Little Big — Aaron Parks, left,  David “DJ” Ginyard, Greg Tuohey, and Tommy Crane. 

Significant autumn album highlight in prospect — and not only for fans of Aaron Parks who will be more than pleasantly surprised.

Little Big sound like a band. 

Dreamier than Chick Corea's Vigil band and less overtly jazz-rock but equally subtle if you think of jazz-rock only in terms of the 1970s, Little Big might puzzle because they owe something to the innovations kindled then.

Characterised quite thrillingly in context by the left handed bass guitarist David “DJ” Ginyard, who owes something to Stanley Clarke and even more to Matt Garrison — he is as much melodic presence as beat personified as too are Clarke and Garrison.

As for Parks he has toured widely with Terence Blanchard (Ginyard is also a more recent Blanchardian in the E Collective and on Live), has been on Blue Note recording as a leader, and made a magnificent solo piano album for ECM, for this project settling more for a keyboardist direction, the electric keyboards an extension of the piano like a very large canvas sat on easels or “baby” grand as stage kit stands. His ideas are really fresh and new.

Little Big played London club dates at the Vortex earlier in the year and the record marks their first outing as a band, the name is inspired by a 1980s John Crowley fantasy novel.

Guitarist Greg Tuohey is to me a Nir Felder-like presence, his secret sauce a carefully asymmetrical emotional Celtic rock fusion flavour, matched sometimes by Parks on keys, triplets pirouetting all over the place on the mini-Moog type atmospheric ornamentation in tiny places, and that suits well. I became a fan of drummer Tommy Crane hearing him live playing in Logan Richardson’s fine Shift band but have not heard of him since either live or on record and this extra exposure is sure to bring his Brian Blade (ballpark) approach to the attention of more jazz fans globally in time if this view is at all typical. SG.
An October release. On Ropeadope Select.