HARAKKA BIALOIPOKKU (AKA B THE MAGPIE)

In 1974, multi-player Pekka Pohjola turned in a more carefully finished if somewhat less exuberant work than his stunning debut two years earlier, and it was a more than worthy follow-up. With only his soprano sax player remaining from 'Pihkasilma kaarnakorva' but a new and larger band of drums, brass and woodwinds, Pohjola crafted a logical progression from that landmark record and expanded on a musical promise he'd made. His piano and bass are unmistakably jazz-rooted but his material would be hard-fought as 'Jazz', retaining that unique Nordic perspective on the world's musics, able to rearrange it all in the most compelling way and give us a taste of what this whole 'progressive thing' could really sound like, could really be. Like a slightly mad composer, he saw the bigger picture and along with artists as Samla Mammas Manna, the Zeroes, Bo Hansson and Zappa, he wanted it to exist.

'Alku' opens on Pohjola's somber piano, ascending wholetones from long ago, emotional counter lines and some uplift too, becoming almost a folk lament. 'Ensimmainen Aamu' continues building on the established theme, another layer is applied, variations expounded upon, and soon we're so wrapped up in what's going on we've forgotten everything else. More structural additions, re-interpretations, derivatives, juts, eddys and currents that all eventually flow back to the same body of water. The blackness of 'Huono Saa/Se tanssii' with its tense strings that extend forever, sax players Eerno Koivistoinen, Pekka Poyry and Paroni Paakkunainen's soprano screams in the night, and Pohjola's pumping-heart piano. 'Ja nakee unta' is some lift after the dark clouds-- a fun but slightly twisted number wherein, like a Charles Ives piece, the sound of at least two marching bands passing each other can be heard. Killer get-up-and-dance jazzrock in 'Hereillakin uni jatkuu' full of vintage 1960s horn arrangements and thu-dunking clubhouse bass rhythms from Pekka. An appearence by guitarist Coste Apetrea and his tasty licks in 'Sekoilu seestyy', all wrapping with the nearly 8-minute closer, a celebratory reprise of the whole affair. Like a great idea you had, forgot, and now only exists as a long-grieved fantasy, Pekka Pohjola's second record was the product of the kind of times in music we rarely see.