Mark Kelso
  • About
    • Biography
    • Resumé
    • Philosophy
    • Influences
    • Quotes
  • Gigs
  • Recordings
    • The Dragon’s Tail
    • The Chronicles of Fezziwig
    • Elementals
    • Stealing from My Youth
    • Musician First, Drummer Second
    • Lost Kingdoms
    • Full Discography
  • The Jazz Exiles
    • About The Jazz Exiles
    • EPK
    • Recordings
      • The Dragon’s Tail
      • Elementals
      • Stealing from My Youth
    • Reviews – Elementals
    • Reviews – Stealing From My Youth
  • Gallery
    • Photos
    • Videos
  • Store
    • The Dragon’s Tail – WAV
    • The Dragon’s Tail – MP3
    • The Chronicles of Fezziwig MP3s & CD
    • Elementals MP3s & CD
    • Stealing from My Youth MP3s
    • Musician First, Drummer Second Digital Download
    • Teachers & Drum Students – Play Alongs
  • Contact
  • Menu Menu

Reviews – Stealing From My Youth

JazzdaGama Review

Mark Kelso and the Jazz Exiles: Stealing From My Youth
By Raul da Gama – Dec 7, 2015

A fierce energy leaps out of the speakers in the opening bars of Anti-Arktos (Bears, or a Centaur in Greek) – it’s an immensely and viscerally exciting start to a recording that has you on the edge of your seat. Primary colours and textures abound in funky-shaped performances guided by the rolling thunder of Mark Kelso’s drums. All of this keeps the music in tight rein albeit the letting go of keyboard, alto saxophone, guitar and bass to gambol and improvise as if interminably. Mark Kelso’s rhythms and phrasing are precise and alert and if the band is tight in a sophisticated sort of way it’s exactly because of this. Having heard the jazz grooves of Mark Kelso, this is refreshingly different as he pays homage to the halcyon days in Stealing From My Youth, a trippy album of astounding vitality and winning resonance.

I have always believed that Mark Kelso can play in any idiom and anyone who has heard the drummer with Hilario Duran will testify to the fact that he plays in clave with the tempest of vivacity, as if he were an Afro-Cuban. I cannot think of anyone else who can play like Mark Kelso today – except perhaps Peter Erskine, who played on some of the fine Weather Report albums. Mark Kelso has the power of a Titan and yet he can caress the skins and cymbals as if he were making love to a woman when the music demands. Tale a listen to For Where You Are Now and you will hear what I mean. On this track he captures the transcendent imagery of a ballad. Elsewhere he is a force of nature, his elemental thunder and lightning of a world of rhythms unfolds. The drummer can play some of the most complex time signatures you will ever hope to hear by a drummer on either side of the border. So successfully does he do it on this disc that you will be left breathless.

This is an excellent album and feels like an elegant railway system linking rock and other rigorous musical metaphors with the freedom and rollicking splendour of jazz in the most formulated as well as its freest forms. But to describe as such might give the impression of overcooking when in fact the whole project is a masterpiece of subtlety. Mr Kelso and his Jazz Exiles take on the lineage of hot and picante music sees him summoning all that is primordial about a percussion-led ensemble. In bassist Rich Brown he has found an able doppelgänger who can mirror his burgeoning rhythms with two-handed party time thrills and spills. The bassist is not the only key to the success of this outfit. Saxophonist Luis Deniz, the phenomenal pianist Robi Botos and the brazen and monstrously talented guitarist Joey Martel also contribute immensely to the surging vigour of this disc.

There is nothing benign or cool about this album. It is a hipness alert sent out to the cognoscenti that Mark Kelso and his band of merry men play their hearts out from one sunburst of a song to another. The musicians weave their harmonics like the molecules in the Double Helix in a rich and not entirely predictable foundation to the music. The surprises, when they come, are effective but discreet; a gamelan-like riff in Like A Finger Pointing To The Moon is played with pizzicato harmonics, and a delicate curlicue of a bass line underpins what sounds like the keening of a poet in a Celtic lament in the playing of Luis Deniz as he plays the solo on The Forbidden City, while throughout, close-knit passages develop from beautiful single phrases. The recorded sound balances detail and warmth. This one’s a keeper on a vaunted shelf.
View original article.

Special thanks to FACTOR for their support.

We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts.

Industry Related

  • Drum Magazine
  • Drumset Connect
  • Evans Drum Heads
  • Headhunters drum sticks
  • Modern Drummer
  • Paiste Cymbals
  • Plunge Audio In ear Monitors
  • Yamaha

Endorsements

  • Evans Drum Heads
  • Headhunters drum sticks
  • Paiste Cymbals
  • Plunge Audio In ear Monitors
  • Yamaha

The Jazz Exiles

Follow Mark Kelso

  • Facebook - Mark Kelso
  • Facebook - Jazz Exiles
  • Instagram
  • Email

Upcoming Gigs

Bill King Trio

Date: March 24, 2023
Time: 7:30 am - 9:30 am
Location: 173 Bruce St S, Thornbury, ON N0H 2P0

Thornbury Jazzworks ‘Jazz At The Library’ concert at the L.E. Shore Library.

Mark Kelso & the Jazz Exiles

Start date: March 29, 2023
End date: April 1, 2023
Time: 8:30 am - 11:00 am
Location: 194 Queen St W, Toronto, ON M5V 1Z1

Live at the REX

W/Rich Brown, Luis Deniz, Elmer Ferrer & Jeremy Ledbetter.

View All
© Copyright 2002 -2022 Mark Kelso - Site by lucie
  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Home
  • Privacy Policy
  • Contact
Scroll to top

This site uses cookies. By continuing to browse the site, you are agreeing to our use of cookies.

OK

Cookie and Privacy Settings



How we use cookies

We may request cookies to be set on your device. We use cookies to let us know when you visit our websites, how you interact with us, to enrich your user experience, and to customize your relationship with our website.

Click on the different category headings to find out more. You can also change some of your preferences. Note that blocking some types of cookies may impact your experience on our websites and the services we are able to offer.

Essential Website Cookies

These cookies are strictly necessary to provide you with services available through our website and to use some of its features.

Because these cookies are strictly necessary to deliver the website, refusing them will have impact how our site functions. You always can block or delete cookies by changing your browser settings and force blocking all cookies on this website. But this will always prompt you to accept/refuse cookies when revisiting our site.

We fully respect if you want to refuse cookies but to avoid asking you again and again kindly allow us to store a cookie for that. You are free to opt out any time or opt in for other cookies to get a better experience. If you refuse cookies we will remove all set cookies in our domain.

We provide you with a list of stored cookies on your computer in our domain so you can check what we stored. Due to security reasons we are not able to show or modify cookies from other domains. You can check these in your browser security settings.

Other external services

We also use different external services like Google Webfonts, Google Maps, and external Video providers. Since these providers may collect personal data like your IP address we allow you to block them here. Please be aware that this might heavily reduce the functionality and appearance of our site. Changes will take effect once you reload the page.

Google Webfont Settings:

Google Map Settings:

Google reCaptcha Settings:

Vimeo and Youtube video embeds:

Privacy Policy

You can read about our cookies and privacy settings in detail on our Privacy Policy Page.

Privacy Policy
Accept settingsHide notification only