In November, colleague Nick Ostrum reviewed the trio of Cath Roberts, Corey Mwamba and Olie Brice "Trio Set At LUME". The vibraphonist from Derby in the UK has been quite active last year, despite the clear message on his website: "I retired from all public performances in March 2019. All gig offers will be refused", and this for a variety of reasons, none of them related to Covid. Despite this, he stays active, and even very active.
Corey Mwamba is the current presenter of Freeness, a weekly programme on BBC Radio 3, focused on on adventurous jazz and improvised music. I can only recommend that you check this one out. Readers of our blog will surely appreciate the programme. He is also the lead administrator of Out Front!, an organisation promoting and producing 'new music'. Mwamba was also the artistic director of Derby Jazzfrom 2016 to 2020. Mwamba was granted an AHRC studentship for a Master of Research degree in Music at Keele University, for which he was awarded a distinction in 2014. Through this research, Corey developed new dark art, which is a notational and theoretical music system that takes early European medieval music practice as a starting point to create modern music. He was awarded a doctorate in Jazz Research at Birmingham City University. I also recommend to have a look at the research page on his website for those of you interested in the more theoretical approach to his music.
Rachel Musson & Corey Mwamba - What We Said When We Met (Takuroku, 2020)
We reviewed British saxophonist Rachel Musson before, and she figured on colleague Lee Rice Epstein's end of year list with her album "I Went This Way". On "What We Said When We Met", Musson and Mwamba perform a duo through zoom. Both musicians performed together from 2013 till 2019 when the vibraphonist decided to no longer to perform in public. And now with the pandemic, creative solutions were required. Despite the limited recording technology, the quality of the sound is excellent, very intimate and close. Musson's tone is direct, expressive and stripped of anything superfluous, and her sometimes raw yet sensitive tone matches well with the bright open sound of Mwamba's vibes. The latter is not a percussive player, but rather a weaver of sounds, managing a sonic fluidity that is unusual with the instrument. The collective efforts is gentle, versatile and they appear to be very close listeners.
Nick Malcolm & Corey Mwamba - Chat (Green Eyes, 2020)
We find Mwamba back on this equally intimate duet with British trumpet player Nick Malcolm. Interestingly enough, as on the duet with Musson, this album's title also evocates a conversation. And it is. Like Musson and Mwamba, Malcolm has many musical projects he's working on, including his own record label, for all of them possibly the result of creativity and possibly also necessity. I am not familiar with his other projects, but this one is a winner. The music 'shines', it has a wonderful lively dynamic, with a great positive undertone. Even a track like 'Down The Bell', that starts quite subdued, is rapidly brought to more energetic levels, not of speed but of intensity and musical joy. Both instruments find a common voice in the warm clarity of their tone, making their music sound like a cheerfully rippling river. It's not spectacular, it's not boundary-shifting, but it's of high quality and wonderfully human.
Malcolm himself writes: "I feel it is a beautiful document of a musical and personal friendship, with elements of combat, playfulness and celebration, all emanating from a deep mutual listening, and from brotherly love and respect." This underlying understanding and friendship clearly determines the quality of the interaction and of the music.
The Swedish trio Fire! - reeds player Mats Gustafsson, bass player Johan
Berthling and drummer Andreas Werliin - never sound the same. Fire!’s
insurmountable free jazz matched with powerful, hypnotic grooves still
defines Defeat, the trio's seventh album since 2009, but with some
major differences. Somehow, the pessimistic title and the dark cover art by
Kim Hiorthøy define faithfully our pressing times.
Gustafsson leaves aside the tenor saxophone and the bass saxophone, which
played a major role in the sound of Fire!’s last album The Hands (Rune
Grammofon, 2018), and focuses on the flute, his first instrument, as he did
on the recent album from The Underflow trio (with trumpeter Rob Mazurek and
guitarist David Grubbs, Instant Opaque Evening, Blue Chopsticks, 2021), the
baritone saxophone and electronics. The addition of trumpeter Goran Kajfeš
(who plays quarter-tone trumpet) and trombonist and sousaphone player Mats
Äleklint, both played in Fire! Orchestra, color the tight, rhythmic
interplay of Fire! with layered horn arrangements, done by Aleklint.
