Max Johnson Trio - Elevated Vegetation (FMR Records, 2012) ****½

By Philip Coombs

Dear Mr. Johnson;

Two records in one year! Thanks for keeping me entertained and keeping my anticipation time between records to a minimum. A music lover can't ask for much more than that.

A Fan.

Do people even write fan letters anymore? Do they request 8"X10" autographed pictures or do they just download everything? Do artists even have pictures anymore?

Well here is Max Johnson's picture, his snapshot of three men in a room making music, and as with any great composed shot, here would be his law of thirds for creating a great image.

First Law: Max Johnson (bass) has the ability to search out the best musicians to suit his current project. Ziv Ravitz (drums), drawing from his Israeli roots, contributes not only a solid and earthy foundation for the others to play over but also provides just enough world music flavor without making it old or tired. Listen to the beginning of "The Chirps of Imaginary Birds" to get a taste of what I mean. Rounding out the trio is Kirk Knuffke (cornet), who not only writes a great track for the album ("Meta Analytical Procedures for Social Research"), but also takes Johnson's melodies and arrangements and transports them from the ground, past the weeds and straight to the fruit on top of all the vegetation. His playing on "Money, Money, Money" is fantastic.

Second Law: Johnson constantly displays his ability to maintain all of the rhythmic qualities needed in a trio setting but can switch gears to push the melody. Regardless of what is happening in the track, your ear will find its way back to the bass somehow. On the opening track "Blue Willie", he keeps the time under the cornet yet seamlessly finds a way to either finish, start and interject the melody in unison with Knuffke.

Third Law: He is always changing. Very little here sounds the same as his quartet record from earlier this year. I admit, I was expecting the same, but was forced once again to question what it is I like. Now I can't turn it off. Tracks like "Crackdown" and "Many Celebrations" are germinating seeds that get under your skin, just waiting for you to add your own water and sunlight.

So there you have it. I am a fan, hoping that music of this calibre will continue into 2013.

Buy it from his Bandcamp page or anywhere else you can find it.

Here is what I mean about "Many Celebrations".

         

© stef

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Boneshaker - Boneshaker (Trost Records, 2012) ****

By Martin Schray

I don’t like Decembers. The days are getting shorter and shorter, it is cold and muddy outside, the cities are crowded with aggressive people shopping for Christmas. Christmas actually: What has it become? It starts in early November with the first decorations and ends on Boxing Day when families have almost killed themselves fighting over their Christmas dinners. It’s hell! My personal strategy to overcome December is a self-made musical advent calendar. One track each day keeps madness away. Today, on 26th of December, it is 'Hostilities of Progress' by Boneshaker, a hardcore trio consisting of Mars Williams (reeds, toy instruments), Kent Kessler (bass), and Paal Nilssen-Love (drums and percussion).

To be honest, I chose 'Hostilities of Progress' at random, I only wanted Boneshaker to be part of my calendar today. I could have chosen What does not kill you (another programmatic title) or 'Sticky Wicket' as well, these pieces would have had a similar effect. But 'Hostilities in Progress' is perfect because this piece starts with a typical Brötzmann howl (I actually checked the notes on the LP if he was guest-starring) and does not release you for the next 15 minutes. I am gonna play it over and over again. It is full throttle free jazz, you feel your fists clench and your face contort while listening to it. After you survived it there is nothing left in you (and maybe in the players neither) because you (and they) did the best to handle the insanity around us.

But there is hope on the album as well: 'Beauty of Sadness', the second track on the album, is unlike the other pieces. It is indeed a beautiful and melancholic - but also a grim - composition starting with a solo improvisation by Kessler which sounds like a double bass in a philharmonic orchestra gone astray, before Williams joins in with a heartbreaking theme that reminds one of Ry Cooder’s “Paris, Texas” theme, only that it is played by a saxophone in a zombie ghost town. The track is full of scattered drum parts, toy instruments, creepy voices, absolute silence, bowed bass lines, and an incredibly elegant saxophone at the end.  When you listen to it in the dark, it is really scary. On the other hand the beautiful elements the track includes make me look forward to another new year, even knowing that there will be another December at the end – but also another advent calendar.

Boneshaker is not newfound territory but it is music which is emotionally exposed and raw. Exactly what I need to cure my Christmas blues.

