Tip! In Reality Is Not a Theory, the partnership between Mark Fell and Pat Thomas draws listeners into a dialogue where theoretical rigor and improvisational intuition collide with palpable tension. Fell, renowned for investigating the limitations of technology as creative catalysts, approaches systems not as inert tools but as living contexts for musical discovery. Thomas, whose unpredictable improvisations have continually renewed the language of contemporary jazz, brings a welcoming instability to the sound palette, refusing closure or easy answers at every turn.
Rather than presenting a seamless blend of their respective practices, Fell and Thomas push against each other’s boundaries, inviting dissonance, asymmetry, and disruption as agents not only of sound but also of meaning. Their collaboration refuses to flatten the subject or reduce it to a theoretical exercise; instead, it succeeds in showing the subject in new and unexpected ways, making each moment an event of listening and learning. The album’s arc is not linear; its points of contact shift organically, guided as much by accident as intention. This is music where the act of decision-making itself becomes audible—a network of possible outcomes rather than a single route mapped out in advance.
Through deliberate constraint and wilful expansion, Reality Is Not a Theory explores musical time as nonlinear, drawing on sound theory and quantum concepts to frame each gesture as both an isolated event and an entangled moment. Thomas’s contributions resist flattening or routine, potentiated by Fell’s provocations and the resulting interplay. The duo’s refusal to prioritize theory over lived experience, or vice versa, maintains a restless energy, continually interrogating the fabric of sonic reality. Each passage invites the listener to engage not only with what is present but with what is implied, always questioning how much can be held within a single moment of sound. For enthusiasts of experimental electronics and improvisational jazz alike, this album offers a textured, lively account of collaboration at its most vital. The release stands as both critique and celebration: advocating for musical risk, nuanced exchange, and the ongoing dismantling of consensus—in perception, in theory, and most crucially, in artistic practice.
