar. He covered Radiohead's
"Everything in Its Right Place," (how my favorite jazz trio started covering this band I'll never know but will always be thankful for) and he dazzled us with a new composition, "Boomer." I was wowed and I left thinking that Mehldau's jazz trio system would perpetually expand and innovate. I was unprepared for it to halt in its tracks, at least for now.

With "Largo," we now have to be specific about which Brad Mehldau we're talking about. If subsequent albums follow suit, you may now have to qualify whether you like "all of Mehldau" or "back when he played straight jazz." This isn't Herbie Hancock's "Rock It," by any stretch, but it heralds a sea change in the direction of Mehldau's music. Fans may have to tread carefully over the selections here.

The first song, "When it Rains" magically evokes a sorrowful warmness that turns a listener inward. The piano is unmistakably Mehldau, but there's a background buzz and a snare drum you can't place. It introduces a new direction by playing just enough of what you know from Mehldau to follow along. It's hello and goodbye. Following compositions hasten the pace of the transition. So, when you reach "Sabbath," led by a buzzsaw electric guitar reined-in just enough to co-exist with Mehldau's sound, you may decide there's not enough remaining of what you loved about his music to follow down this fork in the road.

It's unfair for me to want to keep Mehldau boxed-in for fear that he'll drift into the fusion/lounge catalog never to return. There's no mistaking that "Largo" is consistent with the quality of work we expect from Brad Mehldau. But the sound is too far gone for me. I hope that there's enough in the jazz trio work he finds sustaining so that he'll come back....