The atmosphere of Defeat, recorded in October 2019 and February 2020 at the
Village Recording in Copenhagen, is clearly more reserved, even gentle and
lyrical than of Fire!’s previous albums, close to the one of Instant Opaque
Evening, which was recorded in the same period of time. Gustafsson’s
expressive and ornamental approach on the flute opens up the new pieces and
allows the rhythm section of Berthling and Werlin to patiently cook more
nuanced hypnotic pulses. Kajfeš and Äleklint expand the rhythmic spectrum
of Fire! With their clever playful interplay with Gustafsson, especially on
the opening “A Random Belt. Rats You Out”.
“Each Millimeter Of The Toad” begins with Gustafsson’s raw electronics
noises and his expressive talking-singing with the flute, but soon
surrenders to the subdued yet sensual groove of Berthling and Werliin, a
typical charismatic baritone saxophone solo of Gustafsson and
call-and-response game with Kajfeš and Äleklint. Werliin and Berthling lay
a tribal pulse for “Defeat (Only Further Apart)”, triggering Gustafsson,
Kajfeš and Äleklint abstraction of this addictive groove. The last piece,
“Alien (To My Feet)” is the most melancholic and unsettling piece here.
Gustafsson’s contemplative, lyrical tone on the baritone saxophone and
later on the flute fits perfectly the open, sparse rhythmic patterns of
Berthling and Werliin.
Defeated again, this time not by Fire! Sheer power but by its surprising
fresh, reserved and still highly seductive approach.
Being a father with a son, I will foreground the fact that I was easy prey
for the sentimental angle on this fantastic set of music. I’m not going to
say I was deceived, or that I was driven to over value the sounds because
the circumstance is so charming, but the father-son-story of Michael and
Peter Formanek was one of the reasons I chose to talk about this disc, as
opposed to any of the hundreds (not kidding) of discs that cross my field
of vision in this role. That said, I don’t really need an excuse to talk
about Michael Formanek, easily my favorite bassist during “these times.”
Dyads
is a duet set between Michael Formanek and his son, Peter, on tenor
saxophone and clarinet. It’s a quiet-ish (-ist?) affair, with the space and
the communication achieving a level of clarity that I so very much love.
The level of sympatico between Michael and Peter is — I’m not going to call
it extraordinary, but that’s what it is. Listening to them construct these
pieces (with composing duties pretty much equally divided between the two)
is like being privy to an intimate conversation. There is an equity to the
roles that is emblematic of M Formanek’s past work. Yes, the bass supports,
and it also weaves melody, and the saxophone also supports. There is a
mutuality to the playing here that wins me over.
I have two platonic ideals for this sort of super small group setting. The
first is the bass/reed duet on Anthony Braxtons Five Pieces 1975.
Dave Holland and Braxton do a bursting out of the gates version of “You
Stepped Out of a Dream.” That was the time I understood what Tom Waits’
meant when he said, “Someone oughta lock up that bass!” Holland swung so
hard on that. He was so “original and inevitable.” And, again, there was
that clarity of voice. Braxton and Holland in conversation. The second
platonic ideal for “this kind of thing” is the trio work of Jimmy Giuffre.
It might be that I am being swayed into seeing this connection by Peter
Formanek’s giuffrian horns. Neither the tenor nor the clarinet is a second
horn. Each is a voice of its own, weaving a thoughtful, knotty post-bop
reality that almost defines my sweet spot.
Also, it seems important to mention that this duet was recorded in a studio
in 2020 and the sound is goddanged exquisite. I’m no audiophile, but the
depth of sound coming from Formanek’s bass reminds me of the time I sat
three feet away from Reggie Workman doing his thing. It’s hypnotic.
Ensorceling.
The Pre-Apocalyptic Michael Formanek Quartet (Out of Your Head Records, 2020) ****
Not that long ago it felt like there was a system of stellar bodies
orbiting each other in the free jazz firmament and those bodies were Tim
Berne, Michael Formanek, and Craig Taborn. The playlist that could be
constructed of their combined work would be formidable and bring much joy.
