Real Deal

Murray has worked with a number of jazz’s most important drummers, including Rashied Ali, Roy Haynes, Andrew Cyrille, Steve McCall, Billy Higgins, Ed Blackwell, Sunny Murray, Ralph Peterson, Hamid Drake and more. This 1991 duo CD was his sole encounter with percussion legend Milford Graves, and it’s a standout even in his vast discography. Graves, who started out as a trap drummer in Latin bands, is always more about the up-top than the down-low; he rumbles across the toms and snare, tagging the cymbals as he goes, but kicks the bass drum much more rarely, and he’s not interested in “time” as much as “pulse”; his drumming is built around human biological rhythms, so listening to it for long enough feels like it changes the way your blood rushes through your veins. A linear, melody-based player like Murray is going to be left with only one option: to float on top of the endlessly swirling percussive ocean, occasionally matching Graves’ energy but mostly pursuing his own interests, playing long winding lines, often ending in high-pitched squeals, with the drums as a constant backdrop.