Eric Alexander
Don’t Follow The Crowd
High Note Records
www.jazzdepot.com
By George W. Harris

Tenor saxist Eric Alexander has come LA only a couple of times, and
I’ve regrettable missed each opportunity. I was either sick, or out of
town myself. He’s one of the few younger sax men I really want to see
in concert, as his tone on record is so powerful that I need to see if
it’s that potent in a jazz club setting. Here, again, with his latest
release, his sound is simply the best that’s out there right now; big,
macho, full of high octane power, and he can milk it for all its worth
on a ballad like “Don’t Misunderstand” or can use it like a steam
engine locomotive on the charging “Nomor Senterbrass.” His long time
yoke carrier Harold Mabern/p as well as Nat Reeves/b and Joe
Farnsworth/dr have the nimbleness of a hurdle relay team on the swift
“Footsteps” as well as the unfolding theme from “Charade,” but the draw
here is really that San Francisco fog of a sound emanating from
Alexander’s bell.