You can listen to the first track here:



Boneshaker is released on vinyl only.

You can buy it from instantjazz.com

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Musicians Of The Year 2012

By Stef  

We can argue a long time about the best albums of the year, or the most innovative ones, because nobody has listened to everything and tastes differ of course.

It's the same with the somewhat arbitrary list of "Musicians Of The Year", a list drawn up by myself, based on the quality and variety of the music presented by some artists this year.

Here is my list, with some explanations of why these musicians have outdone themselves, to the joy of their fan-base. Some of the luminaries of the British free improvisation scene demonstrate that creativity and open-mindedness do not dwindle with age, and then the younger generation with solid and upcoming talent. They all surprised me this year, and of course very positively.


The revelation of the year was French pianist Eve Risser, and that should be no surprise to readers of this blog, but I was personally also entranced by the new music direction that the British violinist Angharad Davies presented, as well as by Ingrid Laubrock's prolific participation on some of the most noteworthy albums of the year. I will start with the ladies, out of courtesy, but there is no ranking in this overview.

Eve Risser

For many of us she arose out of nowhere to bring one of the most acclaimed albums of the year, "En Corps" with Benjamin Duboc and Edward Perraud. It blew me to pieces the first time I listened to it, and it has kept doing that. It's not because I did not know her that this is her first album, quite to the contrary, and she released albums before with Polish bassist Rafal Mazur, or with bands like Donkey Monkey and Fenêtre Ovale.







Angharad Davies

British violinist Angharad Davies released two albums in the more minimalist genre but both of outstanding quality, "Outwash" with Tisha Mukarji and Dimitra Lazaridou-Chatzigoga, and"Ist Gefallen In Den Schnee" with Skogen, and "Pluie Fine" with Cremaster Duo. Like Risser, Katherine Young, Mary Halvorson, Magda Mayas, Hannah Marshall and many more, she is among the most daring young female artists, with a clear and solid vision on what sound can sound like.

Ingrid Laubrock

Even she did not release any new material under her own name, 2012 also seems the absolute breakthrough of German saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock, with "Union" by Paradoxical Frog, "Catatumbo" with Javier Carmona & Ollie Brice, "Haste" with Veryan Weston and Hannah Marschall, , "Camino Cielo Echo" with Tom Rainey and Mary Halvorson, and "Old Myth/New Science" by Living By Lanterns. Her way of playing the tenor is something else, something new, quite expressive and adventurous, unharmed by too much training, and it's this raw authenticity that makes her music appealing.




Barry Guy

From the classical "Tales Of Enchantment" with his partner Maya Homburger, the impressionistic miniatures on "Games And Improvisations" with Katharina Weber and Balts Nill, "Hexentrio" with Paul Plimley and Lucas Niggli, to the more extravert "Lava" with Liudas Mockunas, and the explosive "Metal" with The Thing, Barry Guy adds musical value in whatever genre or line-up he performs in. His playing is as precise as it is creative. And on top of this, he is also as part of Evan Parker's ElectroAcoustic Ensemble in the excellent "Hasselt". He also performed with the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra on "Schweben - Ay, But Can Ye", and the album "One Four and Two Twos" brings us some older performances by John Stevens, Paul Rutherford and Evan Parker. In short, a prolific year for the British bass-player, but primarily with outstanding records.

Evan Parker

His fellow countryman and long-time musical partner Evan Parker also had an astonishing year in terms of quality and quantity of output, with no less than ten albums and we may have missed a few. His ElectroAcoustic Ensemble released one of the most innovative albums of the year with "Hasselt", he was the invited star on "Vivaces" by Grand Groupe Régional d'Improvisation Libérée, but he also shone in smaller ensembles, such as All Told's "Meetings with Remarkable Saxophonists" with John Edwards and Eddie Prévost, and the stellar "The Bleeding Edge" with Okkyung Lee and Peter Evans, "Live At The Vortex" with Foxes Fox, a fabulous duo with Agustí Fernández on "The Voice Is One", an equally stunning trio with John Coxon and Eddie Prévost on "Cinema", with George Graewe on "Dortmund Variations", on "Improcherto" with the Glasgow Improvisers Orchestra, and then the release of older performances with John Stevens, Paul Rutherford and Barry Guy on "One Four and Two Twos", and the re-issue of "Supersession" with Barry Guy, Eddie Prévost and Keith Rowe, all of those still to be reviewed. He produes more albums than we have to review.


