Jazz /
Onilu
Onilu is an all-percussionist trio utilizing the extensive family of drummed and tuned percussion instruments to deliver beautifully composed, arranged and executed small ensemble music. Nothing about this all-percussion band feels rarified, or missing anything musical. To the contrary, Onilu create a soundworld where nothing is missing, and everything is musical -- defying the stereotype of modern percussion ensembles as esoteric or academic pursuits, reaffirming the powerful social and sacred …
Live Cuts 1981-1983
Following the recent archival release of Primitive Art Group’s studio albums “1981-1986”, we are pleased to announce the release of this 65-minute album of live PAG performances recorded between 1981 and 1983. These recordings document the beginnings of the PAG in all its raw beauty and chronicle its development into a unique improvising unit. Made from original cassettes tapes, this fills a missing part in the story of free music and in the story of underground music from New Zealand. “Live Cut…
Music Is Here (Live At Studio 104 Maison De La Radio (ORTF) Paris 1973)
First-ever release of cult Freddie Hubbard live performance recorded in 1973 at Maison De La Radio (ORTF) in Paris. Released in collaboration with Duane Hubbard and French Institut National De L'audiovisuel (INA), the double-LP set has been remastered for vinyl from the original tapes and comes in a gatefold sleeve including liner notes by Kevin Le Gendre.
A mesmerizing live performance by Freddie Hubbard and his quintet recorded in Paris at Maison de la Radio (ORTF) on March 25, 1973. Featurin…
The Quartet
Huge tip! It is a huge honour to announce the publication of Peter Brotzmann’s final concerts on Otoroku. When we invited Peter to do a residency at Cafe OTO back in February 2023 we had no idea these would be his last ever shows and he played with such power it would have been hard for anyone present to believe he would never play publicly again. Recorded over two nights this grouping of Jason Adasiewicz on vibraphone, John Edwards on bass and Steve Noble on drums feels especially resonant and …
Harlesden Sessions
‘Harlesden Sessions’ is a collection of duo recordings between versatile saxophonist David Bitelli and gifted drummer Ollie Usiskin, whose imaginative improvisations take us on a journey through post-bop, jazz-funk and free jazz landscapes. The two North West London natives would meet up on occasional Thursdays to play improvised sax and drums duo sessions. As their understanding grew, they decided to start recording them and ‘Harlesden Sessions’ presents the best of these concise improvised exc…
Happy Apples
*300 copies limited edition* 'Happy Apples’ presents a collection of improvised duo exchanges between legendary free jazz vocalist Julie Tippetts, whose spell-binding vocals intermingle perfectly with saxophonist Kevin Figes’ atmospheric playing. Both musicians supplement the recording with an array of percussive devices, including the quirky tinkling 1970s toy that lends the album its name. The epic opening track “The Third Harmony” sets the mood for the recording as Tippetts displays a dazzlin…
Lullabies And Other Stories
CD edition. Solo album by Walter Prati, here back on his cello driving us through an illuminating and sublimative journey. Walter Prati’s composition for cello seems to interpret this range of facets, these transparent and elusive angles. Contemplative music, to a certain extent, but also ready to express fragments lyrically, and their rushing to compose a mosaic. For reasons I cannot explain, I catch a glimpse of several iridescent colours, between turquoise and hard blue with odd crimson strip…
Biyartabiyu
"Because I make records in a number of different styles, I often filter and change my saxophone playing to match the style of the record I’m making. But when I make a work like this, you hear my playing in my natural, unfiltered style, and that style is determined by the many AACM records which were most influential in forming my own playing. That’s especially true in this duo setting with Walt Shaw, where the music is stripped down to its essence of blues + abstraction. It’s really simple - I’m…
Nightcap
Tip! *300 copies limited edition* {scope} came to life in 2020, when musicians Laura Agnusdei, Matteo Pennesi and Luca Sguera got selected for Holydays Festival, an artist residency in Scopoli, a small village in Umbria, central Italy. Despite having never played together before, the musicians found a common musical language which emerged in their first album "A week from Monday", recorded during the residency and released by ViaIndustriae and Rous Records. At the start of 2022 a new opportunity…
"Concerto Alla Statale" Nov. 29, 1975
*2024 stock* This concert was recorded live on November 29th, 1975, during "New Trends in Italian Jazz", a series of concerts held at the State University, Milan, and has never been released before.
