Round-Up: Tim Daisy

By Tom Burris

Today we are featuring a couple of recent improvisational collaborations featuring Chicago percussionist & Relay label owner, Tim Daisy.

Tim Daisy Trio – A Day In Berlin  (Relay, 2013) ****

Daisy recorded this improvised session with Norwegian pianist Havard Wiik and Australian bassist Clayton Thomas during a particularly adventurous afternoon session in Berlin.  It's definitely not a standard piano trio.  It's more of an experimental vehicle maneuvered by the collective spirit of the players and the moment, like the kind of European/Chicagoan ensembles you're likely to see at Chicago's Umbrella festival – meaning it's a pajama party where some of the most creative minds on the planet get to interact with each other in a carefully planned format that ideally fosters a surplus of surprise and whimsy.  And like the line-ups Umbrella presents, this one often meets the mark and sometimes exceeds its pretty high expectations.

The disc opens with “Suite for Three” which begins with inspired chaos, setting the tone for the entire recording.  It moves in many directions, including a walk along a fine line between free jazz and modern classical structures, comprising a clash of mini sonic movements that places the listener into the heart of a micro-tonal beehive.  “Spreepark Serenade” continues the hum-with-small-bits-of-chaos sound featuring Wiik's piano work, which is reminiscent of Fred Van Hove's attack on those classic Brotzmann records.  “There Goes the Sun” rides many thunderstorms throughout its nearly 30 minute exercise, along the way inviting comparisons to Van Hove/Bennink (again) and featuring a segment that features Thomas playing a glass while Wiik plays monolithic clusters and Daisy frantically searches for a way out of the mayhem.  The disc closes with “Treptow Promenade,” which begins as a minimalistic exploration of the spaces between the notes/sounds, but gradually builds to a long crescendo of Cecil Taylor style proportions until collapsing into a sub-sonic rumble that lasts for two minutes. 

Here's hoping this is just the beginning for this band.  Rempis, bring 'em to Umbrella 2014!

CD limited to 350 copies.  Also available as a digital download here.




Hans Peter Pfammatter & Tim Daisy – Different Names  (Relay Digital, 2013) ****

Similar to the session for the trio date, Swiss pianist Hans Peter Pfammatter recorded this duo w/ Daisy in a single afternoon in 2009 in Chicago.  Pfammatter plays “prepared” piano, but not exclusively.  Combining the percussive attack of the prepared strings with the melodic and chordal structures of the unprepared strings creates a one-man-band feel at times, notably on pair of tracks, “For Tinguely” and “Ravenswood”.  This playfulness and invention reminds me of Monk, in the way that it's done with humor and careful attention to space.  Also like Monk, Pfammatter uses elliptical blocks of melody as an anchor and likes to “slur” the notes.

Daisy is a magnificent foil for Pfammatter, pushing and pulling and prodding Hans who, again like Monk, can be as stubborn as a mule.  Daisy is sensitive and surprising enough to make the most of every musical situation here – even when Pfammatter puts his foot down and holds steady.  “On Sheridan” and “Different Names” are particularly fascinating psychological studies of both of these musicians' personalities.

Things slow down a bit on “Winona,” a contemplative track that drowns the melody in its own resonance by way of Pfammatter's refusal to lift the damper pedal for even a millisecond.  His timekeeping on the prepared keys, playing dual/duel percussion with Daisy, whose playing lifts the track above mere prettiness and closer to a place of beauty.  The album closes with a spacious exploration of sound (“Glass and Steel”) on which both men work in hot pursuit of every tonal color their instruments are capable of producing. 

Download here.

 Available from Instantjazz.

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Tim Daisy – October Music Vol. 2: 7 Compositions For Duet (Relay, 2016) ****½

By Tom Burris

Two years have passed since the first volume of Tim Daisy's October Music, a very sturdy group of seven duets that provide the conceptual foundation for this new volume. At first glance, the new collection almost reacts against the former. Most of the new compositions are skeletal - almost sketches - that are strong and inspiring; but are such a 180 degree turn away from the earlier careful constructions they come as a bit of a shock. On the surface, the themes are almost Ayler-ish: very sturdy compositions that function like a quick shot of whiskey, there to help the players build up enough nerve to be free and blow their asses off for awhile.

But that's not it. This isn't a free-for-all blowing session at all. These are compositions, no matter how minimal. There is definitely a frame for the contents of each duet; but the structure is more flexible than before. It's as if the duet is being put in the position of becoming the composition. Daisy is simply creating the conditions for this to happen. Hear me out: listening is the most important part of improvisation; and the same is true in conversation. So if the art of listening changes a conversation, can it do the same for a composition? It's almost as if the written structure remains implied even after the theme is dismissed, the same way implied rhythm is present in many instances of unmetered time. In this way it is possible that Daisy is as much director as composer of these pieces. I don't have any answers; but the questions surrounding Daisy's intentions make my head swirl like his melody lines.

Nothing can prepare you for the opener, “Radiant.” The track makes several jarring cuts between an impassioned vocal loop, a garage band blasting out a one-chord riff, and Andrew Clinkman's face-melting guitar noise. This is followed by “Type-M,” which features Mars Williams on soprano sax and percussion. Again, the cuts are jarring between sections. When the duo begins to improvise after the theme, the sound lurches this way and that, as if they are becoming disoriented by all of the sudden movement. There is a softer, exotic sounding middle section which falls into a collage of percussion and squeak toys – before lurching into a wild shrieking finale.

Cellist Fred Lonberg-Holm joins Tim on the prickly “Black Mountain,” featuring a tip-toeing theme that alternates Fred's catchy pizzicato plucking with Tim's melodic brushes-on-metal-bowls. After the niceties are out of the way, Daisy and Lonberg-Holm hurl all the cats and bedpans into the grand piano. There is a movement toward conventional structure along the way, but it is quickly tossed aside. Then the musicians take quick turns at the theme and the piece ends abruptly. There is only one track more “out” than this one, and that is “Wires and Static” with Aaron Zarzutski on synth and percussion. It's a really fascinating piece, subtle and almost purely sound-based. I'm not certain if there is a technically composed theme here; but there is definitely a conceptual one. This piece is also a great example of how expansive and playful Daisy's music has become over the last couple of years.

Ryan Packard plays on the drum duo “Songs For Dancers,” which features a theme that is free, thoughtful and purposeful. The interplay is playfully serious and confounds observations as quickly as they arise. Daisy plays a similar theme on the boppish “Tandem,” featuring trumpeter Russ Johnson, who turns out to be a fascinating match for Daisy. “Seeing” with bassist Clark Sommers closes the disc with a slow, loping theme. He and Daisy take turns at being the “leader” on winding lines that have become a Daisy trademark. The improvised section is short, but just the perfect length to change your perspective before flipping the theme back on you. The winding melody placed at the end of the disc is familiar and comforting – but you arrive here with new ears. October Music Vol. 2 isn't a sequel. It's a deeper cut.

