Jason Robinson - Tiresian Symmetry (Cuneiform Records, 2012) ****

By Paul Acquaro

The mythology of the blind soothsayer Tiresias, expressed in numerical relationships, undergirds the compositions in Jason Robinson's Tiresian Symmetry. However, I must admit I've paid less attention to this aspect than the music, which is delightfully rife with clever melodic passages, rich harmonies, vibrant rhythms and fantastic playing.

'Stratum 3' kicks off the album with propulsive exchanges between the horns, drums and bass creating a jaunty foundation for the sax to build on, while the guitar adds a slight shimmer with well placed comping. Another fine moment is when the bass clarinet rises out of the mix on 'Tiresian Symmetry', soon joined by the sax and guitar spinning out angular patterns, it becomes an uptempo whirl of voices that soon breaks into a bass solo and free improv section. The rhythms and intertwining melodic lines emerge and grow like musical kudzoo, quickly taking over the sonic landscape.

Joining Robinson's tenor sax, alto flute, and soprano sax is JD Parran playing alto clarinet, contra bass clarinet, tenor sax, Marty Ehrlich on alto sax, bass clarinet, flute, Marcus Rojas on tuba, and Bill Lowe providing tuba, bass trombone. The rhythm section is fleshed out with Liberty Ellman on guitar, Drew Gress playing bass, and George Schuller and Ches Smith on drums.

From tiny interactions to big melodic statements and harmonic developments, the playing swings from being fierce and raucous, to mere moments later, hushed and spacious (I'm thinking about the opening of 'Radiate' which features the guitar prominently and the beautiful free intro to 'Saros' that suddenly erupts rhythmically).

The aforementioned mythology guiding this recording, which I summarily ignored, can be explored better on this site, and the video below also contains a detailed explanation. Regardless, the music is dense but light, heavy but open, and invitingly accessible. A solid listen through and through.

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Peter Brötzmann & Jason Adasiewicz: Going All Fancy (BRÖ/eremite, 2012) ****½

By Martin Schray

Right now I am totally excited and enthusiastic. I just saw Peter Brötzmann performing solo in the vaulted cellars at the Center for Jewish Studies under Heidelberg’s old quarter. The room created a special reverberating sound, as if a giant was standing in the back of the location with his mouth open echoing Brötzmann’s notes. The concert was dedicated to John Tchicai, who passed away two days before, and you could feel that Brötzmann was touched by his death.

After the concert there was a merchandising table, which is where I bought this album that Brötzmann sells at live gigs and via eremite only. Now I am on my way home and I am listening to it, it is a perfect extension of the live experience I just had.

Brötzmann has recorded hundreds of albums but he has never released a duo with a vibraphonist before, so even for him this is something really new. Jason Adasiewicz (vib) provides him with a great variety of sound carpets to walk over. On the one hand his vibraphone can sound like musical glasses, which reminds you of an imaginary music of the planets. However, Adasiewicz can also play fragments of rock or techno trance riffs or he can make this instrument sound like steel strings (I know it sounds weird, but it is true). In general there is a strange beauty to his playing as if you were standing behind a waterfall of single notes. When he is soloing you can also hear the influence of Asian music, children’s lullabies and – of course – Milt Jackson.

And Brötzmann sounds as if he was swimming in a fountain of youth. “Going All Fancy” and Swinging to the Leaf” are free jazz services, Brötzmann cries out his desperation and anger to heaven about what is wrong in this world, waiting for the clouds to open up giving him whatever kind of sign – even if he knows that it is futile. “Left Luggage” is the typical mournful blues, there is an ultimate, deep sadness to it at the beginning. Later it gets so tense that you can hardly stand it, but then he lets out the Albert Ayler beast. 

The whole album is an acoustic antagonism: the world is beautiful, there is pantheism, even man has created wonderful things, but the social and economic circumstances under which we live make you furious.

It is late at night in the meantime. I am looking back at the concert, being glad that I could live to see something like this. The stars are out tonight, winter is coming … I am looking forward to it, listening to Brötzmann/Adasiewicz.

