Music to panic by
Cooped up in our abodes, strategizing about how to acquire food and other necessities and uncertain about the pandemic’s course, we’re all experts in anxiety these days. El Cerrito trumpeter Ian Carey feels our pain, and he’s created an ideal soundtrack for these disquieting times.
His new album, “Fire in My Head: The Anxiety Suite” (Slow & Steady), was composed and recorded long before COVID-19 became a household name, but it’s about as tuned into the zeitgeist as an N95 face mask. Evoking anxiety itself isn’t hard. But Carey does something far more interesting: The five-movement suite unfolds like a stream-of-consciousness interior conversation, with recurring themes, counter themes, digressions and roiling rhythms that mimic a pulse driven by encroaching dread. But his extended forms and through-composed passages leave plenty of space for deep breathing.
“Even my intentionally anxious material can’t seem to help but to also reflect a sense of hope and a desire to create beauty and connection,” he writes in the liner notes (a professional graphic artist, Carey also created the album’s striking cover art). Joined by pianist Adam Shulman, drummer Jon Arkin, bassist Fred Randolph, reed expert Sheldon Brown on bass clarinet and alto saxophonist Kasey Knudsen, Carey surrounds himself with supremely accomplished collaborators who make it clear he’s not alone even as they bring his fevered vision to life.
Details: Due out April 24; $7 digital, $15 CD; order at iancarey.bandcamp.com.
— Andrew Gilbert, Correspondent
Ian Carey’s new album, “Fire in My Head,” unintentionally invokes the tension of our times.
SLOW& STEADY RECORDS
