Jazz uk
July/Aug 2006
Pinski Zoo
After Image

Regular attenders at London’s original Jazz Café in Stoke Newington in the late ‘80s will remember Pinski Zoo – a pioneering UK jazz-funk quartet that seemed to join Ornette Coleman’s Prime Time, Albert Ayler and soul-sax music, and whose cult influence was out of all proportion to the exposure it ever had.
This is a double-CD set of Zoo live recordings between 2002 and 2005 – with all those early associations still plain, and what sounds like slightly more of a late-Miles feel at times – except that Pinski Zoo preceded much of the mingling of contemporary styles that has now become commonplace. Two electric bassists give the bottom end fearsome clout, the grooving is rugged and relentless, and the themes embrace the spikily hook-based and the unexpectedly tender. The ‘80s Zoo anthem ‘Sweet Automatic’ isn’t there, the recording quality is variable, and maybe not all the improvising justifies the length it’s represented at – but a unique band in full flight, and happily determined to keep airborne.

(JF)