Brad Mehldau Jacob's Ladder 2LP

TAS Rated 4.5/5 Music, 4.5/5 Sonics in the July/August 2022 Issue of The Absolute Sound!

Jazzwise The 20 Best Jazz Albums of 2022 - Rated 19/20!

The album features new music that reflects on scripture and the search for God through music inspired by the prog-rock Mehldau loved as a young adolescent, which was his gateway to the fusion that eventually led to his discovery of jazz. Jacob's Ladder is made up of original compositions by Mehldau alongside interpolations and covers of songs by Rush, Gentle Giant and Yes. Featured musicians on the album include Mehldau's label mates Chris Thile and Cécile McLorin Salvant, as well as Mark Guiliana, Becca Stevens, Joel Frahm, and others.

Although Jacob's Ladder is one of the more idiosyncratic albums in Mehldau's discography, there's enough sophisticated and delicately rendered piano work here to appeal to his longtime fans.

'Maybe as His Skies Are Wide' sets the sonic table, its title borrowed from Rush's 1981 prog-rock gauntlet-crusher, 'Tom Sawyer.' Six tracks later, 'Tom Sawyer' gets its own full-on reading, with Mehldau and frequent collaborator vocalist/mandolinist Chris Thile tackling the song's structure template fairly reverentially before transmogrifying the original's gnarly guitar solo into a synth-laden, sax-charged, and mandolin-infused section. The three-part title track is an avant-jazz extrapolation of another acknowledged Rush classic. Meanwhile, 'Herr and Knecht' reinforces the tenet that fusion is alive and well in the 21st century - albeit located at the three-way intersection of Weather Report Lane, Amon Duul II Avenue, and King Crimson Court.

On Jacob's Ladder Mehldau gives you both something to think about as well as musically get your teeth into. Those are indeed rare qualities.