Nate Wooley

Nate Wooley has always been one of the stars on this blog, yet now again he is part of the best albums of the year, with RED Trio on "Stem", with Christian Weber and Paul Lytton on "Six Feet Under", his very adventurous solo albums "(8) Syllables",  "The Almond", then his collaboration with Bruno Duplant and Julien Héraud on "Movement & Immobility", and in a more traditional format on Harris Eisenstadt's "Canada Day III". Some absolutely fascinating recent work by him still needs some review on this blog, but they are in the pipeline :  "The Nows" with Paul Lytton, "Instrumentals" with Peter Evans, "From The Discrete To The Particular" with Joe Morris and Agusti Fernández, and on Ingebrigt Haker-Flaten's "NY Quartet". You have a number of musicians who are part of the scene, or who manage to create their own voice and carve out their own space in music, yet Nate Wooley is at the absolute center of it, shaping future style, contributing to music history and influencing lots of other musicians with his sometimes uncompromising approach ... like Barry Guy and Evan Parker. You can sometimes question what he's doing, but I guess that's what it means to be boundary-breaking.



A couple of other musicians also stand out, but because they were already among the "Musicians Of The Year" before on this blog, we will just mention them. The first is Martin Küchen who continued to deliver fantastic albums with Angles 8 "By Way Of Deception", on his solo album "Hellstorm", or with the Trespass Trio's "Bruder Beda". The first two of those albums figured on this blog's top-10 of the year, a major achievement.

The second worthy mention is for bassoonist Katherine Young, who also figured on our "Musician Of The Year" list before. She confirms her idiosyncratic approach to the instrument, and her search for new musical languages with "After Party - Releasing Bound Water From Green Material ", "Pretty Monsters",  and Verdure Into Onyx.

The third person is Wadada Leo Smith, less prolific, but with such superb quality that he's worth a mention again : "Ancestors" his duo album with Louis Moholo-Moholo, his unique "Ten Freedom Summers", and with again a totally different sound on "Dark Lady Of The Sonnets" with Min Xiao-Fen and Pheeroan AkLaff. 

Have I missed some musicians? Sure, truckloads of them. Yet I just wanted to select the ones really worth looking for. With the abundance of new material being produced, it's good to have some anchor points. Listen to the musicians mentioned above. They shape listening.

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In great memory of ....

2012 has been a sad year for jazz fans around the world with the passing away of seven sax-players whose records we all know, whose music we've enjoyed, whose shows we admired. In memory of those men, some quick overviews.


David S. Ware 

David S. Ware, one of my favorite artists passed away, after long suffering from kidney disease despite a transplant two years ago. Ware's music will always remain among the absolute top in free jazz, with albums such as "Live In Vilnius", "Threads", "Corridors & Parallels", "Surrender", "Shakti", "Live In The World" as a few of my favorites. His band members were always among the best you can find in innovative jazz circles, with Matthew Shipp, William Parker, Whit Dickey, Guillermo E Brown, Susie Ibarra, Joe Morris. His music has this post-Coltrane soaring spirituality, full of lyricism and great themes, while at the same time offering lots of freedom to improvise and express feeling. His energetic expansive way of playing will remain unique.

A jazz monument and musical innovator left us with a fantastic catalogue of music.


Byard Lancaster  


Alto-saxophonist and flautist Byard Lancaster also passed away in August at the age of 70. Less known than David S Ware, he is one of those musicians who were into the soul and the roots of music, willing to play funk as well as collaborate with Bill Dixon and Sunny Murray. A music educator, he wanted his free jazz to appeal to larger audiences, adding solid rhythms and more tribal African sounds. Also a Coltrane adept (who isn't?) his music adds this communal element of joint celebration, dancing and mourning. "Funny Funky Rib Crib" (1974), "Live At Macalester College" are among his best, but also his more recent work such as "Pam Africa" and "Ancestral Link Hotel", both on CIMP are easy to recommend.


