AMM

Two London Concerts documents AMM as a duo, with John Tilbury on piano and Eddie Prévost on percussion, in two sets played in London in 2011. The group, active since 1965, had continued as a duo since guitarist Keith Rowe left in 2004. The titles, E1 AMM and SE1 AMM, are the postcodes of the two venues. Reviewers heard the pair leaving more silence and air in the music than in their first years as a duo, without losing intensity.

E1 AMM was recorded on 6 March 2011 at The Rag Factory in Spitalfields, during the As Alike as Trees festival of improvised music. SE1 AMM comes from the Purcell Room on 27 November 2011, part of The Engine Room, Morley College's festival and conference on the life, works and legacy of Cornelius Cardew. The first set opens with Tilbury bringing his forearm slowly and repeatedly down on the keys, while Prévost answers with softly bowed metal. The second is calmer and longer, made of very quiet passages that build into crescendos. It closes with Tilbury playing almost alone, slowly and solemnly, until Prévost joins in the final moments. Both ImproSphere (2012) and Avant Music News heard echoes of Morton Feldman in Tilbury's repeated, unresolved phrases and the long spaces between his chords. Prévost bows and strikes metal objects of various sizes, some pressed into the head of a snare drum, and Tilbury plays both on the keys and inside the piano. Richard Pinnell (The Watchful Ear, 2012) found the duo allowing "a lot more white space and air" than before, with a near telepathic understanding. For Avant Music News in 2013 it was one of the most exciting AMM records in some time.

Released by Matchless Recordings in 2012 as MRCD 85 on CD, recorded by Giovanni La Rovere and mixed and edited by Sebastian Lexer.