Effra, Misha Mullov-Abbado’s fourth album as bandleader, is in many ways a love letter to Brixton: the London neighbourhood that he calls his home. So it might seem slightly ironic that the composer and double bassist would play the album’s launch gig at a venue on the other side of the river, at Kings Place in King’s Cross. That said, having seen Mullov-Abbado play an excellent show on the same stage (*) with Alice Zawadzki during last year’s London Jazz Festival, I can’t begrudge this decision.
Effra contains its fair share of bluesy bop jams, many of which were written by Mullov-Abbado during lockdown: the album’s namesake – “The Effra Parade” – is an enjoyable tune that takes its name from a small road in Brixton. “It’s actually a really boring residential road”, its composer admitted, which is a stark contrast to the composition’s boisterous energy. As the opening performance of the night, this was the audience’s first taste of what proved itself to be a consistently very strong horn frontline: James Davison (trumpet and flugelhorn), Tom Smith (alto saxophone, bass clarinet) and Sam Rapley (tenor saxophone). This trio were to take up most of the soloing spotlight throughout the night, with a few standouts from Scott Chapman on drums, Liam Dunachie on piano and Mullov-Abbado himself.
Tracks such as “The Effra Parade”, the Jobim-inspired “Canção de Sobriedade”, and the as-yet unrecorded “Popcorn, Incense and Mary Jane” (so-called after the smells you may be assaulted with when walking through Brixton) were balanced out by gentler tunes like “Bridge” and “Rose”, dedicated to Mullov-Abbado’s wife and daughter respectively.
Following a dedication to the late Martin Hummel (+), founder of Ubuntu Music on which Effra is released, the band finished on a strong note with another hard bop tune, “Lock, Stock and Shuffle” from 2015’s New Ansonia. The closest the band came to truly channeling The Jazz Messengers, this was a fitting finale to a night of bops and ballads.
