I was very lucky to attend this show in person; I hadn't any version of the group before, so JMP's empathetic genre-crossing jazz fusion was a joyful surprise! I can't offer comparisons between JMP shows, so here's my general impression/intro: Masefield's singular jacked-in mandolin provides a startling variety of thick upper-atmosphere electro-textures, new guy 'Mad Dog' Mavridoglou alternately surrounds the rhythm churn with tasty keyboard effects and rips off trumpet solos and dialogues with Masefield, and Fishman is, well, the best rock drummer of his generation totally in his freewheeling element, that familiar smile beaming out every time he returns from the outer regions. In THE PHISH BOOK(?) he commented that he doesn't enjoy playing rock drum solos, but will throw down in a jazz context; with JMP he proves it, breaking up the time and pushing the other players left and right. His reputation as a wild man is a fascinating contrast with his precisely controlled drumming in Phish, so I loved seeing him cut loose with JMP. The biggest surprise of the night for me (as I didn't know his résumé) was Danton Boller on upright bass, who grounded the heady stuff with a huge bottom end then got into upper-register knifework whenever space opened up, 100% locked in with Fishman; the bass/drums hookup was the highlight of the show for me.

I walked out of the Paradise floating on air. If the phrase 'gorp jazz' weren't intolerable, I'd use it here, and would say JMP is exactly what I want from the groovy-weirdo region of the new-music spectrum -- it took some restraint on my part to not track down Brooklyn Bowl tickets on the cab ride home. Let's hope we don't have to wait as long for the next reunion. They're a really good band, YA DAMN RIGHT.