My favorite of the lot — this is me going out on a limb, now — was
Formanek’s ECM disc, The Rub and Spare Change. This disc is a live
set done in 2014 with those three eminences (and Gerald Cleaver on drums)
doing the Rub repertoire. Again, I am not an audiophile, but the
sound on the ECM record is (to quote myself) “goddanged exquisite,” and it
is jarring to move from that to the rougher confines of a live club
recording. But it’s more than made up for by getting to hear these pieces
being done over by folks who are constitutionally incapable of doing the
same thing twice. The creativity that unfolds … is exactly what you would
expect from this crew and it is utterly engaging and fascinating. Like an
amazing Carrollian rabbit hole that drags you into it.
On June 5, 1969, an unrecorded singer named Judy Stuart went into
Apostolic Studio in New York to record two demo tracks to present to
Vanguard Records. Steve Tintweiss arranged, conducted and produced. At
the time Vanguard was pioneering quadraphonic surround sound, so
special care was taken to create a 12-channel tape in the hope it could
be released in the new format. As it turned out, Vanguard wasn’t
interested. By that time, Stuart (born Judith Pizzarelli) was 30 years
old and had been singing publicly since childhood, following from
amateur contests to singing standards, including work with the
bandleaders Les and Larry Elgart. In his liner essay, distinguished
historian and broadcaster Ben Young (he wrote Dixonia: a
Bio-discography of Bill Dixon) remarks, mysteriously, “Stuart appeared
on at least one published phonograph record.”
As popular music changed, so had she: she wrote songs and accompanied
herself on guitar. In the late ‘60s she sang with rock bands, then
later wrote music for plays produced by La Mama. A couple of years ago,
Tintweiss decided to release the two 1969 tracks and made arrangements
with Stuart. She died, around eighty, before ever hearing the test
pressings. The two songs from the session have now appeared as the
first release on Tintweiss’s label: it’s a 10” 45 rpm record, about as
specialized a format as you could find to release 12 minutes and 14
seconds of music.
Why am I telling you all this? Because the music is startling, a direct
window on the possibilities‒some real, some imaginary‒of what music
might be or become 52 years ago: free, creative, previously unimagined
and…popular.
You might recognize Tintweiss’s name if you’re an aficionado of the
early ESP recordings and the ‘60s explosion of free jazz. He’s the
bassist in the band with Burton Greene that accompanies Patty Waters on
that extraordinary version of “Black Is the Color of My True Love’s
Hair” on her ESP debut. Tintweiss is also the bassist on Albert Ayler’s
final tour recordings, Nuits de La Fondation Maeght. The backing band
on Silver’s Apostolic Session is composed of musicians more familiar in
advanced jazz than rock circles. Greene is the pianist. Calo Scott (who
worked with Gerry Mulligan, Ahmed-Abdul Malik, Gato Barbieri and Archie
Shepp, and appeared on Carla Bley and Paul Haines’ Escalator over the
Hill [the most ambitious genre fusion/confusion of the era]) plays
cello. Marc Levin, who made a record for Savoy in 1968 with Scott and
Cecil McBee, plays cornet. & valve trombone. Dave Baker, who played
trombone with George Russell and later became a cellist and famed jazz
educator, was the recording engineer.
What does the music sound like? Crazy. Stuart’s songs come in broken,
half-talked phrases, with sudden interval leaps, shifts in timbre,
pitch bends, weird shrieks and yodels. The words to “Inspiration” and
“Nickel Bag of Tears” are a struggle to understand (I came away from
the former with “the wet collect the faded dead”; the latter has a
great title) . . . almost Dylan sings Schoenberg. If I’d heard it fifty
years ago, I probably could have made out the words (or just imagined
them). The accompanying music is loopy, filled with high-speed
collisions, compound dissonances and twisted solo episodes, held
together by sometimes commonplace riffs. Paul Nash’s guitar is either
fragmentary or high speed, haunted by strange, internal tensions. Scott
and Greene are momentarily brilliant and strange, while Tintweiss,
conducting, somehow manages to make all the disparate and far-flung
bits, pieces and sudden impulses come together, in a way that may be
more spontaneous if less magical than Captain Beefheart.
It summons up a time when music could be both brief and startling.
