Jazz - delicious hot, disgusting cold was the title of a spoof track by The Bonzo Dog Doo Dah Band. In between these two extremes, the metaphorical temperature is lukewarm and the sound is neither ostentatiously good nor ridiculously bad. The debut album from this London-based quartet exemplifies this mellow 'middle way'.
Dice Factory formed in 2009 by pianist George Fogel and tenor saxophonist Tom Challenger and were subsequently augmented by Tom Farmer on double bass and drummer Jon Scott.
These ten instrumental tracks combine tight composition with loose improvisation. The importance of chance in constructing their music explains why the band name is inspired by Luke Reinhardt's The Dice Man, a novel which explores what happens when fate is determined by the roll of a dice.
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Within such a concept, the possibility of veering off into a chaotic cacophony must be ever present but if any such moments occurred, they didn't make it to the relatively restrained final mix.
I would have welcomed more madness or experimentation rather than the sonically sophisticated, musically accomplished precision which just sounds too flat and controlled to my ears.
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