Lol Coxhill 

In July, British soprano saxophonist Lol Coxhill passed away. He was one of the absolute central figures in the British free improv scene, with hundreds of records on which he performed. Like Lancaster, he was open to any style of music, and collaborated with bands of all genres : blues, soul, R&B, punk, jazz and very very avant-garde electro-acoustic work, and very very much himself at all times. His tone could be detected from miles away. The British newspaper The Guardian described him as "generous, gifted and amiably eccentric".





John Tchicai 

Last October, Danish tenor saxophonist John Tchicai left us. Like Lancaster, Tchicai was also one of the early free jazz voices in the sixties, playing with John Coltrane, Albert Ayler, Cecil Taylor, Don Cherry, Archie Shepp, yet he continued to perform and innovate, by playing with young musicians and by keeping an open mind to new evolutions, as with John Coxon and Ashley Wales, or with fellow countrymen Jonas Westergaard and Kresten Osgood. My preferred recent album by him is "Good Night Songs" with Charlie Kohlhase and Garrison Fewell.





Faruq Z. Bey

In June, Faruq Z Bey passed away. Despite an erratic career due to an accident and health issues, he will be remembered as the driving force behind Griot Galaxy and for his collaborations with Northwood Improvisers. His own music was also very much inspired by Africa, with great polyrhythmics and trance-like soloing. Recent reviews can be found on this blog : his collaboration with Dennis González on "Hymn For Tomasz Stanko", and his own "Emerging Field". I am not too familiar with his other work, but also "Auzar" is easy to recommend for fans of Africa-centric music. Somehow, his music remained strongly rooted in the seventies.




I want to thank them for their great music. Our thoughts are with their families.

Borah Bergman 

Borah Bergman also died, ironically and sadly enough on the same day David S. Ware passed away. Bergman was a great pianist who worked with many great musicians like Roscoe Mitchell, Anthony Braxton, Andrew Cyrille, Evan Parker, Peter Brötzmann or John Zorn. Brötzmann even called him his favorite pianist. My Bergman favorite recordings are The Human Factor (with Cyrille), Exhilaration (with Cyrille and Brötzmann), Ride into the Blue (with Thomas Borgmann and Brötzmann, I also had the pleasure to see them live), Eight by Three (with Braxton and Brötzmann) and Luminiscence (with Greg Cohen, Kenny Wollesen - and John Zorn, on one track only). Allegedly he was suffering from dementia and died in a nursing home in New York. He will surely be missed (By Martin Schray)


Tony Marsh

"The percussionist Tony Marsh, who has died of cancer aged 72, was an inspired collaborator, combining intensity with restraint and stroking the drums more than he struck them. He worked with some of the most creative artists in European jazz of the past four decades, from the composer Mike Westbrook to the saxophonists John Tchicai and Evan Parker.

“‘Listen closely, take a chance, keep going even if money's tight, and you'll find the real reward – that's why Tony was hip in the most meaningful sense,’ [Evan] Parker says. ‘And he didn't need to play loud, or be loud, to get that intensity. It's like splitting diamonds or something. If you know exactly the right place to make the impact, you don't need to hit anything hard.’” (from The Guardian, with thanks to guitarist Han-Earl Park for adding his name).

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DKV Trio - Past Present (Not Two, 2012) ****½

By Stef  

One of Ken Vandermark's most straightforward projects is with the DKV Trio, with Kent Kessler on bass and Hamid Drake on drums.

What you get here are the incredible rhythms by the master Hamid Drake himself, funky and free and crisp and sparkling like only he can do it, including in the drum solos, usually a boring thing, but here an absolute delight.

Kessler is best known as the regular bassist in The Vandermark 5 and Brötzmann's Chicago Tentet, and his interaction with Vandermark's powerful rhythmic playing is brilliant, whether with thick boppish plucks or more avant-garde bowing, he always keeps the pulse going.

And Vandermark, he can bop, swing, shout, sing and weep, but most of all he is the champion of building structure and then have it implicitly move on through his soloing, always nicely returning to the base, while having explored the various possibilities inherent in it, and keeping this incredible pulse throughout.

Put all three together and you get the best fireworks to come from a sax trio. The real treat is that you get 7 albums in this limited edition box with live performances between mid-2008 till 2011.

The seventh album gives a tribute to Don Cherry, with covers of "Remembrance", "The Thing", "Elephantasy" and "Brown Rice". Don Cherry has always been high on the trio's playlist, as it was on "Trigonometry" (2002) and "Live At Wells & Chicago" (1997).