Mallet percussionist Patricia Brennan crafts a tuneful environment on the
hour-long debut solo and debut as leader, Maquishti. While Brennan
has recorded with
7 Poets Trio, most of her recorded work is with large ensembles, including
Michael Formanek’s Ensemble Kolossus,
Matt Mitchell’s, the John Hollenbeck Large Ensemble, and the
Webber/Morris Big Band. It’s refreshing to hear her vibraphone and marimba unobscured, with space
for the harmonic glow of the bars to breathe. Some tracks are highlighted
as improvisations, but many of the other tracks were composed out of
improvisations in the studio, so there’s a spirit of spontaneity that keeps
things fresh.
Most of the tracks feature vibraphone, and most of those have a melodic
theme. The pacing is relaxed and the time between strikes spacious. The
vibraphone is sometimes lightly modulated with effects pedals, bowing, or
pitch-bending techniques, the spaced-out tones of “Solar” being a great
example. The tunes teeter on lullaby or jingle territory but playfully
explored, making a music that is surficially simple but rewards a close
listen for harmonics that hang in the air, clash with each other, and
blend. Notable exceptions, which are also the most lively vibraphone
tracks, include the angular contrapuntal rhythm of “Magic Square,” the new
age drone and bowed wavy resonance of “Away from Us,” and the small sounds,
scraped glissandos, and tinny mbira-esque pluckings achieved with objects
on “Point of No Return.” The marimba tracks - “Improvisation VI,”
“Improvisation VII,” and “Derrumbe de Turquesas” - are welcome timbral
palate cleansers and, juxtaposed next to the ringing vibraphone, illuminate
the lower resonance of the material; whereas the vibraphone easily fills
space with a single note, the marimba often plays at an increased tempo and
drastically varies tempo and volume to fill space and create movement. The
marimba tracks are evenly sequenced but the more adventurous tracks are
backended, which seems to provide a pacing strategy that eases in
conventionally-minded listeners and hooks more adventurous listeners before
too long.
I have a personal bias, in that I hoped for a solo mallet record -
something I’m not sure has been done in this style since Bobby Naughton’s
and Jay Hoggard’s records in 1979 - to really extend the sound and language
of the instruments, but this is not far from the foundations of Milt
Jackson or Bobby Hutcherson. That said, Brennan’s style is distinctive from
Adasiewicz, Dell, Moran, Nicodemou, etc., not to mention the other
percussionists that dabble in mallet instruments, and that’s made clearer
than ever thanks to this intimate format. There is a measured, comfortable
inside-outside sandbox play here. And while I think the focus is on the
tunes, their dancing harmonics, now uninterrupted by other instruments,
give the ear a lot of material to enjoy.
British pioneer vocal artist Phil Minton turned eighty this year. Minton’s
close collaborators in the last decade are the Berlin-based, fellow-vocal
artist Audrey Chen and Viennese turntables wizard dieb13.
Audrey Chen & Phil Minton - Frothing Morse (Tour de Bras, 2020) ****
Minton said recently in an interview to The Wire that “singing with Audrey
is like working with all the possible noises of the universe and beyond,
earthquakes, colliding galaxies and slugs sliding down a wet window, very
quiet. It’s endured because we love working together and some people in the
world ask us to perform for them and give us a meager wage”. Frothing Morse
is the second album of this duo, following By the Stream (Sub Rosa, 2013).
The title-piece was recorded live at the Santa Chiara Nuova church in Lodi,
Italy, during the ImprovvisaMente festival in November 2015. The intense
and fearless, dadaist conversational duet aims to go deeper than the
textual level as Minton and Chen explore the most inherent bodily
instruments and search for enigmatic, unintelligible and incomprehensible
means of communication that leave behind all common elements of language,
syntax, or vocabulary. Chen and Minton sound like one, two-headed vocal
organism, interacting in a total telepathic manner. They explore together
an expressive and highly nuanced spectrum of feelings and moods, from the
meditative and ritualist, through the sensual and passionate, and,
obviously, to the eccentric and grotesque, but with an arresting sense of
timing, storytelling and emotional drama.
