Jazz & Improvisation / Contemporary

Fifty years and counting. One of the most important larger bands in European jazz, The London Jazz Composers Orchestra celebrated its golden anniversary over three days in Krakow which culminated in a triumphant performance of "Harmos." Long a staple of the LJCO repertoire, with its beautiful melody, it's one of leader Barry Guy's most approachable works. This rendition was powerful and moving, studded throughout with absolute dynamite individual contributions, and furnished a fitting conclusion…

Polish label Not Two presents a massive 7CD set of unreleased recordings by Ken Vandermark in various combinations, featuring duo, trios and quartets with John Butcher, Joe McPhee and Mette Rasmussen on reeds and brass, Nate Wooley on trumpet, John Tilbury on piano, Ikue Mori on laptop, Kent Kessler on contrabass and Hamid Drake, Eddie Prevost and Steve Noble on drums and percussion.Disk One:Ken Vandermark / Nate Wooley duo1. Deeply Discounted 16:072. Sequences of Snow 19:17Steve Noble solo3. Pa…

Not Two Records proudly present a 5 CD boxset by different constellations led by Barry Guy; recorded in Krakow in 2018 .

*2023 stock* The fifth release in the BBE Music J Jazz Masterclass Series has the perfect combination of rarity and exceptional musicality that inspires seasoned collectors to break out in a sweat. Animals Garden by Miyasaka + 5 was originally issued in 1979 on the cult private Japanese label ALM and is reissued for the first time in a 180Gram 2LP edition.Animals Garden was a one-off project led by master drummer Takashi ‘Bear’ Miyasaka and features a powerful and progressive jazz group includin…

The ninth album in BBE Music's J Jazz Masterclass Series presents ‘At the Room 427’ by Koichi Matsukaze Trio Featuring Ryojiro Furusawa, a rarely heard exemplar of post-modal power bop and free jazz. Delivered by a trio playing with an intensity and energy that draws on classic Eric Dolphy and mid-era Coltrane but definitely with its own particular vibe, At the Room 427 is an exemplar of febrile improvised jazz that could only come from Japan. This deluxe reissue sees a welcome return to the J J…

As part of its continuing exploration of Detroit’s Strata label with DJ Amir’s 180 Proof Records, BBE Music reissues the 1974 rare jazz classic ‘Inside Ourselves’ by Sphere. Recorded live on June 28th, 1970 at the Detroit Institute of Arts, ‘Inside Ourselves’ features John Dana on bass, Jimmy Peluso on Drums, Keith Vreeland on, Electric Piano, Eddie Nuccilli on Trumpet and Flügelhorn, plus bandleader Larry Nozero on tenor and soprano Saxophone. The album comprises seven captivating original comp…

As part of the widely respected BBE J Jazz Masterclass Series, Koichi Matsukaze‘s incredibly rare and much sought after album Earth Mother sees a deluxe repress on BBE Music. This is the third highly anticipated release in the series. Regarded as one of the most sought-after yet elusive albums from a pivotal era in Japanese jazz, Earth Mother was originally issued in 1978 on ALM, a private label home to some of the most innovative jazz, contemporary classical and free improvisational music relea…

The 3rd album from the touring trio of Joe McPhee on trumpet & tenor sax, John Edwards on double bass and Klaus Kugel on drums, following their previous NotTwo releases A Night In Alchemia and Journey To Parazzar, here captured live at FreeJazzSaar 2019, in Saarbrucken, Germany for a boisterously exciting set of three collective improvisations, including a tip of the hat to Charles Gayle.

Uniquely orchestrated with all three members bringing a trove of objects & percussion, the trio of Martin Küchen on saxophones, Agustí Fernández on piano and Zlatko Kaučič on drums are heard in this two-part live concert at BUMF festival in Smartno, Slovenia, for a superb example of intent listening and use of space around confident, stunningly creative & virtuosic playing.

