By Dan Sorrells
Famished minds no longer sated by spi-raling horn, one of last year's standout releases, can now feast upon Live at the Hungry Brain. Recorded the night before renowned pianist Marilyn Crispell entered the studio with the Midwest force of bass clarinetist Jason Stein, bassist Damon Smith, and drummer Adam Shead, Live at the Hungry Brain features the third of three concerts the quartet played in June 2023.
If antecedents help orient one to this music (more on that anon), Crispell’s presence—along with Smith’s place in a bass lineage that passes through Mark Dresser—makes it tempting to call up Anthony Braxton’s storied Forces in Motion quartet. This isn't really that. In terms of sheer brow-sweat and preternatural interaction, the music onLive at the Hungry Brainis more allied with Crispell's incursions into the Evan Parker/Barry Guy/Paul Lytton trio. Here, as there, she's a shining light settled into the very heart of an established trio's sound, backlighting its dense tangles from within, casting different shadows. But such comparisons are at best a makeshift compass. They'll get you pointed in a direction, but reveal little about what you'll find upon setting out.
"A Borderless Event" begins with Smith and Shead in an agile coalition, Smith deftly springing between arco and pizzicato. Shead's rapid patter can be reminiscent of those clattery Europeans like Lytton, but his assertive feeling of pulse often positions him as a more marked rhythmic goad. As Crispell and Stein enter, the group traffics in a dizzying array of ideas before winnowing into Stein's increasingly fretful solo, pierced by chiming piano chords. Crispell's chords soon fray, rapidly spilling notes, the pressure mounting until the rhythmic elements have superheated and Stein's dark looping calligraphy has transformed into glowing, Twombly-red coils. Even at its most unfettered, Stein's eloquence with the bass clarinet is remarkable. Spanning the breadth of its range, he rafts the complex timbre of his instrument over the piano's melodic swells and into the rich undercurrents of the bass and drums. On the shorter second piece, "Bone Eaten Up by Breathing," he finds a strong rapport with Smith as they trade lines through cascading piano and cymbals, Stein eventually stepping back to send the rhythm section along with Crispell's hypnotic arpeggios, beautiful and intense.
Music of this intensity, being played at this level, is possible not only because the approach provides a platform for spontaneity and virtuosity, but because it is a conduit for instruction. Here's where forebears return. It's hard to talk about music like Live at the Hungry Brainwithout them. Describing the music in the manner I just attempted falls short, but the players themselves are a reference—a living history—a genealogy of past selves setting expectations that they presently rework. Smith has made no secret of his belief in the importance of playing with "elders," and his formidable technique and instinct have been honed over decades of apprenticeship with experienced improvisers of every stripe—players exactly like Crispell (or Roscoe Mitchell, who has also joined the trio in performance). Likewise, Crispell has recently spoken of her deep love of playing with younger musicians who seek her collaboration; the conduit directs flow in both directions.
So, the resulting music is astonishing, slippery. It's novel, but not free of influence. It is a crucible. This influence extends beyond music and into engagements with abstract visual artists, poets, even practices of body and mind like those Milford Graves conveyed to his student Stein. Rarely do these things directly initiate the music. But, acknowledged—added later as song titles, liner notes, album art—they sound their own sort of resonance, expressing accord or juxtaposition that's beyond (or even before) fumbling attempts to speak of them. Like the visceral Cy Twombly paintings that grace the covers of the quartet's records, this music also lays bare the physical work that it essentially is. It's abstract not because it is inscrutable but because it remains largely ineffable, constituted wholly of but never adequately described by the gestures of its makers. Our fascination lies in this mysterious something emergent in the work, prone to dissolve when we focus our attention too keenly on the parts: just a mark on a canvas, the strike of a tom, a bow dragged across string. "Tear a mystery to tatters," Barthelme said, "and you have tatters, not mystery." Our hungry brains devour the likes of Live at the Hungry Brain, our ears drink in this vital music, the vitalizing talent of these musicians. But our mouths, agape, can't quite find the right words.
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