Phil Minton & dieb3 - With, Without (Klanggalerie, 2020) ****
Minton and dieb13 (aka Dieter Kovačič, a generation younger from Minton)
work were scarcely documented so far - the DVDr’s (Unlimited 23, PanRec,
2011, and im Pavillon, PanRec, 2013), both captured short performances at
the Unlimited Festival in Wels, Austria. With, Without is a collage of
Minton and dieb13 performances from the Unlimited festival in 2009, through
three performances in Vienna, one at the Instants Chavires Festival in
Montreuil, France in 2016 and the last one from the Disobedience Festival
in Ljubljana, Slovenia in 2017).
Minton refrains on these performances from referencing literary texts as he
did in many previous free-improvised meetings before (he has sung lyrics by
William Blake with Mike Westbrook's group, Ho Chi Minh with Veryan Weston
and more recently Daniil Kharms and Joseph Brodsky with Simon Nabatov, and
sang extracts from James Joyce's Finnegans Wake with his own ensemble).
With dieb13 he employs his dramatic baritone only with extended vocal
techniques, deconstructing every possible facet of the human voice into
free-form train of abstract and eccentric retching, burping, screaming,
gasping, childlike muttering, whining, crying, whistling and humming
sounds, or as Minton himself calls it: "belching obscene incoherent
rubbish", often with what seems like as a tortured body language that
enhances the abstract narrative.
These series of free-associative and imaginative gibberish of human voices
were framed and orchestrated brilliantly in real-time by dieb13, always
attuned to every nuance of Minton’s vocalizations, and injecting loose but
coherent threads to Minton’s wild vocal journeys. On With, Without, dieb13
mixed and edited again these performances into an hour plus piece. The
subtle and clever orchestration of dieb13 often extends and twists Minton’s
manic vocalizations into alien and sometimes perfectly fitting cartoonish
sonic universes. But at other times dieb13 charges these eccentric yet very
emotional vocalizations with ironic comments, adds surprising depth and
colors the crazed vocal eruptions with dense and unsettling urban noises.
There are even brief segments where dieb13 matches sax pieces that trick
Minton into brief, playful jazz-y duets. Typically, it ends with Minton
articulating his clear desire to go to sleep. Obviously, no words were
needed.
The legendary reedsman and composer
Roscoe Mitchell
officially became an octogenarian this past summer and his work continues
to grow in scale and scope. His ambition and creativity never waning,
Mitchell in a recent interview with
SFJAZZ
(on the occasion of his induction into the 2020 NEA Jazz Master class) said
"...it takes a long time to be what I'm trying to be!" Though the pandemic
has certainly slowed things down for the Chicago native (currently living
in Wisconsin), it sounds like he's enjoying the additional time afforded by
the lockdown to explore new ideas. Fellow AACM member
Mike Reed
has also been keeping busy, both keeping his venues the Constellation and
the Hungry Brain afloat during the intermittent lockdowns as well as
providing virtual and live events (when permitted). Their first duo album
In Pursuit of Magicwas released in 2014, the same year as the
Conversations
albums that have become so significant to Mitchell's orchestral works. The
album is rightly framed in a review on the
(Free) Jazz Alchemist as "A meeting of an avant-guard legend and a few decades younger disciple,
one of the most active animators of the modern jazz scene in Chicago- ain't
that a definitive prove of art's continuity?" It's a fantastic album that
showcases the physicality of their approach across a pair of tracks. On the Ritual and the Dance that physicality is redoubled across a
single long piece with Mitchell on saxophones and Reed on percussion and
electronics.
The album was recorded in October of 2015 as part of the Oorstof concert
series in Antwerp. The piece starts with Reed weaving sparse bits of
percussion around Mitchell's irregular, probing sopranino squawk. These
minor sounds quickly accumulate in frequency and velocity as the musicians
lock into their heady and physical interplay. Reed is a spectacular
drummer, a true lion of the skins he colors his crisp, flowing percussion
with subtle and sometimes unexpected sounds. Here he puts on a clinic; the
speed, power, and sharpness of his technique serve to soften his pummeling
attack, but it is a pummeling nevertheless. Mitchell meets him right in the
midst of his tempest, a swirling mass of razorwire sound piercing the din.
