Point of Few is a new instrumental quartet from the Czech Republic, with an extremely fresh sound, organically combining electronic and popular music with contemporary jazz. Even though the compositions often have unplotted forms or use odd meters, they still sound like songs with separate worlds, telling stories.
The band, formed in 2019, is releasing their debut album Open to Closeness on April 24, 2022 (Bivak Records), featuring a guest appearance by the acclaimed New York keyboardist Jason Lindner. You may know Lindner ie. from David Bowie’s last, iconic album Blackstar.
Collaboration with Lindner was a dream-come-true idea of the bandleader Radim Přidal:
Jason was my number one wish when I was thinking about who I’d like to feature as a guest artist on the album. We never met and didn’t know each other before and when he agreed to work on the album with us, it was really thrilling and gratifying. The collaboration worked out perfectly and Jason, remotely from his home studio in Brooklyn, recorded the keyboard, synth and sequencer tracks and really moved the album forward big time.
As Přidal further explains, the album’s title Open To Closeness carries a strong non-musical theme:
As a society, we’ve isolated ourselves in our shells, be they cities, apartments, or cars, thinking that we’ve matured to our surroundings, that we’ve conquered them, that we can cut ourselves off from their influence, and that we’re better off without them. But now we are coming to the point that eventually we have no choice but to come out of these shells again and find a new relationship with the environment, a new way to live in connection and intimacy with it.
3Stories is a three-part suite that is intended as three interconnected musical narratives that together form a narrative and imaginative whole. 3Stories opens with a very melodic, dynamic, yet melancholic motif, which alternates with sound-coloured interludes in different tempos and rhythms. Over an ambient guitar interlude, the track segues into a sonically powerful second “story”, whose mood is reminiscent of Bowie’s Blackstar album. Lindner’s synthesizer and sequencer parts weave through both parts like subtle and coarser yarns, giving the record’s sound an impressive breadth.