Album Notes

"...[The Wayward Trio] have strayed deliberately, searching for an approach, seeking to operate in the spaces between dominant styles...[the band] balances serious craft with light-hearted appeal...Their open organic feel gives [the] tunes a decidedly jazz flavor...and their shifting grooves feel elastic and loose. Each composition also tells a story...[through] Gilbert's melodic development and narrative sense..." -- The Oregonian A&E, 5.9.03

In a market overrun with stale jazz and flaccid funk, The Wayward Trio makes a fresh and bold noise, for they possess in abundance what many jazz acts lack -- personality and humor. They loiter in the gray areas between genres, but their music is not a synthesis of styles; rather, they offer their own skewed takes on blues, lounge, R&B, bebop and New Orleans musics. Imagine the whiskey-soaked beatnik ramblings of Tom Waits crossed with the soulful jazz-grooves of Charlie Hunter and John Scofield, and that will put you somewhere in the territory of The Wayward Trio.

The three members work collaboratively, avoiding macho displays of musical dexterity to instead focus their energies on bringing out the personality and humor in their music. But being a trio, the guitar naturally emerges as the prominent voice, and it is an eccentric one at that. The guitar work is never quite what you'd expect, and it elicits exaggerated interpretations from the rhythm section in response.

The Wayward Trio's material is almost exclusively original, all across the map stylistically, and absolutely magnetic to boot. The melodies are strong, the pocket is deep, the moods are distinct, and the performances are fluid and exciting. In short, The Wayward Trio makes music that excites audiences and that people can relate to.