Reed puts down his sticks and adds some light electronics as Mitchell
continues working through his concept, then returns subtly and takes over
as Mitchell inhales his first deep breath in a quarter hour. The rhythm
relaxes and Reed stretches out, working over his toms and punctuating the
maelstrom with violent cymbal work. His pace slows and there is a brief
period where the duo employ a slightly more delicate measure. Mitchell, now
on alto, plays long, wailing figures against the abstract rhythms of Reed.
Mitchell's playing quickens as Reed briefly recoils before going in for the
finish. Now on soprano, Mitchell peels off knotty, twisted passages within
the barrage. The intensity wanes for a final time and Mitchell softly plays
bells against Reed's thumping backbeat and the appreciative whoops of the
crowd.
This is a special duo and I'd been hoping for a sequel from them for a
while now. From Mitchell's artwork adorning the sleeve to the ferociously
meticulous contents within, it's my favorite release so far in a still
young 2021. Hopefully very soon now I'll get to make the trip up to see a
show at one of Mike's places (and soak in a city I've not seen for too long
now), in the meantime albums like this serve as reminders of a better time
that I still hope to get back to. An incredible set of live music by two of
the AACMs finest. Released today and very highly recommended.
GreMi is the Hungarian sax and drums duo of István Grencsó on tenor and
soprano saxophone and Szilveszter MIKLÓS on drums and percussion. I must
admit that this is the first time I listen to a recording from Grencsó, but
most probably, by now, you have listened to AT MU, MIKLÓS’ duo
with Peter Brötzmann which also came out late last year. What those two
recordings have in common is –apart from the fact that they came out on
vinyl which is a treat for us fetishists- the amazing percussion work from
MIKLÓS. But we will get back to this shortly.
Prepost is one of those small, independent labels that captures the
adventurous spirit of free improvisation. Its focus is local, trying to
capture what goes on in the Budapest scene (an action already worth
praising as the fascists in power there are working on their agenda),
helping all of us realize that there is interest, pathos an energy for
these musics outside the well known epicenters.
I’ve more than once used this space I’m given on here to present such duos,
especially of the reeds-drums spectrum. The interaction of two people as
minimal as it may seem, it incorporates, on a small scale (as is mostly the
focus of free improvisation), many of the feelings, ideas and thoughts that
have progresses through improvisation. Egalitarian music I call it
sometimes. This time it’s a bit different, because MIKLÓS percussion work
stands out (which is the same for the AT MU LP by the way). He utilizes all
parts of his drum set experimenting with timbre and polyrhythmic outbursts,
while at other times his playing is very minimal, leaving space for the sax
to develop its, very often, melodic lines. Whichever be the case he never
tries to dominate.
Red Carpet is divided in five parts, with Cut V occupying the whole of b
side, being the core of the recording I think. There are times that
Grencsó’s sax is aggressive spitting out notes out of the great free jazz
tradition, and other that he finds solace in melody. Even though I really
enjoyed the percussion work throughout Red Carpet, this is a recording of
equals. The fact that it was recorded live, proves, once more, that free
improvisation utilizes this fact (spontaneity I would say) to explore all
the possibilities of sound. As any music, outside of conventions, should at
least try. Only three hundred copies were made, buy yourself one.
Algo en un Espacio Vacio, or 'something in an empty space', is right on. There is something that pianist Paula Shocron and drummer Pablo Diaz, musicians and physical movement teachers from Buenos Aires know about how to fill a space and on Algo en un EspacioVacio they use light brushstrokes when applying their magic. Their medium - piano and drums, or cello and percussion, with intermittent vocals, could fill-in quite a bit, but they work sparingly here.
The pair have collaborated extensively and have made many recordings with other musicians, but this is their first official duo album, and it is out on their label Nendo Dango. Actually, there is one more artist involved with this recording, Veronica Trigo, who collaborates not musically but artistically with a series of engaging watercolors that have been pressed in an accompanying booklet. The images Trigo (who is also a classically trained pianist) has contributed are sumptuously minimalist expressions of the music translated by the motion of the brush. An example can be seen above on the album's cover.
