Joan Torres’s All Is Fused – ‘Embrace Form’ [Album Review]

Embrace Form, the latest long player from San Francisco’s unconventional jazz fusion band Joan Torres’s All Is Fused, amalgamates bass-heavy jazz, complex polyrhythms, and funk stylings into what comes close to being a concept album. Although released last year, the album deserves attention.

According to the band, “‘Embrace Form’ is an album that explores the relationship between experimental instrumental music and popular music. Sometimes it’s easier to write experimental music that follows no rules other than ‘sound musical,’ but by leveraging familiar forms and enhancing or appropriating them to fit our expressive style, we can also expand our vocabulary and the diversity of our repertoire.”

While making the album, the band was informed they had been awarded a San Francisco Arts Commission grant.

The tracks on Embrace Form comprehend musical forms and compositional techniques such as verse-chorus (“Explode”), vamps (“Friends, Memories, Loops”), canon (“Crystalline”) as well as improvisational forms that are open (“Cotati Reset”) or that follow antiphonal patterns (“Caribbean Mountains”). These familiar forms are then modified, providing listeners with something recognizable but with a twist.

Of the album’s nine tracks, entry points include “Cotati Reset,” which initially sounds like the band is merely warming up until the song begins to take on a semblance of shape – akin to a splendidly ambient piece of music with shimmering fluidity.

Joan Torres’s All Is Fused, photo by Andrew Westhoff

Combining Latin-flavored syncopation and jazz tones, “Unexpectations” fashions an upbeat, funk-lite lounge tune, highlighted by braying brass and a spangled piano. For some reason, probably the finessed guitar licks, “No Voices Lost,” summons up memories of Tommy Bolin playing with Billy Cobham on Spectrum.

A personal favorite because of its bouncy, pushing rhythm that transitions to a more traditional improvisational structure, “Pursuit Ongoing” dances around the edges of being chaotic yet remains compelling.

Suffused with unique jazz variations, Embrace Form exhibits bold gestures, at once glossy and often unforgettable.

Embrace Form Track Listing:

1. Cotati Reset
2. Unexpectations
3. Darker Decision
4. Explode
5. No Voices Lost
6. Caribbean Mountains
7. Friends, Memories, Loops
8. Pursuit Ongoing
9. Crystalline

Run Time: 43:55
Release Date: January 20, 2023
Record Label: Independent