Up Popped the 2 Lips
Veteran alto saxophonist and flutist Henry Threadgill enters fresh  territory withUp Popped the Two Lips. It's the first album by his  intriguing, all-acoustic Zooid sextet. Along with a simultaneously issued new  effort by another band of his,Make  a Move, it also marks his first association with a small independent label  in many a moon. A longtime proponent of world sounds, Threadgill plays  international matchmaker here in drafting Moroccan oud player Tarik Benbrahim  into a string section that includes acoustic guitarist Liberty Ellman and  cellist Dana Leong. By turns jaunty and mysterious, funky and reflective, the  music is characteristically Theadgillian with its contrasts between light and  dark, juxtaposition of flighty carnival melodies and assertive zigzag rhythms,  tricky time signatures and fulsome unison lines. And in Jose Davila, Threadgill  has another excellent tuba player to man an instrument of great importance to  his patented sound. But with Benbrahim and Ellman lightening the textures and  drummer Dafnis Prieto nimbly threading through them--and doing his share of  slashing as well--this may be Threadgill's springiest unit.Up Popped the Two  Lipsis certainly Threadgill's most consistently strong effort since 1993'sToo Much Sugar for a  Dime.--Lloyd Sachs