You can wonder whether seven albums are really worth it, and what it offers more than their existing catalogue. The answer is simple, it's as good as the "Live At Wells & Chicago" album, their best album in my opinon, with similar drive and raw lyricism, and with a great sound quality, much better than "Baraka", "Live" and "Trigonometry".

So, get your copy while they are available!


You can buy the album from instantjazz.com. 

© stef

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Samuel Blaser Quartet - As The Sea (hatOLOGY, 2012) ****½

By Paul Acquaro

Samuel Blaser is a trombonist and composer who has been garnering well deserved attention in the avant garde jazz scene over the past couple of years and the NYC/Berlin based musician has recently released a great new album on hatOLOGY records.

As The Sea, like the sea, is a both a tranquil and violent entity, four musicians contributing to a wave of music that starts quietly and builds slowly and progressively more powerful.
It starts out almost inaudibly, a free improv based on textural rather than melodic developments. Slowly though, guitarist Marc Ducret's angular motifs generate the first real wave of energy - a mild lapping of distorted fragments that swells expertly. This is soon followed by Blaser's solo, which picking up from Ducret, introduces his own fragmentary lines until reaching, mere minutes before the end of the 19 minute song, a tight climax.

The second song, simply entitled 'As the Sea II', begins with a much different vibe. A strong rock beat laid out by percussionist Gerld Cleaver and a rather nice pulse on bass provided by Bänz Oester underpins the trombonist's urgent melodic lines. At times, Ducret's counter melody sounds Iike a second horn, as he shadows and interjects, then breaks into another imaginative and melodic solo, exploiting sometimes jarring chord fragments. While the guitar solo is burning and brilliant, Blaser not to be outdone, matches Ducret's energy. Locking in tight with the rhythm section, he delivers. We also get Cleaver's first solo stretch here as well.

Following the naming convention, III starts with Oester's percussive bowing on the bass and Ducret's deeply distorted guitar figures emerging and receding in the sonic murkiness. IV kicks off with the trombone, and a strong rhythm by Cleaver showcases some deft syncopations between the percussionist and the rest of the group. Moments of the tune swing, but never for too long, as the shifting feel and beat patterns compete for the listener's attention.

As the Sea sat in my review queue for a little too long. It's a fantastic album and a great introduction to both Samuel Blaser, who, judging by the strength of this album is a player with a lot more still to say. Also, the inside/outside guitar playing of Marc Ducret is an additional treat.

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Weekend Roundup: Dynamic Duos

By Dan Sorrells

This week we look at a variety of pairings: some barely more than a whisper, others with buzzing, whirling electronics, even some inspired by construction workers. (Plus! A soprano sax gets in a scuffle with a cello).

Taus - Pinna (Another Timbre, 2012) ***


Taus, the duo of Tim Blechmann and Klaus Filip, get a gold star for patience. Pinna -a live recording from a small Viennese church-is 50 minutes of quietly, carefully added and subtracted layers of sine waves. The restraint on display as each musician gently goads various sonorities out of their laptops is impressive, even in an era where musicians no longer fear silence or tiny, cumulative gestures. The recording captures the feel of the concert well, during which speakers were strategically placed in the church and sounds were allowed to refract and diffuse throughout the space. Pinna was probably far more impressive for those in attendance, but it offers some pleasures if you can set aside a quiet hour with a good sound system.

Another Timbre YouTube preview


Bruno Duplant & Barry Chabala - La Nuit (Roeba, 2012) ***


La Nuit is a heap of droning low-end crafted long distance, an MO that Chabala has experimented with on a least one other release this year. Three long tracks of rich tones, everything bleeding together like submerged watercolors. Who's doing what is neither discernable nor essential for enjoyment. For the most part, La Nuit is warm and easy to adjust to, which makes the sudden long breaks of silence in "After 916" a tad disappointing-they violently halt the comfortable modes of listening roused by the preceding sounds. But maybe that's the whole point. "Far a Go" and the title track are a bit more animated, with Chabala dropping delicate notes through the fields of feedback.


