A Hot Night in Paris (1999)


 

  1. Sussuido
  2. That's All
  3. Invisible Touch
  4. Hold On My Heart
  5. Chips & Salsa
  6. I Don't Care Anymore
  7. Milestones
  8. Against All Odds
  9. Pick Up the Pieces
  10.Los Endos Suite

 

To be perfectly honest, reviewing this one feels a bit like wandering into unfamiliar territory without a map. Big band jazz has never been a particular area of expertise, and while the names Gene Krupa, Buddy Rich, Miles Davis, and Woody Herman might ring a bell, I couldn’t tell you which bell belongs to whom. That said, when an artist like Phil Collins releases a big band instrumental album, it’s at least worth giving a listen—if only to see what he's up to now.

A Hot Night in Paris isn’t your typical Collins affair. There are no vocals, no Top 40 hooks, and no tear-stained piano ballads. Instead, what you get is a full-fledged big band set featuring jazz-inspired reinterpretations of material from both his solo career and his days with Genesis. The results are often surprising—and in places, genuinely impressive.

Out of the ten tracks, eight are drawn from familiar Collins territory, though you’d be forgiven for not recognizing some of them. Hold on My Heart and That’s All, for example, are reworked so dramatically that they could easily pass for entirely new compositions if you weren’t reading the back of the CD case. But then, that’s sort of the point. This isn’t a karaoke night with brass—it’s Collins indulging in a long-held passion project, reimagining his catalog through a jazz lens.

There are some familiar faces here. Daryl Stuermer (guitar) and Brad Cole (keyboards), longtime collaborators from his solo tours, are on board, along with several horn players who’ve become regular fixtures in the “Phil Collins sound” over the years. The arrangements are tight, the playing sharp, and even though the disc runs just ten tracks, the runtime stretches past 70 minutes. Remarkably, it never drags. The energy level is consistently high, and the musicians clearly sound like they’re having a good time—which is contagious, even if this isn’t your usual genre of choice.

This probably won’t convert many jazz skeptics, nor was it meant to. But if you’re a Collins fan and curious to hear what his music sounds like without vocals—and with a horn section leading the way—A Hot Night in Paris is an enjoyable and surprisingly slick detour. It’s a project that clearly came from the heart, and for all its novelty, it works. You don’t need to be a jazz aficionado to enjoy it. You just need to be open to hearing the familiar in an entirely new—and very brassy—light.

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