Ben Flocks - Mask of the Muse (2019)

“In the jazz sea, teeming with the daring, impetuous and utterly merciless young tenor saxophonists, Ben Phlox is the one to pay attention to. He is distinguished by patience and passion, directness and kindness. He does not blind with a flurry of notes and does not hit the tsunami of technology. But his wave is the widest and most powerful. And more importantly, he can dive deeply. The sound of Ben seeks to get to the bottom, looking for the soul of things. " When such a flattering statement belongs to no one else than Joshua Radman, it is worth listening to him. It is not surprising that the thirty-year-old native of California, who has been living in Brooklyn for ten years, Ben Flock, with legitimate pride, posted this quote on his website.

Flock's new album Mask Of The Muse provides a good opportunity to evaluate this musician himself. As for me, the sound attracted me the most. It’s been a long time since I heard so many honey tones in the sound of a saxophone. Perhaps more than others, he reminds me of the Getz Wall in this regard. Ben is quite romantic. It seems to me that this was manifested even in the compilation of the album program, in which the old standards are side by side with the original plays written by Flock in collaboration with Ari Chersky, guitarist, producer and closest friend. In four tracks out of twelve, the word “dream” appears in the titles: from Dream from Roy Orbison’s repertoire to Dream Of Life from Billy Holiday. If this is a coincidence, it is very symptomatic. Along the way, I, as a person prone to a bad smoking habit, was amused that the smoke curls in this program in two more tracks: Smoke Rings (in my opinion, the album’s most beautiful composition) and While A Cigarette Was Burning.

Ben recorded this program in a quintet format, in which three - the aforementioned Cersky, drummer Even Hughes and bassist Martin Nevin - are Flock's old friends from the early years of his youth in California. True, it seemed to me that in relation to friends Ben could show more generosity: almost everywhere his saxophone does not leave the foreground, giving his colleagues not so much space to demonstrate individual mastery. But, for its sound you can "forgive" this.