In the liner notes, bassist William Parker writes "the sounds are like an ocean in a painting ... internal rhythms and burst open to field of blue or green." Accept the hacked quote and poetic grammar and let the sound of the language convey the motion that is captured in many forms on Algo en un Espacio Vacio. The motion is more important than the notes, and like on the first track 'Obertura', where Diaz's asymmetrical pulse is accentuated lightly and spaciously with bursts of tonal color from Shocron's keyboard. Blocky tonal clusters follow, leading to a pensive melody that Diaz accentuates with cluttery percussion. 'Alterna', the second track, introduces Shocron on cello and, I believe, Diaz contorting a drum into a wind instrument. With bowed, elongated tones, the track becomes an ornate semi-drone. Throughout the recording the roles of the instrument are interchangable, for example on 'Ritmo', which is full of motion, percussive use of the cello and other small implements provide a somewhat ritualistic underlayment which Shocron vocalizes rhythmically over. The less shamanic sounding closing track 'Forma' finds Shocron back on prepared piano, while Diaz quietly plays an array of drums and percussion. The vocalizations on this final track are actually a bit distracting as the duo locks into a fairly unusual and hypnotic groove.
With bassist Germán Lamonega (see below), Shocron and Diaz make up two thirds of the SLD trio (which has a new release as well, see En vivo en Estudio Libres), and they have been rapidly adding local and international collaborations to their Nendo Dango portfolio; however, at the heart of it is the movements, large and small, of the duo.
German Lamonega - MoNoCRoMo (Nendo Dengo, 2020) ****
Bassist German Lamonega has a recent solo recording that is quite worth a mention. Much like his companions in the SLD Trio, he sketches out his own language using the upright bass on MoNoCRoMo. Percussive playing on the track 'Prisma' leads to spacious and pensive plucking on the follow up 'MoNoForMa', which picks up in motion and fills in with juicy doublestops. 'Giger' is a pensive drone that plays with sonic contrasts, and 'Butoh' is its polar opposite: a slippery tune that explores sounds from all over the fingerboard. MoNoCRoMo is a captivating solo bass recording, and one of many other exploratory works to be found in the rapidly expanding Nendo Dango-verse.
In a word, free-rock Americana (by way of Norway). The record opens gently at a walking pace, but once the electric guitar and snare drum get busy, it becomes a chunky, patient march, one part electrified Western film, the other a slightly drunk steamroller. The guitar takes the cake. (It’s the same beat as on their 2012 release, Country of Lost Borders which opens with the Neil Young cover “Dead Man Theme.”) The second tune has a rock structure, led by the tenor sax. As in the first tune, it starts simply enough, but then in additive manner, it becomes a handful of sonic puzzle pieces fitted shakily together. There is a looseness to the playing. Nothing too serious, here, but everything played with intent. Some nice grooves. The funky bass and drums hold it all together, allowing the tenor and electric guitar to freestyle. Third track: some hard hitting, pounding drums, straight-ahead rock jamming. Pogo-stick slam dancing could easily accompany this beat. The fourth track, “Interlude,” calms things down. It’s a country guitar slow ballad with a distant tambourine on beat three. On “10-4,” while sort of another “Interlude,” is in fact a quite lovely bass-led piece over held guitar notes with lots of reverb, tremelo, and backward effects. The tenor enters like an extension of the bass. Some Pink Floyd action lilting into Pharoah Sanders. After the smooth space jazz we move into a jagged, freer mess. Lots of distorted guitar, heavy on the pounding drums and the double kick bass drum. A raging sax. Let your freak flag fly, dudes. “Within” opens with a sweet tremolo guitar playing a sing-songy, lilting ode to some memory or other. A splash of carnival, but sincere. The closing tune is a lovely anthem. Some nice clarinet (I think) and sliding guitar through bit-breaking effects into a clearing of bowed bass over beating toms. Just flick your lighter to high and sway to the beat.
I like this record. It is super good-natured and fun, and that comes through in all the playing. These cats are enjoying the music, and it’s infectious.
Chrome Hill is:
Asbjørn Lerheim baritone guitar Atle Nymo tenor saxophone Torstein Lofthus drums and vibraphone Roger Arntzen double bass