Pascal Battus, Bertrand Gauguet, Eric La Casa - Chantier 1 (Another Timbre, 2012) ***


Though the binding theme this week is duos, Chantier 1 actually credits three musicians. Only two are playing, per se, but anyone familiar with Eric La Casa's unique recording credits is well aware that his technical choices leave a profound thumbprint on the resulting music. Battus' "rotating surfaces" and Gauguet's saxophone collude in two situations: the middle of a bustling construction site, and in a "neutral, quiet space," where the musicians attempt to remember and recreate the experience of improvising along with the sweaty din of the worksite. Naturally, it's the "field" recordings that provide the most interest. It becomes difficult to separate improviser from ambient sound. The standout moment-which somehow feels both surreal and grounding-is the sudden appearance of Kurdish flute, a contribution from a worker's smartphone, thrust into the proceedings in an attempt to reconcile two disparate musical worlds.

Another Timbre YouTube preview


Dale Gorfinkel & Heddy Boubaker - Out Ear/In Head (self-released, 2012) ***


Out-Ear/In-Head is kind of what I imagine you'd hear if you pressed your ear up against someone else's---the hum and buzz of a billion crossed wires, the fitful shifting of countless neural transactions. What I initially thought was Boubaker's sax may actually be Gorfinkel's prepared trumpet-I later discovered that the protean Boubaker hangs up his saxophone in favor of analog synth, which he threads through Gorfinkel's thoroughly-obscured horn and "sound sculptures." Though there's something reminiscent of the quiet, internal processes of a complex machine, Out Ear/In Head is actually quite easy to relate to. What it really seems to capture is the nature of our restless thoughts from a new angle: that of pure electrical impulse, synaptic squabbling made audible. The sound of neurons improvising.

Listen to the album on Heddy Boubaker's Bandcamp page.


Gianni Mimmo & Daniel Levin - Turbulent Flow (Amirani, 2012) ****


Daniel Levin is intense. He plays as though he's never satisfied. His virtuosity on the cello seems to be a direct manifestation of his passion; there's simply no way some limit can be allowed to prevent his ideas from being realized. Turbulent Flow's lengthy title track neatly sums things up, with Mimmo's splashes of soprano trying everywhere to put out Levin's flames. Skilled as they are in free jazz battle, they're also able to conjure up creepy ambience in "Orbit Unknown," or even some bluesy turns halfway through "Mini-festo." Exciting music from some profoundly talented guys.

Mimmo has posted the entire album on his SoundCloud page.

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Reeds and basses

By Stef  

A couple of months ago, I planned to make a review of the various reeds-bass duets that were produced this year, with Pedro Sousa & Harnano Faustino's "Falaise" (already reviewed) and with Sean Conly & Michael Attias "Think Shadow" (still to come). So I waited for more, and possibly this is it, just a handful of albums with a line-up that I really like. If you like the format, as I do, the following albums are not to be missed.

 Frode Gjerstad & Nick Stephens - Different Times (Loose Torque, 2012) ***½

The great thing about duos is the intimacy of the interaction, two musicians focused on each other's movements, thoughts and concepts, catching and anticipating, just to integrate, develop and then amplify. One of the critical elements is the sound quality : it is chamber music in a way and as a listener you should get the feeling that the musicians are playing in your living room.

Which is certainly the case here. What they don't do, is playing wall-paper music, or offering you the warm comfort of a burning hearth fire. They do the opposite. They are in your living room, and they offer you some burning fire, yet it's not of the comfort-offering kind.

Gjerstad's clarinet phrases are mostly short, almost like dots on a canvas, or like bird calls, full of abstract frenzy and wild commotion, yet combining this with the natural lyricism we know him from.

Nick Stephens' bass sound as it should sound, deep, warm, with every string plucked releasing notes that are  enveloped in a woolen warmth. The calm delivery, the love of timbre and single notes, the cautious touching of sounds, it is all here, as you hope to expect from a duo performance. Stephens picks up his bow at various moments, but the magic comes with the last track, when suddenly notes are lengthened, both on bass and on clarinet.