Get an impression of the music here: 

You can buy it from the label: eremite.com

© stef

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Eli Keszler - Catching Net (PAN, 2012) ****½

By Paolo Casertano

“I didn’t know you were into tribal stuff now …” This is what my wife told me peeping into the room where I was listening to the record mentioned above. Actually, she’s not properly my wife, but we live together and we share a lovely kid. What I don’t want to share with her is my record collection.

There was in any case some truth in her remark. Reading from Eli Keszler’s website we learn about this release what follows. Catching Net is a two-disc collection of selected installations and compositions the artist created during the last two years. It includes both stand-alone recordings of the installations and the integrated ensemble scores performed in conjunction with those. We find, on disc one, two ensemble versions of Cold Pin, a superb percussion composition resulting from a technological installation that had been previously released on vinyl in 2011, plus a 26 minutes long excursus given by the mix of several live ensemble recordings of such a work. To be more accurate, the installation going under the name of Cold Pin features 14 strings and piano wires of various lengths strung and stretched along a wall and struck (I imagine maybe with different intensity) by micro-controlled motorized beaters. Come on! Help me please and watch this video!

eli keszler : cold pin from eli keszler on Vimeo.

The result is a self sufficient musical universe that can be enhanced by the live performance of a varying ensemble that numbers, in this case, Eli Keszler on drums, percussion, crotales and guitar, Ashley Paul on alto saxophone and bass harp,  Geoff Mullen on prepared guitar,  Greg Kelley on trumpet,  Reuben Son on bassoon and Benny Nelson on cello.

Especially the long live act gives us back all the sound gradations and the stylistic undertones that constitute Keszler’s musical vision and approach. Percussive clusters, jarring resonances, scraped cymbals emitting drilling whistles and harmonically complex tones interact and merge in an archaic maelstrom of paths to follows in the dark, bursts of light, death and life. My involvement during the listening is more epidermal than aural. That’s why in some way I understood the definition of “tribal”. This music is timeless and boundless to me. I can imagine it playing both as an hidden soundtrack during the rush hour on a NYC subway and as a far echo coming from a bonfire in the Gobi desert at night. It’s tribal because it sounds as our lives sound. It’s tribal because it has the urgency and unavoidability of the mechanism of life itself.

The second part of the work begins with Catching Net, a 17 minute score for string quartet and piano performed by pianist Sakiko Mori and the Providence String Quartet to be played in conjunction with the Cold Pin installation. Then we find two recordings of Keszler’s large-scale installations functioning on their own. One is a solo version of Cold Pin without live performers. The other is Collecting Basin which features piano strings/wires splayed from a water tower in Louisiana across two large empty basins acting as amplifiers for the installation. Imagine a drunk and immense double bass playing a stunning perpetual low chord. I’m the kind of person who can be motionless and enraptured for hours “seeing” live such a sound.

Packaging offers besides an extensive selection of images and sketches of the installations, program notes, electronic schematics from the projects and drawings by the artist himself.

This is what Keszler’s music also makes me think. As John Cage reported more than once in his writings, when you enter in an anechoic chamber - a specially designed room to stop and absorb reflections of either sounds or electromagnetic waves both from inner or exterior sources - you will not find in any case total silence. You are going instead to hear two different noises. First is a low uninterrupted tone. That’s the flux of your blood. Second is a sharp recurring pitch. That’s your nervous system at work. We could summarize saying that sound is inside you, something you cannot completely get rid of. Something that has always been there, that you can maybe cut out of your attention but that sooner or later will emerge to take a coherent shape. In my opinion this is what happen as well in the Eli Keszler’s music conception.

I was about to give a five stars rating, but this is in any case a collection of already released stuff. So, I promise that the missing half star will be added to the next, I’m sure even more challenging, Keszler’s release. Per aspera ad astra

I was there overflowing while thinking this thoughts when I felt the need to listen to Mats Gustafsson “Needs!” album.

“Is our washing machine broken?” She came and asked. I will not marry her.

Listen if you want.

Buy if you like.