Educated Guess Vol. 1
2024 stock. Dave Tucker says that he brought this disparate group of musicians together for a live performance at London’s Cafe Oto last March on “an educated guess,” predicting that the artists - Mark Sanders (Drums & Percussion), Pat Thomas (Piano & Keys), Dave Tucker (Guitar) and Thurston Moore (Guitar) - would be able to create something extraordinary through improvisation. The condition of their encounter would later become the collective’s name, an “Educated Guess” and the eponymous title …
Four Spheres
On this maiden recording, Chicago-based bassist Jason Roebke leads a new quartet, featuring his original compositions and a stellar lineup. The music, which was brilliantly recorded at Steve Albini's legendary Electrical Audio and expertly mixed and mastered by Alex Inglizian at Experimental Sound Studio, is performed by veteran reed player Edward Wilkerson Jr., whose own bands Eight Bold Souls and Shadow Vignettes were among the great ensembles of eighties/nineties Chicago, extending the AACM t…
Roscoe Village (The Music Of Roscoe Mitchell)
Tuned metal percussion figures prominently in the sound universe of Roscoe Mitchell. Many of Mitchell's early compositions for the Art Ensemble of Chicago feature xylophone and tuned bells, and his immersive set-up known as The Cage arranges an array of percussed instruments in a circle around him, including all sorts of metallophones and gongs. On Roscoe Village, Chicago-based improvisor Jason Adasiewicz has transcribed and arranged a selection of Mitchell-penned pieces, performing them all on …
Post Koma
Berlin-based Swedish bassist and producer Petter Eldh returns with a new Koma Saxo album Post Koma, out on We Jazz Records, 10 November. The title Post Koma aptly describes the vibe of this one: The Koma Saxo sound continues its evolution, morphing into a holistic vision of jazz now and soon, where live instrumentation and repurposed sampling lose their boundaries. Over the course of its three iterations (self-titled debut in 2019, LIVE in 2020, Koma West in 2022) Koma Saxo has sounded at times …
Lasting Ephemerals
*2023 stock* Sparkling acoustic duo featuring a contemporary wild chamber attitude, improvising instant compositions, sound texture explorations and sudden lyrical flights. Their improvisation, that has been defined "A Gentle Vertigo", freely crosses boundaries and welcomes rich contradictions between melody and blessed chaos. Experimental flavors, multi-perspective intuitions and reciprocal listening are the extremely well balanced blend of this duo that strives for an improvisation where "thin…
Busy Butterflies
*2023 stock* "To watch two butterflies in flight is to see a complex intertwining of zigs and zags, dips and weaves, as each—seemingly erratically--rides the turbulence its wings create to carry it along. Together they trace an unchoreographed but nevertheless coherent set of variations on the line as they move with, against and through each other’s paths.
The intricate pattern of two butterflies’ interwoven flight paths stands as a fitting analogue for the nuanced complexity of Busy Butterflie…
Transient
"Second album for Clairvoyance, a trio that sublimates improvisation through a blessed chemistry, delivering a perfectly balanced music where elements coming from different derivations and attitudes find grace and essentiality, freshness and solidity. Narrative spots and timbral consciousness inform this classy band and make this record unmissable!!
Clairvoyance's fundamental orientation--an orientation that, collectively and individually, represents a compositional stance toward improvisation. …
Wells
"Amirani Records, the label founded and run by Milanese soprano saxophonist Gianni Mimmo, ends its eighteen-year run with three final releases. The last of the three, a recording of the Sestetto Internazionale, was reviewed here earlier; preceding it a duet for Mimmo and Finnish soprano and sopranino saxophonist Harri Sjöström, and a solo recording by Milanese cellist Walter Prati.
Mimmo and Sjöström are frequent collaborators, whether in the Sestetto Internazionale or as duet partners, and on W…
Cadenza Del Crepuscolo
"The meaning of "cadenza del crepuscolo" ("dusk cadenza") can be interpreted in a variety of ways. The most profound is the one corresponding with the implicitly slow flux of thoughts and reflections that emerge as we sense the day fading away, possibly in a moment of somewhat regretful oscillation between an unknown tomorrow, what we have already experienced and now miss, and the unexpressed potential of what we long for, but have not yet achieved (and perhaps never will).
The sympathetic music…
HerbstReise
"I look at this HerbstReise of ours as a sequence short but complete gaze of sound, often evocative in a narrative way, aimed at fulfilling an articulate as well as legible pattern. Though a single breath crosses them, fascinating opportunities are not alien to the syntax, the outline, and the expression of these improvisations. A clear ellipsis the dialogue proceeds delicately and consistently into, even when it thickens.
The inner timing, the layer of colour that shines through have a reflecti…