Heaven on Earth (James Carter album)

Reception

The Allmusic review by Matt Collar says "More than just a live date, Heaven on Earth is a knotty, adventurous document that allows for as much group interplay as it does for spotlighting Carter's long-recognized virtuosity". JazzTimes critics rated the album 19th in their top 50 new releases of 2009. On All About Jazz George Kanzler noted "With the quintet on Heaven on Earth, putative leader James Carter (here playing mainly tenor sax, but also some baritone and soprano) pays homage to, while smartly updating the tradition of, populist jazz of the mid-20th century that once flourished in urban clubs and at JATP concerts. Sometimes hyphenated as soul-jazz, jazz-blues or funk-jazz, it embraced the groove and spirit of the black popular music of the day with in-your-face exuberance. Carter, whose lip-smacking, guttural vibrato recalls the honking saxists of early R'n'B, plays with a swashbuckling swagger that would have made PT Barnum proud". PopMatters critic Will Layman observed "By mixing expertise with a healthy appetite for the avant-garde, Carter and his crew avoid The Problem of Too Much Precision. The saxophone playing is matched, tonally, by Medeski’s free-wheeling approach to the organ drawbars. So the whole band has a Jackson Pollack vibe, flinging color this way and that. And because the songs on Heaven on Earth are blues-drenched, the whole proceeding is grounded rather than precious".

Track listing

1. "Diminishing" (Django Reinhardt) - 14:14
2. "Slam's Mishap" (Lucky Thompson) - 8:35
3. "Street of Dreams" (Victor Young, Sam M. Lewis) - 9:25
4. "Infiniment" (Traditional) - 10:39
5. "Blue Leo" (Leo Parker, Ike Quebec) - 12:19
6. "Heaven on Earth" (Larry Young) - 11:34

Personnel