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Bobby Bradford, Frode Gjerstad, Ingebrigt Håker-Flaten, Paal Nilssen-Love – Kampen (NoBusiness, 2012) ****

By Martin Schray

Sometimes there are weird coincidences. When we got new albums on our review list recently, many of them included reminiscences of the golden jazz eras in the 1950s, 60s and 70s. Rob Mazurek’s Pulsar Quartet sometimes sounds like the seminal Miles Davis Quintet, Sam Rivers’ trio with Dave Holland and Barry Altschul brings back memories of his RivBea studio days, Michael Blake taps the great jazz-rock bands of the 70s, Joe McPhee’s plays “Naima” and “Round Midnight” on two new reissues, and even Wadada Leo Smith and Louis Moholo-Moholo salute the great Ancestors. Finally, west-coast-legend Bobby Bradford’s new album reminds one of the landmark Ornette Coleman Quartet with Don Cherry, Scott LaFaro and Ed Blackwell.

Somehow a circuit is complete here because Bradford has had a long history with Coleman. In 1953 he met him in Los Angeles and they played together and worked out some revolutionary notions for something completely new, but before any recordings were made, Bradford was drafted into the Air Force. Don Cherry took his place in Coleman's group, and it was Cherry who left his marks on The Shape of Jazz to Come and This Is Our Music. Then Bradford rejoined Coleman's group in 1961, a period during which the group did not record and performed publicly infrequently. Only in the early 1970s and 80s he appeared on Coleman’s Science Fiction and Broken Shadows.

On Kampen, which features 78-year-old Bradford on cornet, Frode Gjerstad on sax and clarinet, Ingebrigt Håker-Flaten on bass, and Paal Nilssen-Love on drums, he seems to revive the music of Coleman’s band with new combatants. There are marvelous moments when Bradford and Gjerstad soar backed up by one of Europe’s best rhythm groups (you will be surprised if you only know them from The Thing). Cornet and sax/clarinet pick up each other’s tunes and build upon them, mutually they are lighting up sparklers. Hardly ever have I heard musicians listening so closely to one another. Gjerstad once said that Bradford is “always trying to make him sound good” and that “he draws you into his music”. Fortunately, the band likes being in this territory. It is a wonderland bursting from elegant solos, you can find military march quotations and hardbop riffs played in unison, there is a deep knowledge about the history of jazz.

You feel like listening to a visionary band which is trying to blend Free Jazz with the original idea of  Dixieland, the music swings (yes!) and it is totally open, freely improvised, harsh, and tender at the same time. The more you listen to it, the more details you find and the more you’ll like it. Shake on it!

The album is released on vinyl only and limited to 300 copies only.

You can buy the album from instantjazz.com. 

© stef

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Oren Ambarchi/Jim O’Rourke/Keiji Haino: Imikuzushi (Black Truffle, 2012) ***

By Sam

An album like Imikuzushi by the trio Keiji Haino (guitar and vocals), Jim O'Rourke (bass), and Oren Ambarchi (drums) makes me wonder what, exactly, I value in noise improvisation. Forget jazz. This hardly resembles that genre anymore. It may borrow from free improvisation, but it just as equally borrows from psychedelic rock and the more daring fringes of Krautrock. The O'Rourke/Ambarchi rhythm section, that is, keeps mostly steady, sounding much closer to these latter rock experimenters than to anything in the realms of free jazz or free improvisation. And, ultimately, they're practically incidental to the "front man." Yes, although this record is billed to all three, it sounds like a Keiji Haino album through and through. His vocals and guitar dominate the mix and the jam structures.

So why does this music make me reflect on the hybrid genre of noise rock / free improvisation? The answer in part lies in the relative mediocrity of this record. The playing here puts into perspective what makes the truly outstanding recordings in this "style" genuinely excellent. To clarify, I would point to two distinct aspect of the music, what I will call direction and texture. By direction I mean not so much rhythmic propulsion as some sense of gravitational heft to the playing that feels like it's "moving" somewhere. It needn't be a definable beat; but it has to have "pull." By texture I mean the exploration of the potential for sound that any given instrument offers. This texture is independent of notes, and the inspired improviser will constantly remind us of the materiality of his or her instrument (even the voice) by pushing it to extremes or subtly testing its boundaries. No single recording has to avail itself of both of these aspects. Fully mining the potential of one is sufficient to make engaging music. Most free improvisation lacks direction, and that’s fine. Most straight jazz or even free jazz in the classic Fire-music vein lacks texture—and that’s okay, too. Each approach makes up for that lack in transformations and surprises that open up their respective sphere of sonic exploration.