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Tim Daisy’s Fulcrum Ensemble - Animation (Relay, 2018) ****½

By Eric McDowell

In June 2016, Chicago composer and drum wizard Tim Daisy gathered five friends for a concert at the Elastic Arts Foundation to celebrate his 40th birthday. The resulting document—an album cheekily titled The Halfway There Suite—paid homage both to Daisy’s life and work so far and, less directly, to the scene that’s proven hospitable to him and so many other top musicians, including those present. For all these reasons, calling the ad hoc ensemble the Celebration Sextet seemed like a no-brainer. But it’s also not surprising to find that a group with such chemistry and chops should have more to say. With the original celebration over a year behind them, though, for Animation they’ve more timelessly rebranded themselves as the Fulcrum Ensemble—a perfect name for the expertly balanced music they make.

Bringing Daisy together with James Falzone, Steve Swell, Josh Berman (replacing Russ Johnson), Fred Lonberg-Holm, and Dave Rempis, the Fulcrum Ensemble benefits from a deep history of collaboration. The drummer himself, just for one example, has played with each of his bandmates in other, often smaller contexts, from the October Music duets (with Falzone, Rempis, Berman, and Lonberg-Holm) to the Vox Arcana trio (with Falzone and Lonberg-Holm, again) to the Tim Daisy Quartet (featuring Swell). Daisy uses this intimate knowledge to his advantage, writing three compositions that not only call on each musician’s unique personal range but also collapse them together into a single complex layered mass.

The music they make falls comfortably under the umbrella of what John Corbett (via Steve Lacy) terms “poly-free,” oscillating between meticulously composed sections and sections of open improvisation. “I am listening for the way the players negotiate these two worlds,” Corbett says, “the interweaving of strategies that celebrate both the individual will of the player and the global vision of the composer.” On Animation that vision starts with swing, Daisy counting the ensemble into the syncopated call-and-response theme that opens “Corner Counter.” Over a crisp ride cymbal and a walking cello line, Rempis launches a gloriously melodic bari solo, along the way navigating a series of commentaries from his fellow players, some as straight-ahead as his ’50s-style blowing, others treacherously polyrhythmic, others near-chaotic. Later, after Berman’s solo, the structural rigidity seems to give in, letting the group loose for a bout of honking, rumbling collective improvisation—though the stop-on-a-dime pivot into Lonberg-Holm’s burning cello feature belies the assumption that the tune’s grander narrative has lost its direction.

“Glass and Lead” further elaborates Daisy’s range as both a composer and a percussionist, mapping out some of same the territory the drummer has explored in his solo work. Eschewing propulsive rhythms for texture and space, Animation’s middle piece builds an air of mystery and irresolution through a series of winding and unwinding marimba patterns, careful unisons, and smeared brass passages. But again, the clacking metronomes that underlie the polyrhythmic coda remind us that as far as Daisy seems to stray from the center, the laws of gravity are on some level still at play. Helping to keep the music anchored are Daisy’s compositional points of reference—influential names that loom almost as large in places as the names of the ensemble’s actual members. In light of the album’s melodic inventiveness, structural dynamism, and masterful union of forms past and present, it’s not surprising to see the composer cite Anthony Braxton or the AACM in his liner notes. While “Glass and Lead” seems more idiosyncratically Daisy—or maybe it’s simply more introspective—the notes’ mention of Earle Brown and Terry Riley (perhaps misleadingly, Steve Reich may also come to mind) should prove illuminating.

The name to associate with Animation’s final track is Julius Hemphill—yet saying so risks understating the tune’s great variety. At sixteen and a half minutes, “Means to an End” is the album’s longest and perhaps most complex piece. It starts somewhere between the others, overlaying a relatively melancholy horn figure with a buoyantly swinging odd-meter drum pattern. From there, the composition’s first half is a marvel of organic development, Daisy carefully weaving and unweaving melodic voices, tilting a clarinet solo into a clarinet-trombone duet, applying pressure to the seam between order and chaos until it just about bursts. Just about—since it’s at just the point where all hell seems to have broken loose that a door suddenly opens, everyone stops talking, and Hemphill walks in. The tune’s abrupt shift into a stiff “Dogon A.D.”–style drum-and-cello groove is the best kind of surprise. While another composer might end there, not daring to push forward again, Daisy does, first into a superbly musical drum solo and then into one last rollicking swing section. But even then there’s a remainder: a textural passage that closes the album on an unexpectedly grave note. Perhaps the best—if not the only—way to swing back and regain our balance is to start the album over again.

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Tim Daisy - October Music Vol 1: 7 Compositions for Duet (Relay, 2014) *****

By Tom Burris

What do you call someone who hangs out with musicians?  A drummer.  Remember that old chestnut?  Even if a percussionist happens to be one of the very best in the land – as is Mr. Daisy – the prejudice holds that he is merely a timekeeper and foil for the “real” musicians with whom he works.  In our (freer) world, we may hold our drummers in a bit higher esteem – due to the fact that they are creating improvised music equally alongside the players of more melodic instruments – but it is still possible that the musician carrying the drumsticks may suffer from feelings of inferiority in the areas of creativity and composition.  That's what I feared when I saw Daisy's updated website, which now touts him as “Composer / Percussionist” on its title page.  The joke's on me though because Chicago's most imaginative drummer is indeed very much a first rate composer.  The title was earned – right here on this album - and now I feel like a first rate asshole for ever doubting him.

In the Ellington tradition, Daisy wrote these pieces specifically for each musician who accompanies him.  Also like Ellington, Daisy's compositions are full of imaginative imagery.  When he plays with James Falzone (clarinet) on “For Jay,” it's as if a mobile of birds is being controlled by Jimmy Giuffre, while Han Bennink repeatedly jabs drumsticks behind the Oz curtain, goosing him up the ass, in a ridiculously surreal ornithological play.  When Daisy switches to marimba later in the piece, the birds seem more two-dimensional: like an old MGM cartoon with a third-stream soundtrack as Daisy tries to catch a loopy sparrow with buckets and trash can lids.  Cartoon birds return in “Some Birds,” with Katherine Young.  There must be something avian about the combination of marimba and woodwinds...  In addition to containing a melody line that reminded me of Stravinsky (Firebird?), Young's solemn little flyer gets swallowed by a vacuum cleaner at the end.  Damn cat.

It is generally pretty easy to tell what has been written from what has been improvised in each piece – and this is a good thing; although it works best when there is a seamless move from theme to improvisation (or from improvisation to theme).  It happens often, but most notably on “Painted,” featuring Josh Berman on cornet, and “Writers,” featuring drummer-turned-pianist Marc Riordan.  (Daisy is the drummer in Riordan's quartet.)  “Painted,” which closes the album, seems to wander away from the opening theme so far that it is a jolt when it suddenly reappears near the end. 

Dave Rempis' low register baritone sax multiphonics ridaing on top of Daisy's inside-but-outside drumming works on its own.  Add the beautiful theme of “Roscoe St” and a masterwork appears.  Daisy's duet with vibraphonist Jason Adasiewicz, “For Lowell,” is an intricate study in contrasts, opening with Daisy freely banging to a sharp clanging vibraphone melody.  They continue in these roles as the improvisations begin: Adasiewicz stays tight and angular while Daisy plays so loosely it's as if he's on a mission to make the drum kit sound smeary. 

