Carl Michel Group +

"Listening to the new CD release, The Carl Michel Group (+), is a jazz listener's delight! This collection of original songs by Carl Michel highlights excellent solo work and a lively contemporary jazz feeling. 9 songs including "Les Can," "Skippin," "Jitterbug," "Cold Pizza," "Song for Tomorrow," "Forbidden Fruit," "You Probably Will," "C.T." and "N.O. Blues" make this one of the entertaining jazz CD's to come out so far this year! Carl Michel is master of the guitar, and it is very evident in his melodic work throughout this collection.

Gerald Cleaver lays down some excellent drum passages on every selection as does Tim Flood on his bass! Mike Graye on alto saxophone and Andrew Bishop on tenor saxophone and clarinet provide nice solo work as does Paul Finkbeiner on trumpet and flugelhorn and Chris Smith on trombone. Ellen Rowe gives added spice and style to the songs with her flawless piano performances. Rowe's solo work in this collection is both entertaining and exciting.

A CD collection which constantly surprises and delights. The Carl Michel Group (+) is something every jazz listener will want in her or his collection as an example of contemporary jazz at its finest with excellent solo performances. A wonderfully jazzy collection sure to please! Excellent!"   Lee Prosser, jazzreview.com


"An album that starts out giving up the funk a la John Scofield (with a faint hint of the "Tonight Show " band) quickly turns into one hell of an inventive surprise. Ann Arbor-based guitarist Carl Michel, whose last release (1998) was a relaxed, bluesy set with a pianoless quartet (featuring excellent work from alto saxophonist Mike Graye and the priceless rhythm duo of Tim Flood, bass and Gerald Cleaver, drums), delivers nine ideas for jazz octet that'll have fans reaching for comparisons with the Gil Evans and Charles Mingus bands.

Among the many strengths and pleasures on this disc are Michel's compositions (and arrangements thereof) which open things up wonderfully for the soloists. Totally justifying the freedoms they've been granted, Graye on alto, Andrew Bishop on tenor sax and clarinet, Paul Finkbeiner on trumpet and flugelhorn, and Chris Smith on trombone (also Michel on guitar and Ellen Rowe on piano) rise to every occasion with the kind of confidence usually associated with the big time. All the great orchestras of jazz history, from Ellington's and Basie's to Gillespie's and Monk's, relied on soloist power when it came to realizing a vision.

Michel often starts out with really gorgeous melodic material (hear "Jitterbug," with its Mingusesque "Pussy Cat Dues"- like clarinet-or "Forbidden Fruit" recalling the Carla Bley-Charlie Haden Liberation Music Orchestra-or "You Probably Will" with its moody Gil Evansish suspensions), but each tune's success ultimately depends on some boss inventiveness from everybody concerned. It's this sense of heavy responsibility fulfilled that makes Michel's new project such a joy.

One of the more intriguing approaches to soloing in evidence here is collective improvising (more that one soloist playing at the same time), an idea associated with traditional New Orleans jazz and which took on major importance in the work of Mingus' forward-thinking groups of the '50s and the 60's, Ornette Coleman's quartet and some of John Coltrane's wilder adventures. But Michel's use of it, rather than giving his music an "avant" sound of interaction, creates a timeless space of interaction, a realm if relaxed joyfulness where King Oliver clinks glasses with Gil Evans"   George Tysh, MetroTimes, Detroit


"Carl's playing, like his writing, can best be described as mainstream with an edge. However, it is never a harsh edge. His sound never grates, and his ideas never cause a flinch. The edge is in the unexpected directions he takes that nevertheless grow out of what proceeded, in a quirky, often whimsical way. His playing often raises a sly smile, and his compositions, even when sometimes angular, are catchy and singable.

Carl seems to prefer short structures in his compositions, but they are not necessarily simple. "Big Daddy" for example, an uptempo extended blues is built upon a few simple riffs, but they are displaced in time, much like Monk's "Straight No Chaser". "Old House," a slow-drag eight-bar blues with a bridge has a New Orleans flavor, and appears straight forward, until you realize that one of the bars in this short structure has more beats than the others. "Great Day" is a folk-song-like modal tune in a minor key that proclaims the day, not with wild jubilation, but with a meditative thoughtfulness, as if the past days maybe hadn't been so good, and this one might not last.

In all of Carl's compositions, and in his playing, the blues is never far away. "Okefenokee," for example, has a hard-hop blues line over a funky beat, with a tag line reminiscent of the best of Horace Silver. And his melodies stay with you. The recording and mix on this CD brings you right up front, where you can hear every inflection of every note."

Mitch Genoa, Detroit Magazine

"It's great to get such relaxed, no-rush confidence from a band with seemingly nothing to prove, not a frenetic bone in its astral body."

George Tysh, MetroTimes, Detroit

Michel sports a clean, undistorted tone thatr contains an underlying current of country twang. The only effect he uses is a volume control. He's primarily a linear player. He wouldn't sound out of place in a Gary Burton quartet. Definitely one of the better guitar trio recordings [Food of Love] I've heard recently."   Bob Rusch, Cadence