Imikuzushi does not satisfy as a record with direction—and that would be fine, except that it is so firmly rooted in the rhythm section. In the best moments (the second half of the final jam) it benefits greatly from an inventive interplay of rhythm section and lead (guitar/vocals), but for the most part Ambarchi and O'Rourke disappoint. They too easily fall into a monotonous, relentless pounding that lacks direction, variation, and dynamics.

This weakness is in part counterbalanced by Haino's textured exploration of the guitar (and to a lesser extent vocals). He does here what he has always done well, which is to extract his distinctive banshee-wail skronk in complex layerings. But he also varies his sound considerably over the hour-plus live recording, ranging from abrasive slices of sustained noise to softer tremolo strums to splotches of notes fed through various effects pedals. Most of the best moments of the record, that is, showcase Haino's uncompromising technique.

The problem is that these are only exciting moments, and Haino plays for 10-plus minutes straight (sometimes longer) on each of the album's four tracks. Here, at least, he is unable to sustain interest for that long. Add to that the rather lackluster rhythm section. Haino's skronkery in this context feels like it has been coopted by a psych-jam practice session. And that, in the final analysis, is why the record is only mildly stimulating.

To be fair: the album is hardly bad; indeed, I would say it is good, just not very good. At its best, it is excellent, such as its final ten minutes, when O'Rourke's bass comes to the fore and commands real presence. Ambarchi seems to sense the new urgency, and Haino calms down. His plaintive vocals and short outbursts become chilling. It's too bad it takes an hour for the trio to reach this level of musical cohesion.


© stef

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Michael Blake - In the Grand Scheme of Things (Songlines 2012) ***½

Posted by Joe

Michael Blake is often classed on websites as avant-garde, although to this day I've never really understood why? His early associations with the Lounge Lizards seem to have set up a precedent which follows him around. In my view Blake is better classed as 'left-field', looking at jazz from a very different angle compared to the average mainstream jazz performers coming from the states. However, Michael Blake's music isn't what you call avant-garde, it's very accessible and often melodic in content. His releases 'Right before your very ears' and 'Control this' on the avant-garde label Clean Feed are often very melodic even in there wildest moments.

On 'In the Grand Scheme of Things' Michael Blake again comes up with another multi-faceted 'Blake-ish' offering, something that doesn't really sit in any particular basket (*), and probably one reason he's not better known in the jazz world. As with his wonderful Blake's Tartar Michael Blake covers a lot of territory. The album is an attractive mix of rock, jazz, semi-free, gospel and electronica, bringing several directions together musically. A tune such as 'Willie (the lonely cowboy)' hovers over a lovely melody, gradually sliding into an out of tempo (rubato) improvisation. This develops organically with the soloists leading the ensemble. On the other hand there's 'Cybermonk' a swinging tune which could of come from his tribute album to Lucky Thompson. Another facet heard on the album is 'The Searchers', a long piece which stretches out to develop interesting atmospheres, melodies and solos. The last half of the album really moves into open space territory. The themes 'A View of Oblivion' and 'Freedom from Exile' are very strong pieces using the possibilities created by the electronica present of a Moog, keyboards and JP Carter's processed trumpet. The melody and development of 'Cordial Drive' particularly caught my ears as it conjures up an almost modern Bitches Brew musicality. The one track (last but one) that again falls outside the rest of the album is 'Treat her right', an old chestnut which became a hit for Otis Redding (among others) which is played with much respect. 

Michael Blake has assembled an interesting group around him known as the Variety Hour 4tet. Two of the musicians Dylan van der Schyff (drums) and JP Carter (trumpet and electronics) have often popped up on our blog, the third Chris Gestrin (keyboards) I know less well. All three are perfectly in tune with Michael Blake's music - Gestrin and Van der Schyff have already played with Michael Blake (check the above musicians links on this blog). Looking at the musicians (above) you'll probably notice the group doesn't have a bass player. So, much of the bass qualities are created by Chris Gestrin using a Moog synthesiser combined with his keyboards. This creates some fine 'spacy' sounds which float round in the pieces and at the same time manage to anchor down the chords/harmonic progressions. The other very important ingredient in the groups musical palette is JP Carter. 'JP' rarely plays any direct solos, but uses his trumpet/electronic set-up to create floating lines that either shadow Blake's own voice, or create (as we say in the jazz trade) 'guide tones' which give the colour of the harmony.