Written and recorded with the goal of creating a one-movement suite in the least amount of time possible, "Succo di formiche" reflects the archetypal joy of music making, the spontaneous impulses underlying its formation, and a love of the record album form.

The edition that marks the start of the brand-new Comets Coming, a label linked to Groovie Records and A Traineira, could not be more suitable: it is that Rodrigo Brandão, like his grandfather Herman Poole Blount, dust of stars that the world knows as Sun Ra, may have his feet on the Earth, but he has definitely a sidereal head.Brandão arrived recently to Portugal, but already left a strong mark in the most adventurous Lisbon scene, having performed several concerts in which his language has bee…

Remont Pomp (repair of pumps) is a band playing ethnic, avant-garde and improvised music, which was founded in 2003 at the Polish Association for People with Intellectual Disabilities Koło in Gdańsk, created by the association's charges. The band's inspiration is ethnic music with an emphasis on the richness of African music. Remont Pomp also discovers the space of experimental music by playing unusual instruments and objects not usually associated with music. The band uses a variety of instrume…

Third volume of Masahiko Togashi archives features a concert by a trio consisting of Masahiko Togashi, Haruna Miyake, and Yuji Takahashi held on July 8, 1989 at Fukaya Egg Farm. Supervised by Masahiko Satoh.

The reputation of members of the AACM (Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians), of which Abrams is a founding member, has long been one of adventurous, dangerous, and difficult music. But in fact, much of the music created out of this organization shows enormous appreciation of the blues and earlier jazz forms. Sightsong is a splendid case in point. The album opens with four duets (two dedicated to Chicago legends Wilbur Ware and Johnny Griffin) which have a swing, a groove, and a…

*2023 stock. 300 copies limited edition* The cooperation between Bruno Vansina (saxes - see also ORT007 Vansina Orchestra) and Teun Verbruggen (drums - see also almost all on Rat-Off) makes the pivot of this trio that was formed at the conservatory of Brussels in 1996. They got their initial inspiration from the trio recordings of Sonny Rollins 'Live At The Village Vanguard'. The music of Miles Davis Sextet with John Coltrane and Canonball Adderley, and the music of Chet Baker had it's influence…

*2023 stock* Machine Mass started out in 2011 as an idiosyncratic MoonJune power duo made of longtime collaborators American drummer Tony Bianco (Elton Dean, Paul Dunmall, Evan Parker) and Belgian guitarist Michel Delville (The Wrong Object, Vegir). Hailed as a « feisty and rebel rousing exhibition that contains a surfeit of diametric contrasts and smoldering exchange » (All About Jazz), it has since then morphed into various forms and ventures involving guests such as Dave Liebman (Inti, 2014) …

When the best American sax player of the moment ( grammy, pools, magazines) James Brandon Lewis meets one of the most interesting French fretless bass electronic visionary Floy Krouchi and French avant-garde drummer Benjamin Sanz and they spend a week improvising in the south of France, they come with one of the best contemporary jazz album of the year!

Adrian Lim-Klumpes and Nick Calligeros originally met 15 years ago under the dynamic of teacher and student, respectively. After finishing school, Adrian became a mentor to Nick and 15 years on from originally teaching him the fundamentals of improvisation, they have formed this group together. This album was conceived in one take, with only one simple, predetermined structural element guiding them. Everything you hear on the album is completely improvised. Nick says: "I feel my musical approach…

Tao Forms is chuffed to present this exquisite new solo bass work by young maestro Brandon López.On moving to NYC a little over a decade ago, López began making himself indispensable within many creative music scenes, from the New York Philharmonic to the DIY basements of Brooklyn. As with all bass players of great skill & commitment, López has been prolifically active because he has been in high demand & has made himself available. The Cleveland Review of Books noted: “This is virtuosity as vo…

Peace Flag Ensemble are a free jazz collective from Saskatchewan. Their sophomore LP, Astral Plains, arrives July 18 via We Are Busy Bodies.