Let me also apologize to Tim and Relay.  I did it again this year: the week of the Top Ten lists, I hear something that I would've included on mine!  And it's my fault.  I had it sitting right here, waiting to be heard.  The length of these pieces is just right.  No solo overstays its welcome.  No theme becomes cumbersome.  In fact, they're downright lovely; perfectly suited for each duet.  The track sequencing is brilliant, encouraging many repeated listening sessions.  And for you audiophiles, Alex Inglizian not only captured some amazing sessions; he also managed to record and mix acoustic piano and drums perfectly.  Perfectly, I say!

Listen / Buy / Love:

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Tim Daisy's Vox 4 – Roman Poems (Relay, 2019) *****

By Tom Burris

First, a reintroduction of sorts is in order. Vox Arcana is now known as Vox 4, updating the longstanding trio of James Falzone (clarinet), Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello, electronics), and Daisy (drums, marimba, percussion) to include Macie Stewart of OHMME and Marker on violin and piano.
Did the trio need an upgrade? Not as far as I was concerned – until I heard this release. The fact that this is the finest Vox release to date speaks for itself.

Quietly opening this suite is “Prelude.” With hard mallets on toms, wood & cymbals, Daisy duets with Falzone for a minute and a half - when they become embroiled in a duel against the string section, the music leaning into atonal disarray but not succumbing to it. Macie and Fred make good on their threat exactly 43 seconds into the next track, “The Collector,” when they smash into Daisy & Falzone head-on. Things get quickly sorted out though, with Daisy swinging like Blakey underneath a wild solo from Falzone. Daisy locks in with Lonberg-Holm, who is finger-picking the cello's hard-bop bass line. Another full stop-and-start with Stewart's violin leading the way as Lonberg-Holm kicks into electroskreech mode. And as soon as you have a grip on that, the theme's head appears again to close out the track – before ramming itself right into the next one, another crash-bang-fire whack of freedom noise featuring Stewart & Lonberg-Holm in an apparent victory duet.

This track, “First Travels” is an even more interesting ride than its predecessor, as its reach is broader in both scope and length. The first section is the duet of Stewart and Lonberg-Holm, of course, which ends on a sweet-n-sour slathering of beehive droning. The second section looks down the other end of the hive; and it's all sunny, damp and strange, made up of marimba and wire holding up some kind of sculpture in mid-construction. We spend awhile studying the blueprints during Daisy's subdued marimba solo, later becoming a fascinating duet with Lonberg-Holm. Falzone circular-breathes a note before the full band enters, with Daisy at the drum kit & Lonberg-Holm again in the bass role, the third section of the track. The fourth section is the collapse of the third and the vision of the phoenix that is Fred Lonberg-Holm.

“Intermezzo” continues with the chaos instigated by the cellist, now joined by the rest of the band – including Stewart on piano, who injects clusters into the firestorm of the rhythm section (Daisy on drum kit, Fred on “bass” cello) relentlessly. Piano & clarinet pitter-pat w/ Daisy's tapping, with Stewart eventually opting out – beginning the next track, “Classic Vox,” recalling Steve Reich without all of the instruments bleeding in and out of each other. Vox's approach, as we've seen up to this point, is the stop-and-start. Chords aren't going to weave into being; they're going to crash into birth. Of course, the crash comes at the 1:15 mark. [I don't want to give the impression that this is like Naked City. Vox 4 is much more organic than that - but they do cover a lot of ground in a short amount of time.] The remainder of the track takes you on a trip from Clarinet Chase Music to Flying Cutlery before dropping you off at a stop sounding not unlike the intro to “Prelude.”

“Litografi” begins with Daisy on marimba, in duet with Falzone, on a piece that sounds carefully composed – although one can never be sure with this band. Once Stewart (on violin) and Lonberg-Holm enter, the piece takes on a melancholy longing mixed with tension. It's at this point where it becomes obvious what a perfect musical match Stewart and Lonberg-Holm are, with her perfectly poised playing in the upper-register next to his everything-all-in approach. Bringing Macie Stewart into this group was a stroke of genius. Daisy's lone marimba closes this stunningly beautiful piece of music.

Closing the suite is the title track, named after the City Lights collection of Pier Paolo Pasolini's poems in their Pocket Poets Series. Daisy swings as Falzone plays the theme, followed by group improvisations that find Stewart, Falzone, and Lonberg-Holm jockeying for position at various points. The best bit is when it collapses around the three-minute mark with everyone contributing to a full-on shouting match that stops hard and begins abruptly with a solid-as-a-mountain drum solo from Daisy. The cheers of the crowd at the end jar me every time. It's such a perfect creation it's easy to forget this is was recorded in front of an audience. Bravo!

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Matt Piet Deep Dive (Day 2 of 2)

By Philip Coombs

Part Four - The Swim in New Waters

Matt Piet and Paul Giallorenzo - Wood, Wire and Steel 2017

Matt himself describes this record as “pianistic ear candy” for those who care to listen. I care to listen and it is just like candy.

This album forced me to really sit and think about what goes through a musician’s mind when he sits down at a piano and looks across the stage to see only one other person sitting down at a piano. Obviously there was something that brought them together such as a mutual respect or an insane challenge. So as the first notes are struck and the musician’s put their heads down, what are they hearing?

Is it an extension of their fingers, or their ideas that are one step ahead of what we can hear?

Wood, Wire and Steel is split into three parts with titles chosen to emphasize the fact that there are only 2 voices here. (1+1, Two, and Too) The first track is a feeling out process and the title kind of alludes to that 1+1, still individuals playing together. This all changes in a hurry on the follow-up track, Two.

This is an example of two musicians getting so comfortable with each other that it becomes impossible to tell them apart. Are you finishing your thought or are you finishing mine? Did I just play what you thought or are you reading my mind? As Matt alluded to in the Bandcamp notes for this recording, it has a lot to do with instinct which is demonstrated on the closer Too. It can sometimes get a little overwhelming when 2 great players hammer idea after idea at you so the last track is really refreshing as the tempo slows to a pace where there is nowhere to hide. This results in pure beauty and a tangible respect for each other and the instrument.

Part Five-  Tim Daisy and the March to the Future. 

Matt Piet & Tim Daisy- strike one; strike too (s/r, 2017)

So after a week of listening almost exclusively to Matt Piet, I was looking forward to listening to this one as Tim Daisy, one of my favourite percussionists gets tom play with Piet one on one. So, what happens when the piano gets played hard and heavy like a drum with Daisy sitting next to you? The result? Well, you are not bored, that’s for sure. Piet opens the lid and with the inside and outside of the piano top work with, he develops a new language for himself which in turn becomes a different type of agitator for Daisy. As you would imagine, not a problem for him.

Daisy has been working on a new language for a while now himself and some of that makes an appearance here. Not that he needed any help as his formidable expressive language was powerful enough, radios and loops and other creative uses for his kit add plenty of spice to this record.

At the 12 and a half minute mark of the opener, laissez-faire, the roles are reversed. Piet supplies the percussive elements to the narrative as Daisy melodically makes his way around his set up.

