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I remember when fusion was all the rage in the late 1970s. I was
a young budding keyboard player and saxophonist, and I liked a lot
of the hip new sounds that were emerging, incorporating jazz with
some of the rock and funk grooves that were popular at the time.
Many of my teachers, though, were clearly disdainful of the newer
music, telling me outright that it was "commercial" and
"not jazz". I recognized then, as I do now, that such
music lacked the harmonic and textural complexities of bebop and
post-bop jazz, but that certainly didn't render it worthless from
a musical standpoint, nor did it mean that it was completely outside
the historical lineage of jazz.
Greg Kurstin clearly feels the same way I did/do about these things.
He is obviously more concerned with playing music than with labels,
and that is a very good thing. Greg's education was definitely rooted
in the jazz tradition--he studied with Jaki Byard, pianist for Charles
Mingus, at the New School in New York City and at Cal Arts. "Jaki
Byard was the whole reason I went to the New School", says
Kurstin. "In high school, I was a big Charles Mingus fan, and
Byard, who worked with Mingus, was one of my favorite pianists.
I wanted to learn from him, so I tracked him down in New York."
Since then, Kurstin has worked, both onstage and in the recording
studio, with top-notch jazz musicians such as Chalres McPherson,
the late Billy Higgins, Terry Gibbs, and Charles McPherson. All
About Jazz's Craig Jolley said, in review of a recent McPherson
gig, "Turning Kirstin loose on a blues is like giving dynamite
to the Unibomber."
But Greg  has
another life as well, that of pop/alt-rock studio musician. He's
played with the Red Hot Chili Peppers on their most recent album,
Californication, worked with Matthew Sweet and Sheryl Crow,
and led his own acclaimed band, Geggy Tah. In addition, he's cut
a cool album with his wife, Pamelia, who is a master of the theramin.
It's his contacts from the alt-rock world that he's called on to
help him with his project Action Figure Party, which has
been released on Verve subsidiary Blue Thumb Records. The guest
list at this party includes Flea, bassist with the Red Hot Chili
Peppers, Sean Lennon (turntables), drummer Jose Pasillas of Incubus,
and vocalist Miho Hatori of the group Cibo Matto. In addition, he's
gotten contributions from Garbage basssist Daniel Shulman, Dr. Dre/Eminem
associate Mike Elizondo, Gary Novak, who has worked with Chick Corea
and Alanis Morrissette, and John Molo from Phil Lesh and Friends.
Says Kurstin: "For many of these musician, it was an ideal
opportunity to show their creative versatility and passion for improvisation."
"The guys on this album love jazz and are great improvisers,
but their audiences don't necessarily know that side of them. We
got to collectively explore, and, in some way, we all stretched
beyond what we might normally do", Greg continues. Along with
his colleagues, he creates a powerful brew of soul, jazz, rock,
and funk. Though the grooves are relatively simple and straightforward,
the music is layered, creating a really great listening experience
that is textured and doesn't "talk down" to its listener.
Take the opening track "Everybody Ready". Using a sample
of jazz organist Charles Earland's voice to introduce the track,
it quickly settles into a Crusaders-style groove using a horn section
comprised of sax and trombone as well as Kurstin's work on Wurlitzer
& Fender Rhodes electric pianos and a Moog. There's a nice overdriven
guitar solo by guitarist Yogi of the band Buckcherry as well. The
whole thing recalls the heyday of the funk-rock-soul-jazz groove.
Kurstin does the vocal on the title track, a clever tale of a bunch
of kid's action figures having a no-hold-barred party. In fact,
Gret does everythin on this track except the bass, which is handled
by Daniel Shulman. This and "Clock Radio", the album's
other vocal number, probably are closer to the group's alt-rock
roots than to any particular jazz groove, but they do fit nicely
into the overall mix of tunes.
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