Composer, clarinetist, singer and spiritual jazz soothsayer Angel Bat Dawid descended on Chicago's jazz and improvised music scene just a few years ago. In very short time, the potency, prowess, spirit and charisma of her cosmic musical proselytizing has taken her from relatively unknown improviser to borderline ubiquitous performer in Chicago's avant-garde. On any given night you can find Angel adding aura to ensembles led by Ben LaMar Gay, or Damon Locks, or Jaimie Branch, or Matthew Lux, or e…

In process of stocking. A new project by Chicago-based drummer / producer Makaya McCraven. An addendum to his critically-acclaimed 2018 release Universal Beings, which The New York Times said "affirms the drummer and beatsmith's position as a major figure in creative music," Universal Beings E&F Sides presents fourteen new pieces of organic beat music cut from the original sessions, prepared and produced by Makaya as a soundtrack to the Universal Beings documentary film.Directed by Mark Pallman,…

Atalaya is new work by bassist Dezron Douglas, and it is alive. That is, ‘alive’ in all the ways that jazz is at its best – as a pure and personal expression of Black Music channeled through time-honored traditions by a group of musicians who practice sonic coherence through musical unity. As Dezron puts it in the opening statement of his liner notes for the album: “Mysticism, Magic, Faith, Love, Power, Discernment! These are words that embody the creative process of Music.” Followers of contemp…

"Head-spinning and heavily arresting free jazz cyclones and meditative downstrokes from American jazz bassist Junius Paul, following from Angel Bat Dawit’s incredible LP The Oracle on Chicago’s International Anthem Recording Company.“Polychromatic low tone poems, free form funk flight & Great Black Music turn the page to a brand new chapter in the Chicago sound.” Ism opens audaciously with the spiritual mic-check You Are Free To Choose, a track that features Junius Paul alongside Vincent Davis (…

Allen Lowe writes: In the Dark is a commemoration (sic) of the worst time of my life – a period of time during which, having been operated on to remove a cancerous tumor in my sinus, I slept for only brief periods of time. Sometimes I made it as long as two hours continuously, but most often I dozed off for 20 minutes, 30 minutes, maybe an hour – encamped as I was on my couch, trying not to wake my wife as I wandered in the dark contemplating the long night ahead. Sometimes I turned the televisi…

Allen Lowe writes: "America: The Rough Cut is my statement not only on American music and American song, but also my commentary on the way American musicians of all styles handle that old-time music and those old song forms . . . The old things -- not just the blues, but gospel music and pre-blues shouts and language, plus hillbilly/minstrel song and medicine show irony -- reflect a disinterest in the polite trappings of (primarily but not only white) society, an implicit rejection of basic tona…

Throughout his long and prolific career, Matthew Shipp has presented several different and impressive trio formations. Among the featured members have been bassists William Parker, and Joe Morris, and drummers Guillermo E. Brown, Whit Dickey, and Susie Ibarra. In 2015, two other premier players, bassist Michael Bisio, and drummer Newman Taylor Baker stepped in as the rhythm section on The Conduct of Jazz (Thirsty Ear). Their fourth album as a unit, World Construct makes the group the most enduri…

Dave Rempis and Tim Daisy are two musicians whose work together over the last 25 years has been the cornerstone of countless improvising bands: Triage, Vandermark Five, Rempis Percussion Quartet, The Engines, Earscratcher, and their longstanding duo, to name a few. Over the last decade they’ve purposely found ways to shake their interaction up, reconstructing and redefining the possibilities to keep the music moving forward. Part of that approach has involved bringing in countless musicians as g…

Paris-born, New England-raised, long-time Chicago-residing Makaya McCraven has been at the forefront of genre-redefining movements in jazz since 2015, when he introduced the world to his unique brand of ‘organic beat music’ on the breakout album In the Moment. Culled, cut, post-produced and re-composed by Makaya using recordings of free improvisation he collected over dozens of live sessions in Chicago, through incubation and experimentation In the Moment established a procedural blueprint that …

Full-length, legendary Cecil Taylor Orchestra concert from Jazz Jamboree 1984 feat. greatest names on American and European free jazz scene.