Track 2, the empathy and the entropy, starts with the least amount possible. In a good way. Its a slow build. Then out of nowhere, Piet comes at you with a killer passage followed by another killer passage. This get Daisy really going and the rest of the track is just magic.

Part Six -  Matt goes to Amsterdam and, you know, makes a great record.

Matt Piet, Raoul Van Der Weide, Frank Rosaly - Out of Step (s/r, 2017)

You can tell from the opening notes that there is a new world vision happening here. Van Der Weide is a monster and if there is anyone who can match that intense beginning, its Frank Rosaly. Its like when you stick your face out the window of a fast car and you realize that it is more difficult to breathe than you thought. Rosalyn and Weide hit the groove halfway into Step to the Music giving Piet a chance to carve out a few frequencies of his own.

The 25 minute track, However Measured or Far Away, allowed me some time to think about why a like this music so much. I think its about the discovery. I’ve joked about how I am saving classical music until I get a little older so I will have something to look forward to. Looks like I may have to be pretty old if I keep finding gems like Matt Piet. And it just goes to show, if it wasn’t for my history with Tim Daisy, I wouldn’t have found Matt Piet, and you can see where that got me. Now, i can say, if it wasn’t for Matt Piet, I wouldn’t have found Raoul Van Der Weide, who just took me head first out of my contemplation by trying to rip the strings off the bass. First he treats his bow like a light sabre and now you can hear the wood from his bass cry.  Rosaly rolls in the thunder and the storm continues.

The music here is now music. It resonates, it sings, its enjoyable, its complex and with Piet getting better with every release, the future is, well, nobody knows, because it will be created in the present on a stage with a man sitting behind a piano looking up and seeing other musicians and wondering, so, what are we going to do next???

Learn more here:

Bandcamp: mattpiet.bandcamp.com

Website: mattpietmusic.com

See Day 1 of the Matt Piet Deep Dive.

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Tim Daisy - Relucent (Relay, 2016) ****1/2

By Tom Burris
 
Last year Tim Daisy gathered up various radios, turntables, percussion instruments and kitchen utensils and hit the road.  These compositions are the result of working within the realm of random sounds and textures (radios, turntables) and conceptual ideas about time and space.  Sure, sometimes the passage he has chosen from a record is planned – but it can just as easily be a random grab, an educated guess about what is needed to augment the new sonic world in the moment of its birth.  The radio, of course, is far more of a crap shoot.  The marimba is the latest addition, percussive but also melodic in the most conventional sense.  It has become the center of this new music – but not as the staid old grandfather clinging to tradition.  It serves more as a glue that holds the carefully constructed collages together.  In fact, I'd say that the textural qualities of this music are every bit as important as its melodic ones –  probably more so.  Christian Marclay's turntable work, John Cage's Variations (check out that cover art!) and dadaist Kurt Schwitters are credited by Daisy as influential upon these works.  Something Daisy doesn't mention is the blues, for which these compositions might as well be a valentine.

So given all the high art background, the first imagery conjured up here is of a loose interpretation of Pharoah Sanders' “Thembi” coming from a humble jungle hut.  And dammit, that's as it should be!  Inclusiveness, randomness, the incorporation of the interruption – that's what life IS.  We can only benefit from variety in life, which here forms a shakedown dance line followed by a turntable downspeed drone into malarial hypnosis that is equal parts Ake Hodell and Moondog playing a balafon from Ghana.  Worst sentence ever, but you get the point.  The juxtapositions are all Daisy's.

It turns out that this music was not spliced together at any point.  There was no “cut-up” technique applied in the editing process.  I would have put good money down on the assumption that Mr. Daisy chopped off bits of various versions and inserted them into rearrangements post-recording, due to the fact that the incredible flights that sound like spontaneous creations HAD to have been from an early version – when the thing was fresh.  When it was still in the process of becoming.  Splice that into the finished piece.  Nope.  All live solo performances.  All, as the composer puts it “were recorded live in real time with three turntables, a marimba, and three radios.”  Unreal.

A full peaceful minute of radio static is followed by a three-note repeated pattern on “Naturalized,” before building into a high-speed chase for solo marimba. It's a Takemitsu film score gone car chase.  Prior to this was “Blue Rectangle,” which made this listener fully appreciate the idea of electronic static (and ticking sounds) as a solid background.  (The track sequencing is stellar.)

What follows “Naturalized” is a beautifully constructed aural collage called “Intermezzo,” bringing together all previously heard elements to form something new and indescribable.  Keep in mind the collage is happening in real time and has mostly been predetermined.  It is a magnificent piece.  “Rain Static” and “Tangent” follow, providing a subtle and ambient atmosphere in which melodies from marimba or recordings rise and fall in carefully measured intervals.  The disc closes with the sound of an electric fan on the verge of collapse accompanying a sleep-talking marimba's slumber.

This music is playfully serious and seriously inspired.  It is obsessed with sonic juxtaposition, yet it is highly melodic.  It wears its influences openly, yet it is refreshingly new.  Born of improvisations, shaped into compositions, Daisy has written pieces that are sturdy, finely crafted morsels of musical experiences that the listener will return to again and again.

See footage from Daisy's “On The Ground” tour here:

Get Relucent at a ridiculous discount here:

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Tim Daisy & Marc Riordan – Joyride (Relay, 2016) ****

By Eric McDowell

We’ve heard Tim Daisy and Marc Riordan play together before—we’ve even heard them in duet, on Daisy’s excellent October Music Vol. 1 (2014). On Joyride, the duo picks up where it left off with seven improvisations that bring together each musician’s complementary approaches to their instruments. Skilled on tuned percussion, Daisy is a musical drummer who can draw a rich array of sounds from his kit; meanwhile, Riordan’s piano playing, often dense and percussive, hints at his experience as a drummer. No surprise that this combination makes the two Chicagoans compatible improvisers, but it also leaves them flexible enough in their roles to guard against predictability.

Joyride opens with “Pay to Play,” full of fluttering brushwork from Daisy and crowded, sinewy lines from Riordan. Wasting no time in ascending to a pitch of intensity, the duo is forced to find escalation in unexpected ways. While Daisy makes the effective but inevitable transition from brushes to sticks, Riordan climbs the keyboard very gradually over the track’s five minutes, traversing the distance from the subterranean murmurs of first few seconds to the airy tinkling of the last almost without us noticing. The duo demonstrates a knack for this kind of high-energy improvisation throughout the album—for example “Pray to Play,” into which Riordan smuggles some Monk, or “Rules of the Roll (For Conlon Nancarrow),” where Daisy’s kinetic drumming proves a perfect match for Riordan’s indefatigable Taylor-esque volleys.

Elsewhere the playing is more meditative. “Stay Wakeful,” at eight minutes the longest track on the album, provides a particularly nice contrast to the rowdy opener. In the first half, Riordan earns an extended spotlight, atmospheric and searching; in the second half, he provides rhythmic accompaniment for Daisy, who gives us the opportunity to appreciate his command over the drums, which sing with gorgeous resonance when he wants them to. “Train Quill Writings,” as the title suggests, is another contemplative tune and a lovely way to bring the album to rest. Here Riordan’s sensitive playing evokes the image of ripples fading across the surface of gently disturbed water. Daisy provides rhythmic clicking, some strange buzzing, and finally more of that rich depth of sound—booming malleted toms, washy malleted cymbals. Both musicians come together beautifully just before the final silence falls.

