ARQ/Alison Rayner Quintet - A Magic Life

The Guardian 60

(Blow the Fuse)

British bassist and composer Alison Rayner’s 2014 debut album, August, was an expected reminder of her warmth and alertness as an ensemble player, but also the unexpected emergence of a vivid new compositional voice. A Magic Life retains the same fine band (Diane McLoughlin on saxophones, Deirdre Cartwright on guitar, Steve Lodder on keys and Buster Birch on drums), and a similarly open and accessible mix of jazz, folk and classical ingredients. Celtic, eastern European, jazz-funk and swing rhythms variously drive the music, with a spirited folk dance shared by soprano saxophone and guitar immediately spurring Lodder’s fluid eloquence and a snaking sax break on the opening title track, Cartwright bursting into rockish guitar distort on the funky, handclapping Mayday, McLoughlin smoky on tenor in the lilting ballad New Day, and exhibiting a gracefully languid old-school swing on the instrument in the emphatic, riffy OK Chorale. A Magic Life may be stylistically diverse, but Rayner’s themes are united by the inviting impression that many could have been written to be sung.