The Kandinsky Effect are a modern jazz trio where two members are credited with “effects” in addition to their own instruments. Drummer Caleb Dolister has his hands full, keeping a steady tempo for an open-ended band that teeters between jazz and electronic post-rock. So it’s up to saxophonist Warren Walker and bassist Gaël Petrina to give the Kandinsky Effect the extra textures of echo, loops, and general sonic butchery that keeps them ahead of their jazz-rock competitors.
Their third album Somnambulist doesn’t really sound like its title. There’s nothing narcoleptic about it and there is no sense of the Kandinsky Effect resorting to autopilot. The music is constantly twisting and bending, speeding up and slowing down, letting you down gently for a nap before startling you awake again. Wait, what if this is their autopilot mode? What if they did sleepwalk their way through this? Then I say bring on the Lunesta, because we need more of this.