Another reviewer has suggested that each of the duets on October Music Vol. 1 deserves its own full-length album. With Joyride, Daisy has set the bar high.

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Tim Daisy, Michael Thieke, Ken Vandermark – Triptych (Relay Records, 2017) ****

By Philip Coombs

Ken Vandermark once spoke about the extremely frail ecosystem that is exploratory and free music and how something, however seemingly small, can wipe out a large portion of it in a single motion without many noticing. Vandermark’s ecosystem can be as large as the great-barrier reef or as small as one person’s decision to protect it. We are all very lucky to be in the presence of the fruits of these musician’s labors, and we have a duty to do whatever we can to foster its health. Some of these musical statements can be a huge as a tectonic plate shift to a subtle ripple in a wave. Ken Vandermark’s ecosystem is all encompassing. A life could be dedicated to Ken’s life’s dedication to the art. To ride along with him requires dedication and open ears. His relentless touring schedule (airline policies and sound checks) goes into it, his eye for photography and film goes into it and his ever growing DIY handbook on social media goes into it. His humbling self-criticism is an inspiration and a reminder to not just sit and let the world go by without contributing to it in some way.

So this brings me to Triptych.

Released on Tim Daisy's Relay Records this past April, it came as a bit of an unannounced addition to the Vandermark ecosystem. In order to slow this Vandermark monologue; a definition. A triptych, 3 art panels (musicians) usually held together by hinges (common musical direction) or three musical works designed to be listened to together. This recording has indeed three musicians, Tim Daisy (Drums, radios, percussion and the composer of the three before mentioned tracks), Berlin based clarinetist and composer Michael Thieke and Ken Vandermark (tenor sax and bass clarinet) who are hinged together by Daisy’s compositions and by 5 interspersed, improvised pieces which round out the short 33 minute record and are titled for the pairings and solo efforts of the musicians involved.

The three composed pieces (At Argyle, Yellow Fern, and Tuesday at Noon) start as very listener friendly tunes that soon break away into each player’s deconstruction. The whistle-alongability is just a front and soon you delve into the non-melodic player. For example, track one, At Argyle, Thieke plays the main melody as Vandermark plays counter point so effectively that he is creating a new way of listening to it forging a situation of nearly biting my cheek as my whistling tries to keep up. The 5 improvised tracks (KV-MT, MT-TD, TD, MT, and KV) bring a different substance to the recording. Even though all of the tracks have their merits, I keep going back to KV. In a few short moments of sound Vandermark manages to add so much to his ecosystem. It reads as a complete statement as well as a bridge between his last though and his next. It may not be a tidal wave but the ripples will surely have the momentum to cross an ocean.

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Tim Daisy- Red Nation “1” (Relay Recordings) 2017 - ****½

By Philip Coombs

This is not a record for everyone. It is for me. Here’s Tim Daisy sitting in the middle of a percussive circle of absolute joy. On this recording he utilizes radios, turntables, gongs, found objects and his drum kit.

Sometimes two things equal a mere two things. In rare cases, when two things fit together so well, they create a third. A Cappella groups have different names for this but when all the voices mesh perfectly, other voices are created and everyone involved can hear them. They are heard all over this record. With such an array of toys, gadgets, and instruments at his disposal, Daisy has the good sense not to turn this into an over the top spectacle of jazz drumming saturation. Instead, he uses an incredible amount of restraint to produce not only a sometimes somber meditative piece of work but also an amazing addition to the already complex and varied Daisy cannon. Daisy is all over the music from the Chicago area and has strong relationships with the heaviest of hitters in the creative music scene, but this is all Daisy, from the no overdub approach to releasing it on his own label, Relay Recordings.

Red Nation “1” has, within this unique framework, two distinct sides. Tracks like 'Shadows Play', 'The Drunken Captain', and my personal favourite, 'Beats for an Owl', have Daisy sitting behind a traditional drum kit, playing duets with loops, noises, bells, and scratches. The other side of the recording with tracks like 'East of Appalachia', 'Concord Citizen', and the amazing Indonesian inspired 'Chant', take him away from the drums and places him within the repetition of the loops using other found items and percussion, creating an intensity that he manages to maintain with very few sources of sound. They are just well placed and perfectly timed. 'Yazoo', for example, embodies this notion.

Daisy also knows when to stop, with is one of the hardest things for an artist to learn. Again, Daisy is on point as the album clocks in at 34 minutes, which is just enough time to soak in the textures and listen to all the ghost voices he creates ( Did you hear that? What is making that sound?) while at the same time creating a need to listen to the whole thing over again.

Not a track from the album, but a great look at the approach to this recording:

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Rafael Toral, Mars Williams, Tim Daisy - Elevation (Relay Records, 2019) ****½

By Gregg Daniel Miller

Clicks, bird calls and chirps, toms and brushes, slow and then hastening, a subdued anxiety leading to a throatier sax and growled trills over snare rolls spilling out round the edges. That Rafael Toral
plays “feedback, modified amplifiers and electric oscillator” gives his dialogue with Mars Williams’ saxophone an electric edge that toys with the notions of sound, tonality, and lead instrument. In addition to “saxophones,” Williams is on “toys & busted-up autoharp.” They make a whole lot of something from nothing, grabbing sounds from the detritus of noise making; not turning it into monument – more like the feeling of the air in a room turning into weather, or a quick-sketch of some delectable with sprinkles slowly turning edible

Throughout these three long-form pieces, Tim Daisy’s percussiveness allows the other two musicians a rhythmic floor over which they can work, but if your ears shift focus (especially on the first two tracks), the percussion becomes the all, and the richer noises turn out to simply ornament the drier pulses of the drum kit. At times we’ve got for the most part three percussionists playing at different registers with different toys. The third track becomes almost a lullaby, like those urban night noises over tinnitus that keep you awake at the edge of sleep slowing coalescing into morning birds and car alarms when you realize you’ve finally slept. Incidental music for the free noise fan.

Portugal-based Rafael Toral, whose aesthetic this record most embodies, explains his approach as heavily influenced by Zen, trumpeter Sei Miguel and John Cage, identifying the “defining features in [his] practice and thinking [. . .] as space, silence, unpredictability, agency, responsibility and acceptance . . . .” I prefer Elevation to Toral’s Live in Boston (with Chris Corsano) which as a more stripped down version (drums & feedback noises) has less sonic surprise built in.

Tim Daisy owns and operates Relay Records and is an important player in Chicago’s free-improv scene. My colleague Tom Burris (in his review of Daisy’s 2014 very excellent, but more “free jazz” record, October Music Vol. 1: 7 Compositions for Duet) calls Daisy “Chicago’s most imaginative drummer.” Daisy’s work on Elevation underscores the deep continuity that underlies free improvisation using traditional jazz instrumentation and what we find here, noise electronics with saxophone & other percussion subordinated to that concept.

