Emie R Roussel Trio – TERR

A rock mark dressed in muscular groove is imprinted on the title track that launches the album TERR. Contemporary jazz, organised in a succinct program that maintains this kind of energy and expressive tactics. The rhythmic “riffs” are simple, the melodies direct, all while serving as support for a solid improvisational know-how. The pianist Emie R Roussel generally adds her economical reflections to the symbiotic discourse of her two friends, Nicolas Bédard on electric bass and Dominic Cloutier on drums.

But, through these sessions drawn from a certain pop/rock aesthetic (TERR), it is above all an expansive emotional and suggestive backdrop of spaces that are both visual and psychological, panoramic and intimate, that Roussel manages to paint (Trois lunes). Her constructions sometimes take on cinematic turns (L’écho des brumes), Hancock-esque (John rêve en noir et blanc), funky tinged with tempestuous Rachmaninov-like bursts (Sous une odeur d’ozone), nostalgic (Glow of Forgotten Leaves), and something like indie-fusion (Klara Färdiga Gå, which means “On your marks, get set, go!”). And this without ever abandoning the very contemporary pulse.

A skilful album that is also very addictive.