It's a rare album that can be an adventurous fusion of many different and unrelated roots and yet still remain true to the origins of each disparate element. This band (whose name translates as "Roots and Leaves") manages it quite well. They are a quartet from Amsterdam. Mola Sylla comes from Senegal with his voice and a number of traditional instruments. Kaigal-ool Khovalyg brings the tools and throat singing of Tuva. Bassist Vladimir Volkov is a jazzman from Russia. Alexei Levin, also Russian, plays both ancient and modern instruments including piano and accordion.

What comes of all this is something far different than the usual "toss 'em in a basket and see what happens" world fusion project we are so familiar with. It's remarkable subtle, a jazz jam with cultural roots. Each artist hangs on to his heritage or interest for dear life, exchanging glancing blows of idiom and tradition, but mostly just sharing what they know best and letting the other musicians join in with their own ideas. So we have Sylla singing in a west African chant, with Khovalyg adding a long, drawn out fiddle line around it, eventually joined in by a tinkling piano or sliding bass line. It occasionally bursts into an uproarious din, with throat singing, jazz piano and African strings all tearing it up in what can be strikingly bizarre or sometimes humorous combinations.

But it is the more subdued moments that actually define this recording, as each man finds the disparate beauty of the others music, lends his own idea, and then sits back as the whole ensemble creates something new. Real Life of Plants is honest, simple, and even more remarkable, recorded live. It's a must play recording. - CF