Mars Williams has performed with Peter Brötzmann, Ken Vandermark, and various rock bands. With Paal Nilssen-Love’s trio, Boneshaker on Thinking out Loud or Fake Music, Mars Williams’ playing is a mix of fiery and meditative. Here on Elevation, Williams uses his saxophone less as an expressive extension of intention, and more as another miscellaneous toy adding playful, inventive, thoughtful incursions into the feedbacks and silences.

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Darren Johnston & Tim Daisy - Crossing Belmont (Relay Digital, 2017) ****

By Stef Gijssels

Sometimes it's hard to write about music, even if the music is great, and that's the case on this album. Trumpeter Darren Johnston and drummer Tim Daisy give us two long pieces to enjoy. The first clocks at twenty-five minutes, the second at almost ten. It does not seem as if anything has been agreed upon in advance, and it's this kind of jump and go attitude that creates a very fresh and authentic sound. The first five minutes give us a high energy interaction, with repeated phrases on the trumpet and power percussion, and suddenly the mood becomes calmer, with Daisy demonstrating his inventiveness by playing a slow solo, a kind of sphere-setting thing. Johnston's moaning sounds, electronically altered and muted, creates a deep heartfelt emotion before taking up renewed energy and intensity.

Both Johnston and Daisy are wonderful improvisers, who shift inside and outside the traditional use of their instruments, listening well to each other, and often taking the listener by surprise, while at the same time creating a story that unfolds before your ears, crisp, crackling and sparkling, and fun.

The performance was recorded live on April 23, 2017 at the Hungry Brain in Chicago, and is among the absolutely enjoyable ones in our long list of trumpet-piano duos.

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Triage - Live at the Velvet Lounge (Aerophonic, 2020) ***(*)

By Stephen Griffith

Triage was a fascinating group for me because the Vandermark 5 used to occasionally play in nearby venues in the 90s as part of short midwestern tours. When Dave Rempis and Tim Daisy replaced Mars Williams and Tim Mulvenna respectively, it shook things up in nicely unexpected ways in terms of adding new lyrical voices to the quintet. Those two subsequently added bassist Jason Ajemian to explore a trio persona in an exciting spinoff called Triage. In doing background work for this I revisited their recordings in my collection (Premium Plastics on Solitaire Records and Twenty Minute Cliff and American Mythology on Okka Disk; the limited edition Stagger on Utrech, recorded live in Syracuse, New York, oddly eluded me) and found they held up quite well 15 years, or more, later.

Which brings us to the current digital only recording, a first set recorded at the iconic Velvet Lounge in early 2005 while Fred Anderson still ran the place and provided a workshop of sorts for the group to develop their material. Two of the songs, “Rotor” and “Cape Coast” were included on Stagger but the nearly 21 minute “No Fires” appears only on this release. Over the course of Triage’s short existence it seemed like Rempis went from being primarily an alto player to steadily improving his prowess on tenor and eventually adding the baritone saxophone to his repertoire. “No Fires” leads off with brawny rapidfire DKV like extended tenor runs through a series of groove based motifs, leaning on one briefly before moving on with Daisy and Ajemian locked in. The tenor fades out as Daisy continues the rattling rhythm pattern before slowing things down as Ajemian returns with bowed lines over which Rempis returns with trilled lines before returning to the opening motif and further developments before winding things down into a leisurely rhythm before a plaintive restatement of the theme concludes a deceptively well structured composition. “Rotor” features an Ornetteish alto romp with Daisy tossing in playful cymbal and snare accents as Ajemian maintains the beat. Daisy takes an inventive solo, like a kid with a chemistry set only mixing percussive reagents, before Rempis returns with the baritone to mix things up with deftly smeary big horn resonances before joining Jason to quietly create a slow pulsing rhythm augmented by Tim’s mallets. “Cape Coast" begins with a plaintive tenor theme after which Ajemian plays some strenuous bowing creating a cinema noirish waterfront vibe before fading out to end the well received set.

In the summer following this, Ajemian relocated to New York ending the group as a replacement bassist wasn't considered. Rempis and Daisy have continued their musical relationship with the Rempis/Daisy Duo, the Rempis/Piet/Daisy Trio, Tim Daisy’s Fulcrum Ensemble and the Rempis Percussion Quartet to only name a few. Jason Ajemian has kept active with Jaimie Branch’s Fly or Die and with the Exploding Star Orchestra. But this release provides an enjoyably welcome end point to their collaboration as Triage.

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Tim Daisy and Jason Stein - Alive at the Woodland Book Center (Relay,2014) ****

By Paul Acquaro

I'm glad I had the opportunity to write about Tim Daisy and Jason Stein's duo album Alive at the Woodland Book Center. I have an unfettered bias to all things bass clarinet and have enjoyed Stein's woodwind work in his other recordings including The Story this Time. Daisy's discography is excellent as well, as the reviewers from this blog will eagerly attest to. Together, they do not disappoint as already proven by their work on Bascule.

Growling humming thrumming and drumming - the tracks on Alive at the Woodland Book Center entitled 'Reading', 'Thinking' and 'Being' are just a subset of the overarching category of "Playing One's Ass Off". Kicking off with a tentative melody over some mallet work, the duo is just warming up. Soon Stein's playing begins getting more aggressive, with bigger and bigger intervallic leaps and the most appropriate use of the instrument's ability to create low register blats to help underscore the intensity of some passages. 

The energy is unmistakable throughout, but on the track 'Being', it seems even more so. The duo is connected - Daisey's percussion locked in with Stein's lines as the two propel each other forward, the expressive melody takes over the whole horn as the percussion furnishes complex counter rhythms. 

This is an excellent recording sounding recording of the duo in action. Give a listen here on Bandcamp ... or better yet just get it, at $2.99 you're not going to find a better deal!

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Tim Daisy’s Vox 3 - October Bells (Sonic Action Records)

By Charlie Watkins

Vox 3 is Tim Daisy’s trio with Fred Lonberg–Holm on cello and James Falzone on clarinet. They’ve been playing together since 2008, when their eponymous debut was released, and I believe this is now their ninth recording together – most of which have been under the name Vox Arcana. I reached out to Tim to ask what prompted the name change, and he told me that he changed the name when he started adding other musicians to the group: Macie Stewart on Roman Poems (2019) and Gabby Fluke-Mogul on A New Hotel (2023). He also hinted that the future might see even larger configurations. But the trio remains the core.

Tim Daisy describes Vox 3 as his ‘experimental music trio’. I think ‘experimental’ might be overstating it a little: compared to most things on this blog, I would say Vox 3 falls on the more accessible side of avant-garde jazz. This isn’t a criticism, just an honest acknowledgement that what you get here is not massively ‘out there’. I would instead describe Vox 3 as a storytelling trio. They have a unique language that wouldn’t feel out of place if you were sitting around a fire, listening to folk tales of danger and sorrow. It makes the music quite accessible, in spite of the freely improvised elements, and reminds me a little of the early Ornette Coleman, whose free jazz was so deeply rooted in the blues. Similarly here, the melodies are simple, but it is the highly textural use of percussion that turns these folk tunes into miniature stories.