An excellent record and very clever (very creative) in it's use of electronica.          

* = Concerning Michael Blake's multi faceted musical style(s). Some more reviews on our blog here, and another Amor de Cosmos reviewed on this blog several years back. 

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Holus Bolus - Pine Barrens (Prom Night, 2012) ****

By Paul Acquaro

When I first heard about the album, Pine Barrens, I was intrigued. A press release came out indicating that Holus Bolus leader, woodwind player and composer Josh Sinton, would be releasing the album on his own via his website. I decided to follow the albums' release, but soon found the experience a little tricky. So, I'm quite happy that he also released through the internet only label Prom Night, because otherwise, attributable only to my own need of having the whole album, artwork and all, in my possession, I could have missed out on this excellent and idiosyncratic album.

Working with Sinton is cast of NYC based musicians that have often graced the pages of the Free Jazz Blog: Jon Irabagon on alto, tenor and sopranino saxes, Mike Pride on drums and vibraphone, Jonathan Goldberger on guitar and Peter Bitnec on bass. Sinton plays baritone sax, and bass clarinet. The group's interplay and the contrasts between the two woodwind instruments in the compositions are really attractive.

Pine Barrens begins softly with "Through the Trees I Saw Stone Caves on a Beach I". Built primarily from repetitive motifs, it is a minimalist tone poem invoking the feelings of faded and poignant memories. In fact, the imagery of the tunes are explained in essays about the music which appear on Sinton's website. In the writings, he relates how the music references periods of his life between growing up in the Pine Barrens of New Jersey, family vacations in California, and deeper familial relationships.

The second song, "Water for my Father" takes on a more ominous tone. Working with legato phrases and darker hues, the sonic imagery deepens. Sinton's bass clarinet and Irabagon's sax interplay is perfect and leads seamlessly to the primal scream that develops towards the end of the song. 'Deeper in the Woods Than You' begins as a sort of post-bop/avant-rock song, and it's where we begin to get a taste of Goldberger's guitar work. Creating textures behind the tension building head, he bursts forth with a quick solo that effectively reference bop, rock and skronk at the same time. It's not all turmoil however, 'My Clarinet Teacher' offers a great solo over counterpoint between the guitar and bass clarinet. 'Star Fuckers' is a deliciously spacious and diffuse tune that reminded of certain early fusion excursions. 

The recording is an unusual mix of styles and it works together in an unusual way. I'm happy to have this album land in whole in my MP3 player. It's quite worth a listen:

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Elephant9 with Reine Fiske - Atlantis (Rune Grammofon, 2012) ****

By Paul Acquaro

A few weeks ago I caught up with some slightly older releases, finally getting to Elephant9's 2011 release Live at the BBC. Upon posting, I had no idea that this new studio album was dropping, and like a sudden blast of refreshing Nordic air, the latest Elephant9 made an unexpected and most welcome arrival.

However, before I go any further, I cannot help but ask the question: How can you make a good thing, like Live at the BBC, even better? 

It seems that if you're Elephant9 and have had a good run of albums mining the early canon of jazz-rock, notably Weather Report and Bitches Brew era Miles Davis, the answer, it seems, is by adding Swedish guitarist Reine Fiske to the mix and amping up the intensity. 

'Black Hole' kicks off the album with a short staccato burst of percussion and then a full bodily plunge into driving rhythm and heavy Hammond organ. It seems to a signal a new darker and more powerful musical attitude. A tense energy builds in the tunes, leveling the ground around them and building a new coruscating landscape. 

When it comes to the added guitarist, Fiske is as much a texturist as a soloist. He's shaping sounds, he's blending into and thickening the melodies and harmonies, and he's adding arching solo passages. Even on the more ephemeral atmosphere of the introduction to 'The Riddler' and the title track 'Atlantis', he blends seamlessly with Ståle Storløkken's keyboards, coloring and accentuating. His guitar has quickly become an integral voice in the group. 

