A well-regarded player in the Chicago jazz world, bassist and composer Joshua Abrams has spent the last several years recording expansive trance music with his band, Natural Information Society. That outfit’s records are driven by improvisation, though not necessarily in the form of individual solos. Instead, Abrams and his collaborators create hypnotic interlocking patterns, rhythms, and melodies that seem to spool forth endlessly without any single voice taking center stage. It is serene and peaceful music that relies on spontaneous invention, but also on restraint.
It’s a sensibility that is carried over to Abrams’ other pursuits. In the past several years, the bassist has also established a reputation as a composer for film. Released digitally by Eremite Records, Music for Life Itself & The Interrupters collects two scores that Abrams composed for documentary filmmaker, Steve James—best known for his 1994 picture, Hoop Dreams—including the two features in the title as well as a two-minute piece written for the short, A Place Called Pluto.
If you’re coming to this music having listened to Abrams’ work in Natural Information Society, one thing will be immediately noticeable: these compositions are a lot shorter. Working in the context of a film, there’s no room to sprawl and most of Abrams’ cues last barely more than a minute. It’s a very different kind of music making, but the results share certain qualities with the composer’s other outlet, mainly in that they often carefully balance ambience and melody.
Released last year, Life Itself is an adaptation of film critic Roger Ebert’s memoir of the same name. Though the film includes interview footage shot during the final months of Ebert’s battle with cancer, the mood is not morose. Abrams’ score is mostly lighthearted, often taking stylistic inspiration from blues and '60s cool jazz. Much of it seems to capture spontaneous interplay. The central thread, "Roger’s Theme", finds a brass band trading riffs and "Professional Enemies" is largely a bass solo. For the film’s somber and reflective moments, Abrams’ arranges music that suggests a sense of peace—drones and light chords embellished with flourishes of trumpet and harp.
This is followed by Abrams’ score for James’ 2011 film, The Interrupters, which tracks a group of anti-violence activists working with communities in Chicago. Commissioned a mere six weeks before the film's Sundance Film Festival premiere, it's the slightly less polished of the pair. However, with its focus on percussion and hip-hop rhythms, it’s probably the more enjoyable of the two to listen to outside of the context of the film. On both, Abrams’ benefits from the presence of great musicians, including drummer Hamid Drake, saxophonist Ari Brown, and guitarist Jeff Parker, who also performs in Tortoise.
Watching the films, Abrams’ music is never intrusive. It enhances a scene, but never forces a mood. And while it’s probably not the first place you’d turn to experience his work, it provides an example of his stylistic reach and musical ability. Natural Information Society’s music thrives amid the extended zone-out, but listening to the music for The Interrupters, it’s surprising how malleable many of those sounds are—that, in miniature, the music can slot so naturally into somebody else’s story.