This highly sought-after classic has now returned for a third re-run, showcasing the talents of young Estonian trumpeter Jaan Kuuman and his esteemed instrumental ensemble. Recorded in the early to mid-seventies this compilation features a masterful blend of tight jazz-funk rhythms,infused with a dramatic flair and irresistible hooks that will leave listeners yearning for more. Stock fly fast on this one.

"The master of multiphonics (playing more than one note at a time on a horn), Albert Mangelsdorff has been a giant of the European avant-garde for the past 30 years. He originally studied violin and worked as a jazz guitarist before taking up the trombone in 1948. Here he is taped live at a concert in Tokyo with what was then his regular quartet: Heinz Sauer on sax, Günter Lenz on bass, and Ralf Hübner on drums. There's a very nice blend between the leader's agile but smooth horn and the somewha…

"This is Kunio Ohta's second TBM album, known as a favorite of listeners who love the TBM label. The original "Umi to Taiyo (The Sea and the Sun)" features all the members in lively action, and Takano's melancholy tenor solo on the over 16-minute title track is a must-hear." - Koki Hanawa

Masayuki Takayanagi, a charismatic artist who relentlessly pursued new jazz. Three albums by Tee & Company, the strongest big combo of the 20th century under Takayanagi. This is their second album. Includes the fast-paced "Dragon Garden". The other three tracks, in which Takayanagi, Mori and others interplay with a unique sense of time, are also must-listen.

FRIM Records presents Can't Hide. Released December 10, 2021 Gustaf Hielm, bassElin Forkelid, saxophonesErik Carlsson, drums All music by Forkelid, Carlsson, Hielm (STIM/NCB)Produced by FRIM.Recorded March 12, 2020, at Fylkingen, Stockholm, by John Chantler.Mixed by John Chantler.Mastered by Göran Stegborn.

New Map is based on open-form “cells” of concrete ideas, notes and directions that the musicians had to respond to. The 22-minute title piece swings - sometimes, literally - back and forth between subtle percussive games, mysterious and sensual orchestral-chamber dynamics, anchored by harpist Krüger, accordionist Kalle Moberg and trumpeter Köster, and raw, noisy and abstract improvisations led by sax players Lea, Klaus Ellerhusen Holm, Kristoffer Berre Alberts and Finnish electronics player Tomm…

On Clusterfuck, Nilssen-Love used graphic notations. The 24-minute title piece pushes the Large Unit to urgent and ecstatic blowouts but this powerful sonic adventure is often punctuated by playful, or subtle and reflexive, improvised solos. Eventually, the Large Unit exhausts its whole energy in the explosive coda before letting Moberg and Keränen end this piece. Nilsson-Love, second drummer Andreas Wildhagen and percussionist Celio de Carvalho navigate “Bubbles” to even more intense and energe…

"At first glance this new CD on PNL looks like familiar territory - a trio recording with two known collaborators of Nilssen-Love: Accordionist Kalle Moberg have become a steady and important voice of the Large Unit sound over the last ten years, and Frode Gjerstad truly needs no introduction - him and Nilssen-Love have played together for 30+ years. And while this trio is a new constellation, a combination that is good news in itself, "Time Sound Shape" offers another, bigger surprise: this is …

Rune Grammofon mainstay Hedvig Mollestad joins forces with legendary 12-piece Trondheim Jazz Orchestra on her latest prog-jazz-metal opus.

*2023 stock* "Trond has been compared with guitar calibers such as Bill Frisell and Ry Cooder among a number of reviewers. "Bedehus & Hawaii" locates Trond Kallevåg at the right height on the heels of Ry Cooder and Bill Frisell. " - Jazzaroundmag. On "Fengselsfugl" (prisonbird in english) Trond takes the listener into musical landscape inspired by his job as music teacher in Oslo Prison. Isolation, hope, darkness and the ballads inside the prisons in the 18th century are some key words that desc…