The record starts with Escriptura, a free jazz romp, with Fred Lonberg-Holm walking the cello(!) whilst James Falzone growls away over the top. James is an extraordinary clarinettist who really shows off what the clarinet is capable of: his abstract lines and vibrant array of timbres make him a formidable presence. After a drum break, James and Fred swap over, James now accompanying Fred’s fierce improvisation. I wish we could have heard a bit more of this powerful, passionate playing on the record – you only need to listen to Fred’s recordings with Peter Brötzmann to hear what he can do – but there are only occasional hints of this throughout.

Most of the album is much more mellow in tone, especially tunes like A Simple Theme, where the cello is played arco and the clarinet much more melodic. In fact, the rest of the album is generally more like this. I think sometimes the narrative-driven compositions mean the individual tracks end up with too much variety, whereas I think the record could be more interesting if each track had a stronger individual identity. Nonetheless, I did enjoy the way the improvised elements were integrated in almost as if they were scenes in a drama, especially on The Real Sky, which I think shows all three musicians at their best and manages to hold together melody and experimentation in an interesting way.

There are enjoyable moments throughout, and you will certainly find yourself drawn into the stories they are weaving. But I think this album only hints at the potential of Vox 3, and the stories they have left to tell.

October Bells is available from Sonic Action Records on Bandcamp.

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Vandermark & friends ....

The guy's prolific, open to playing with musicians from very diverse backgrounds. That being said, I have the impression that Vandermark is little influenced by the musicians he plays with. He does his thing, and the others try to add some spice.

Artifact: iTi Live In St. Johann (Okka Disk, 2010) **½

This album starts abstract and wild, with Johannes Bauer's trombone and Vandemark's sax locking horns, supported by Paal Nilssen-Love's explosive power-drumming, and totally thrown off-balance by the absolutely irritating screeching and scratching of Thomas Lehn's synthesizer. At moments inspired, but unfortunately not always, the music evolves without too much sense of direction. The quiet second piece offers a break in the otherwise mad chaos.

Lean Left - The Ex Guitars meet Nilssen-Love/Vandermark Duo, Volume 1 (Smalltown Superjazzz, 2010) ***½

On this album, released in two parts, with Volume 1 already available and Volume 2 to be released later this year, Vandermark and Nilssen-Love meet Andy Moor and Terrie Ex, the guitarists of the Dutch punk band "The Ex". On the major part of the album, you have duets between the saxophonist and the drummer, and that is the best thing about this album. The added value of Moor and Ex is at best in support of the two leaders, adding power and rawness to the proceedings, but otherwise they seem completely lost about what to do, if not for adding some noise on the lengthy "Right Lung". Their limited skills force Vandermark and Nilssen-Love to keep their approach quite simple, the usual power play with repetitive and unmistakeable Vandermark phrasing. When the powerplay subsides, more sensitive moments arise, in which the guitars contribute little, while luckily remaining relatively unobtrusive.

Volume 2 starts as a kind of mirror to Volume 1, with the two guitars taking the lead on the first piece for some minimalist noise-making, with Vandermark only faintly joining after ten minutes or so. The second piece is on the contrary all fire and explosion, with all four members contributing quite powerfully, also in the more quiet moments.

Tim Daisy / Ken Vandermark Duo - Light On The Wall (Laurence Family Records, 2010) ****

This double vinyl is the most welcome album of the series, with Vandermark playing duets with Tim Daisy on drums on the first disk. The performance was recorded exactly two years ago in Poznań, Poland.

The album starts with "Autostrada", slowly picking up speed with Vandermark on clarinet, then Daisy pushes up a kind of tribal rhythm, bringing the clarinet to full intensity, then slowing down for a nice melodious moment. "The Empty Chair" is the ideal Vandermark + percussion duet, full of funky power, deep rhythmic grooves, offering the drummer all the opportunities to demonstrate what can be done if the rhythm is already so inherently present in the solo instrument, and that's what Daisy does, grasping the opportunity to play slow, or double-time, or play around the beat, all cleverness and subtlety, driving the reverse situation to an extreme in the last minutes. Man, this is great fun!

The B-side starts with "Turnabout", a quiet and sensitive piece, lyrical and sweet, and is followed "Landing", in which the rhythm picks up again for some great funky improv, not unlike what we've heard before, yet always nice to hear again, with "Decollage" being more abstract free improv without clear patterns.

On the second disk, Tim Daisy plays seven pieces for solo percussion, and on the D-side, Vandermark brings four 'études for Jimmy Giuffre' on clarinet. Both solo sides are quite interesting to listen to, and a nice addition to complete the album, yet are not really essential.

Watch a clip of Vandermark + Daisy, recorded on May 15, 2008, so exactly two years ago.



Buy from Instantjazz.

© stef

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Tim Daisy and Mikolaj Trzaska - In This Moment. (Relay Recordings, 2014) ***½

By Hugo Truyens

There are albums you can turn to at any time, knowing the high probability of them providing exactly what the doctor ordered. To each man his own. They don’t necessarily have to be the easy records, or the mellifluous. I have favourite albums that can disperse crowds. And then there are the others, the ones you probably are only going to hear once, maybe twice. It pays well once in a while to take one of those and listen to it. And listen again.

This one is a short one (31’51”) and is made by Mikolaj Trzaska with Tim Daisy. Alto saxophone and drums. The title is In this moment. The first time I listened to it left me undecided. On another day it would probably not enter the first category, mentioned above. But that’s too easy now. So I read the songtitles : On Division, Grass and Trees, Statues in the Park, On Washtenau (like that one), Sirens Above Cortez. This is city music. There is some serious traffic going on here. I’m guessing we’re in Chicago. I have listened a few times by now. It is not going to enter in category one, it is not that kind of record to me. But I can get into it.

The drumming is relentless throughout and stretches over the entire spectrum, never losing its pulse. And then there’s a saxophone. I know Mikolaj from an album with the Oles Brothers (Mikro Muzik), but this is not the mood he’s in. He has different things to say. In Grass and Trees e.g. the rumbling of distant thunder and the wailing plangent saxophone soaring  above. If I were there, with them in the room I know I would relax my spine and give in without thinking. It ends with a delicious spluttering over shuffles and cymbals. Now I realize what it is. I realize how apt the title is. This is the now. It is not their now now, it is mine. And that’s the beauty of it. This is one of the records that have the potential of opening up the moment to you, when you listen. Glad I did.

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Feldman, Daisy, Rempis - Sirocco (Aerophonic, 2023)

By Kenneth Blanchard

Mark Feldman – violin
Dave Rempis – alto/tenor/baritone saxophone
Tim Daisy – drums

A Sirocco is a hot wind blowing up from Libya toward Italy. I find it fascinating that a hot wind has a return address. It is also a movie set in Damascus, starring Humphrey Bogart who “meets destiny in a low-cut gown.” I am pretty sure the musicians had the first in mind. The second seemed to me to echo as I listened to this exquisite album. Every bit of Sirocco reminds me of a vast current moving from far away into my corner of the conscious world. To feel a hot, dry wind is to feel a thousand miles of strange geography on the surface of your skin.

