The way to hear Reut Regev’s band is how I heard them at the Belgrade Jazz Festival in 2010: after midnight, in a smoky room where you couldn’t move for the writhing bodies. But this record captures most of R*time’s ass-kicking energy.
Trombonist Regev and her husband, drummer Igal Foni, are originally from Israel, but their snaky rhythms come from all over: the Middle East, South India, Brooklyn postbop, Haiti, head-banging heavy metal. R*time is colorful, wildly inventive and tight. Regev can snort and stomp (“Drama Maybe Drama”), summon the multitudes with long calls from the mountaintop (“Blue Llamas”) or deconstruct into noise (“Raw Way”). Her solos contain continuous disparate new ideas. What she never does is mellow out. Even her eulogy for her late mother-in-law, “Madeleine Forever,” is raucous. Throughout, the guitar of Jean-Paul Bourelly is delightfully edgy and nasty.
Reut Regev’s R*Time: Exploring the Vibe
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