Fetish

Like most musicians for most of the past 18 months, Dave Zinno and his Unisphere bandmates—Mike Tucker on tenor sax, Eric Benny Bloom on trumpet and flugelhorn, Leo Genovese on keyboards, Tim Ray on piano, Rafael Barata, drums and percussion, and special guest Rafael Rocha on trombone—have been writing and practicing, biding their time until jazz scene reopened. In that time, Unisphere took advantage and managed to piece together, "Fetish," a brilliant and beautiful album. The colorful panorama, tonal palette, and sonic breadth featured on "Fetish" are breathtaking. Zinno’s Unisphere is—through all three of its recordings for Whaling City Sound—jubilant, rapturous, and free. Everyone contributed compositions or arrangements to the project, which creates a stunning picture of the diversity represented by this group. That the new Unisphere album comes at a time when folks are longing for something real and new certainly helps. The timing is excellent. The walls aren’t closing in any longer, and the prospect of live music is finally at hand. "Fetish" is the sound of that catharsis, that anticipation, a primal release of aural energy. “This project is the culmination of a year without live music,” says Zinno. “Every ounce of energy and ambition, in reserve from not expending it for so long, is on this record. I hope people feel what we felt while creating it.”