The first two minutes of the first movement (OSTRO) oriented me toward the direction of the wind. It was the kind of spooky that is most intense because it is subtle and puzzling. Ostro is a southerly wind. The almost insect-like whistle-whine is eerie; it must be telling me something important! At just shy of the third minute, the violin drops down and the drums enter the conversation. Still the buzzing, and then the rapid warble increases as the instruments dig in and, one bit at a time, build up an edifice of evocative lines and surfaces.

At seven minutes in (a quarter of the first piece) we first hear a subtle pitter pat from the percussion that teases, reminiscent of water on rocks but revealing only that dry wind on the tent strings. Most of the first movement is given to solos by horn or violin that move in a vast space created by the percussion. Occasionally horn and strings encircle the listener as the drumbeat carries the two along that geography.

The second movement (BORA), like the first, is about twenty-eight minutes. Bora is another dry northeasterly wind, this one a cold blast on the Adriatic. Here a touch more narrative is detectable, bits you could hum along to, and even a little Hollywood romance in the violin lines. Don’t worry, the insect hum of the wind, the ripple of the air current over rough percussive ground, is always there. I think I liked the second movement better, but only because the first prepared me for it. This trio has mastered the art of preparing the ground.

I’ve had an ear out for Dave Rempis for some time. I can recommend The Covid Tapes, with Tomeka Reid, Joshua Abrams, Tim Daisy, Tyler Damon. I noticed Feldman on recordings with Ivo Perelman and Susan Alcorn. For Tim Daisy, check out this YouTube clip .

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Wolter Wierbos, Jasper Stadhouders, Tim Daisy- Sounds in a Garden (Relay, 2016) ****½

By Philip Coombs

Wolter Wierbos, Dutch trombonist, is a multi-disciplined artist to say the least. He has ventured into dance, film, television and theatre and has played on hundreds of albums with more familiar names than I could possibly list here and amazingly, this worldly experience can be forced through a bell of a trombone.

Jasper Stadhouders, electric guitar and bass, who along with Tim Daisy (drums) have had a chance to musically bond during their recent Made to Break time together round out this trio that bursts with ideas, sounds, and drama.

The recording is bookended with an opening statement and a closing statement; 'Finding Things' and 'Pelvis to Snare' respectively, with the real substance exploding within the three longer tracks in between. 'Happy to Play', gives those who may not be too familiar with the work and sound of Wierbos, (me) a chance to hear the world as he does. He goes from melancholy to the sounds of choking to death in a matter of moments. So far the soundtrack to this garden is great but i’m not sure if I want to visit. Wierbos steps away throughout but is never truly gone. Daisy switches to brushes and Stadhouder electronically manipulates the air trapped in my headphones. Daisy cannot only lead a band, he also knows how to stay impossibly creative while letting the others extend their technique.

'Loose Cannon', leaves little time to get adjusted before all three players forcefully interpret what a loose cannon is. This track being over twenty-two and a half minutes, it leaves plenty of time to have monumental breakdowns between various duo settings before the reconstruction. Here is a good a time as any to just say how much fun this is. This track really has everything while giving you the best of each of the players.

'The Grizzly Purr' creates a tense and anxious mood as each musician slowly adds idea over idea until the track has created its own ecosystem inhabited by all sorts of wildlife. Just eight minutes in 'The Grizzly Purr' revisits where it started but yet slightly more ominous.

An album worth repeated listens, this will be spun on my commute for days to come while keeping me dreaming of this secret garden and the sounds that it makes over the concrete i’ll be driving on. Closing statement, turn of the key, I’ve arrived.

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Vox Arcana -Caro's Song (Relay, 2015) *****

[b]By Tom Burris[/b]

Let's just get this out of the way.  Chicago drummer/composer Tim Daisy is getting his second 5-star review from me in 2015.  I don't want to give it to him – because it just plain looks bad, like I'm on the Relay payroll or something.  But Caro's Song is simply that goddamn good.  What follows is a review-length justification of my guilt.

Daisy's ensemble writing here draws heavily on the mid-70s Anthony Braxton model for quartet, which I believe is as fine and sturdy as the more popular late-50s/early-60s Ornette Coleman Quartet model (which was so successfully utilized by fellow Chicagoan Keefe Jackson on Seeing You See back in 2010).  It typically involves a fast statement of the theme, followed by a variation, then a (usually looser) re-statement of the theme, then a loose improvisation on top of a skeletal structure.  This is just the jumping-off point for Daisy, as he bends and folds the blueprint to serve the needs of this trio, which also features Fred Lonberg-Holm (cello, electronics) and James Falzone (bass clarinet).  This is the group's fourth recording. 

“Assembly” opens the disc with Daisy on marimba; and the group immediately calls to mind Jimmy Giuffre's late 50s trio recordings, as Daisy himself acknowledges in the liner notes.  The collective improvisation near the end of the track sets a standard that would be difficult for any band to maintain; but Vox Arcana is simply laying the foundation for the rest of the disc.  The title track follows, utilizing the 70s Arista Braxton composition model for the first time.  Lonberg-Holm does quite well in the Dave Holland role, alternately scraping-&-sawing and plucking the groove (when one surfaces) with fine precision.  The song ends with a compositional surprise: a Braxton-esque loop starting and stopping, fading out to the end. 

This music is spacious, open, and warm – even when abruptly changing gears.  The musicians employ a confident approach that reflects the amount of experience they have with each other.  “Silver Light” is a perfect example, opening with long quiet notes on clarinet and cello, as beautiful as a Morton Feldman piece.  When Lonberg-Holm and Falzone play long notes over a Daisy's busy (but relaxed!) marimba in perfect counterpoint, the sublime becomes transcendent.  There is a hilarious perversion of the Braxton composition model at the beginning of “Objects,” that involves tweaks in the time/space continuum.  Daisy seems to be dangling Fred and James from strings, forcing them in different directions and then suddenly bringing them back together solely through the intuitive will of his drumming.  “Contained” demonstrates even more clearly that this group can play as one six-armed machine, with brilliant unhurried statements made by all, collectively and individually.

The disc concludes with “The Mad Dance,” which begins with Daisy playing a semi-Latin beat which is answered by Fred and James.  Then Daisy replies.  Then the response.  Then faster.  Then higher.  Daisy switches to marimba, pounding out one note repeatedly before finally extending into free runs that actually appear to alternately extend and cut time.  It's a trick that wouldn't work without the exercise that preceded it, but knowing this does not ruin the effect at all.  He settles on a tempo and Falzone enters, playing a solemn melody over Daisy's arpeggios.  Then enter Lonberg-Holm, plucking one bass note while Daisy flips on a radio.  Static and a lone unintelligible voice accompany briefly while Daisy moves to the drum set.  He slowly pounds out four-on-the-floor with bass drum, ride cymbal and snare in unison with Fred's bass note, building tension like the V.U. or Godspeed.  Yes, this eventually hits the sky – but then it abruptly stops on a dime leaving only Falzone's clarinet softly landing us all on the ground.  Incredible.  I'll be amazed if a more solid album appears before the year's end.  If it does happen, and if it's on Relay, I'm not writing that review!  No one would believe me.

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