CD Review: Evening Sky, Meeting of the Four

I’ve been listening to a lot of records lately that sit well outside any strict definition of jazz, and I have several more of these coming up for review in the weeks ahead. Meeting of the Four, the new album from Rhode Island quartet Evening Sky, is the first of them — and a good place to start.

The Rhode Island quartet describe themselves as a jazz and roots group, and I think that’s about as accurate as it’s going to get. Meeting of the Four, releasing this Friday (June 26), is an album that moves freely between reggae, soul-jazz, funk, Americana, and something more cinematic and harder to name — and it does so without any of the self-consciousness that tends to make genre-crossing records feel like they’re trying too hard.

The sound is largely defined by the combination of pedal steel (Chris Brooks) and guitar (Gino Rosati), with drummer and producer Eric Hastings adding Hammond organ and synth overdubs that deepen the palette considerably. Bassist Joe Potenza anchors it all with a quiet authority. Brooks’s pedal steel is the album’s distinguishing voice. It’s not an instrument you encounter often in a jazz context, and that unfamiliarity is part of what makes it work so well here — it brings something genuinely different to the ensemble sound without ever feeling like a novelty or a gimmick.

This is not an album that announces itself immediately. It needs patience and a second or third listen, gradually revealing its logic and charm. The opening track, “For Ernest” — a nod to Jamaican guitar legend Ernest Ranglin — sets the tone with a reggae-inflected groove that shouldn’t quite work in this context but absolutely does. “Coffee Monster” and “Ballz Out” bring a strong funk energy, while “Blue Leisure Suit” channels a slightly off-kilter 1960s soul-jazz feel that I found myself returning to more than once.

I’ve been gravitating increasingly towards albums that sit outside a strict definition of jazz — partly because after forty-odd years in this business I’m increasingly suspicious of strict definitions, and partly because records like this one remind you that American roots music, in all its forms, and jazz improvisation have always been in conversation with each other. Meeting of the Four is a natural expression of that relationship.

In an era when algorithms decide what most listeners hear next — steering them back towards whatever they already know, narrowing the field with every click — records this eclectic tend to fall through the gaps. That would be a shame in this case. If you’re a committed jazz purist looking for something that stays close to the tradition, this probably isn’t your first stop. But if you have any appetite for Americana in its broader sense and an open mind about where jazz ends and something else begins, Meeting of the Four is well worth your time.

Line-Up:
Chris Brooks, ppedal steel guitar | Joe Potenza, bass | Gino Rosati, guitar | Eric Hastings, drums, percussion, Hammond organ and Moog.

Release Date: 26 June 2026
Format: CD | LP | Streaming
Label: Self Release

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