Overall, the sound of this recording seems a bit heavier and at the same time bit more spacious than the earlier two albums, which was a direction hinted at on the live album. Nikolai Eilertsen's bass lines and Torstein Lofthus' drum work are as solid as ever and Storløkken's keyboards cover a huge sonic range. Well into prog-rock territory but still deeply rooted in jazz improvisation, the songs are not so much mind-blowing intricately assembled odd-metered vignettes, but bedrock for the textures and improvisations on top. Atlantis is a welcome addition to the Elephant9 discography. 

© stef

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The Iceberg Quartet - The Iceberg Quartet (FMR Records, 2012) ****½

By Philip Coombs

Paul Dunmall is a true master on this recording. I could stop the review there but it wouldn't be fair to the rest of the quartet who also bring everything they have to this fantastic album.

What starts out as a tentative intro, with each player softly feeling out the mood, quickly explodes with Dunmall leading the charge. On the first and longest track, 'An Uncommon Alacrity', Sam Wooster (trumpet), Chris Mapp (bass), and Mark Sanders (drums) provide the canvas for Dunmall's sax to weave its needle and string around in order to quilt together and amazingly colorful free jazz blanket.

The track seems to reach its boiling point halfway through. It leaves the listener wondering where it could possibly go from here. Instead of pushing the bandwidth even further, the group allows Wooster to play over the bass and drums as Dunmall drops out. Soon Mapp is solo and they have managed to get us right back to how the track started. The is more tentative blowing and plucking, and tapping before Dunmall comes back in to keep it all together. Sanders does a great job in letting the whole thing simmer without forcing the tempo, but is clearly up to the task of keeping up and adding his own color when the track breaks again under its own tension. Wooster forcefully leads the charge during the second half of the track. 

With as much talk of extended technique as there has been lately, this type of a jazz gathering is some what of a relief. Four men doing what they do exceptionally well, that's it.

Track 2, 'Antarctic Hot Day', has trumpet and sax playing each other's faces with Mapp providing a bowed bass carpet underfoot for Dunmall and Wooster to stomp on. They really are something to listen to on this track. The collective experience needed to make this work is truly inspiring.

But there are rumblings, loud rumblings that could only mean that the iceberg has separated from the glacier and is headed south. Dunmall gives us the signal as the the final track 'Cold Approach' begins. There is a wandering and a searching between Dunmall and Mapp but the iceberg soon picks up speed as the rest of the quartet help with the propulsion. The track then simply soars. 

I hit play again immediately after the last note rang out.

Can be purchased from the label. 

Get a good look at them work here:

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Thomas Heberer's Clarino - Cookbook (Red Toucan, 2012) *****

By Stef

Last year I was really impressed by Thomas Heberer's Clarino's debut album "Klippe", with the leader on trumpet and quartertone trumpet, Joachim Badenhorst on clarinets and Pascal Niggenkemper on bass.

Badenhorst and Niggenkemper got acquainted with Heberer's own notation system for composed improvisation, and now that the effort was made, and the first hurdle taken, why not explore further. It was rather a story of enthusiasm : the collaboration and the end result worked so well that Heberer composed some more pieces for the trio. And the result is even more staggeringly beautiful.

The setting is intimate, calm chamber-jazz, with instruments that play mostly in their usual voicings, making the overall sound very accessible. Yet, in contrast to most chamber music, all three musicians are quite expansive emotionally, pushing their sounds in expressions of deep feelings. And then there are the compositions. Each track has its own concept and returning phrases, echoes and counterpoints, as ingredients with which the tune is played. To the credit of the both composer and musicians, the ingredients are light and sparse and used to give their full flavour rather than a complex broth of conflicting tastes.

The end result is extremely beautiful, with songs to be moved, to wonder at, to be surprised, to be impressed.

At the same time it eludes definition, it defies classification or even references, which is one of the reasons why it took me so long to review it. I've been listening to the album with pleasure and repeated anticipation for months, trying to find ways to capture its essence in words. It just doesn't work. It's not possible. So apologies for that. I can only recommend that you listen to it for yourself.

Elusive, fragile, clever, subtle, abstract, lyrical ...



You can listen to some excerpts on Heberer's website.


You can buy the album from instantjazz.com. 

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