2020 was a year like no other.
Plans were in place to record a follow up album to ‘The New Sound’ towards the end of the year.
Even before the COVID-19 lockdown a number of the works had been written but it was expected these songs would be finessed and polished through numerous gigs and rehearsals. What eventuated in Melbourne was no gigs for eight months.
I used this time to complete the writing of the album and meticulously go through each tune and its form knowing that this album would have to be recorded with the songs not having been performed at gigs. This meant that the ‘flow’, grooves, melodies and forms had to be flawless before the band entered a rehearsal studio.
I am fanatical when it comes to practicing the trumpet but lockdown now allowed for practice without gigs or rehearsals interrupting that process. I could push beyond the boundaries knowing I wasn’t required to perform the following day. The fruits of that practice has certainly made it onto this album.
‘The Chunky Biscuit’ is funky and soulful. It has heart and sophistication and there is a party-like flavour for much of the album.
‘Song For Those Needing Peace’ is the first ballad The Daimon Brunton Quintet has recorded since the title track of their very first album released in 2002, ‘Never Again Such Beauty’. It is a haunting and lonely song that breaks to a place of happiness and peace in the middle.
The title track, ‘The Chunky Biscuit’, largely encapsulates what The Daimon Brunton Quintet has striving towards for many years. Technically challenging, hypnotically funky and deeply soulful and sophisticated. This tune starts as a jazz/fusion call to arms and ends as a latin-flavoured, psycholdelic Bach chorale.
This music is eternally fresh, surprising and engaging. This isn’t background music. It asks for your full attention and in return, lifts the soul.
What you are listening to is the consequence of unrelenting work and dreaming.
We dearly hope you enjoy it.