Remi Àlvarez & Ingebrigt Håker Flaten - First Duet Live (JaZt Tapes, 2012) ***

The approach of the Mexican tenor saxophonist and the Norwegian bass-player is different. First, the sound quality is not optimal, with both instruments being recorded from a distance. In contrast to Gjerstad's pointillism, Àlvarez is a lyrical player, stretching and lengthening his phrases, while at the same time not afraid to go into violent outbursts of strong expressivity. The pieces are lengthy, offering both players the time to develop and expand. Álvarez is a real emotional and soulful player, offering his heart on a plate for everybody to see and hear, despite the abstract level of the improvisations. Håker Flaten is his usual good self, used as he is to play in this kind of limited setting, as he did before with artists such as Joe McPhee, Evan Parker, Håkon Kornstadt. Håker Flaten also played with Frode Gjerstad on numerous occasions and is part of his Circulacione Totale Orchestra.

The interaction is good, so is the performance and the live aspect of the recording too, but the sound quality could have been better.

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Christian Lillinger’s Grund: Second Reason (Clean Feed, 2012) *** ½

By Martin Schray

In my real life I am a high school teacher. I like my job and I like teaching kids. However, especially some of the boys cannot sit still, they rock with their chairs, they drum on their desks with their fingers, they fumble through their hair. I guess Christian Lillinger was just like them, he even called his first group Hyperactive Kid. With his rock’n’roll quiff Lillinger, who is only 28 years old, looks like a mixture of Minutemen’s George Hurley and Paul Lovens on speed, and he also plays like that when he is mauling his drums, jumping up and down behind his kit, using all kinds of materials like steel springs, megaphones, or plastic bottles. He is constantly in motion, his drumming is a highly explosive mixture of sound explorations and power play.

Grund is the German word for “reason” but also for “ground”, “cause” or “base”. In an interview with a German newspaper Lillinger said that for him Grund means the ground where he came from, the two basses (Robert Landfermann and Jonas Westergaard) were his platform. They build the base on which Christopher Dell (vibes), Achim Kaufmann (piano), Tobias Delius and Pierre Borel (saxes) can soar. Grund (the band) is like a meta-instrument, an organism from which each instrument can crystallize slowly and individually before it is absorbed in a tight rhythmic network again. Lillinger calls this “interconnection”.

You can see what he means in a shorter piece like “acht!” which starts with a piano/bass/vibes unison part before Lillinger joins in. Far in the distance you can hear a saxophone squealing before the track tilts and drums and sax entwine in an interesting dialogue until the sax vanishes in the group context again. “Schnecke” (which is the German word for “snail” or “slug”) is a similar track, rumbling and rocking, you can find weird circus elements, breakbeats and strange saxophone shrieks. Kaufmann and Lillinger drive the band in front of them. Very often this music transgresses the borders of “jazz”. It is close to new music, the band creates sonic arches which seem to come from a soundtrack for an expressionist film of the 1930s (as in “Grund VII”). On the other hand there are free jazz elements, although not in a traditional way because a lot of the music is composed.

Lillinger says he has ideas he wants to file out. He likes rehearsing, he likes working with his band on these ideas, he wants to be completely free. This is what improvisation means to him in the end – it has to flow.

You can buy the album from instantjazz.com. 

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Andrea Centazzo & Roberto Ottaviano - In A Rainy Day (Ictus, 2012) ***½

By Stef  

Andrea Centazzo is what you can call a "pure" percussionist, a musician who creates percussive sounds, with whatever object or in whatever setting. What counts for him is the impact of the sound, and it sounds like drama, with lots of silences and sudden outbursts full of effect and reverb, as if all his music is created in large empty spaces like churches or caves or just a studio with the reverb switch on the maximum level.

His companion for "In A Rainy Day" is his fellow countryman Roberto Ottaviano on soprano, a fabulous lyricist and improviser. Both musicians started collaborating thirty-five years ago, with the saxophonist becoming a member of Centazzo's Mitteleuropa Orchestra, but their careers bifurcated in the late eighties.

All pieces are improvised during a one-day session, with themes sometimes borrowed from elsewhere, as with Satie"s beautiful "Gnossienne # 1" or from Ellington, yet never as a premeditated tune. The whole album wallows in the same sad and lonely mood, somewhat sentimental at moments, sometimes reminiscent of John Surman, a mixture of ECM spaciness and free improvisation, but always beautiful.

The only track that breaks the cohesion of the album is "A Kind Of Duke's Blue", a nice boppish piece, which suddenly sounds as if both musicians are playing in your living room. Although pleasant by itself, the overall cohesiveness of the album could have benefited from its absence.

In all, a nice album with great interplay between two excellent musicians, yet not essential.


© stef

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