★Clean Feed
Directions
If you thought that Rafael Toral’s quartet was named after some reference to Sun Ra’s spatial jazz, here is the confirmation that there’s much more at stake than that, even if the many allusions to the Saturn envoy are also true. Space is the valorization of pauses, interstices, a certain measure of expression and narrative, a way to create transparencies and, most of all, a return to a human dimension, aware of its heart beating, its organic, silent thinking/ inner living of bodily functions. I…
Nature Hath Painted the Body
Clean Feed presents Nature Hath Painted the Body by Jonas Cambien Trio. André Roligheten soprano and tenor saxophone, bass clarinet | Andreas Wildhagen drums | Jonas Cambien piano (soprano saxophone on track 4, organ on tracks 6, 11). Belgian-born, Oslo-based pianist Jonas Cambien couldn’t have chosen better partners than Andreas Wildhagen and André Roligheten to perform his cleverly constructed compositions. On its third studio album, his trio shows itself as a tightly interacting ensemble, …
In The West
Max Johnson may be the only musician to have worked with legendary improvisers Anthony Braxton, John Zorn, Muhal Richard Abrams & William Parker, bluegrass royalty Sam Bush & David Grisman, in addition to rock pioneers Adrian Belew, Vernon Reid & the Butthole Surfers. That eclecticism is at work on his new album, “In the West”, featuring piano trio, augmented by pedal steel guitar. The album features Kris Davis on Piano, Susan Alcorn on pedal steel guitar, and Mike Pride on drums, in addition …
What Is When
Portuguese guitarist Luis Lopes defies rigid classifications due to his rather unconventional mode of execution witnessed on this persuasive trio date, featuring American rising star bassist/composer Adam Lane and rock solid, Israeli drummer Igal Foni. It’s a mesmeric gala, brimming with circular themes, and fractured movements. The guitarist’s patchy voicings ride atop the rhythm section’s bustling cadences, where the band instills a sense of perpetual motion. Here, Lopes dissects and interlink…
...was there to illuminate the night sky...
In the album notes to Trespass Trio's "...was there to illuminate the night sky...", saxophonist Martin Kÿchen provides a colorful yet somewhat fragmented essay, regarding the evisceration of society, partly tied into the Iraq war and the everlasting Israel-Palestine conflict. He sets the stage for a life force panorama, iterated through the power of music that casts a dour or ominous state of affairs. Recorded in Norway, the Scandinavian trio exercises some bloodletting here. The injustices of …