Jazz /
O Life, O Light Vol. 2
New York-based Zoh Amba first cultivated her musical passion in the lush forests of the Appalachian mountains, playing to the woods around her home, before she studied at classical conservatories. Her music honors her roots, full of folk melodies, mesmerizing refrains, repeated incantations and powerfully-executed Free Jazz. Her sound is courageous and bold, soaring from muted hums to squeaky trebles, producing a confident sound imbued with an innate spirituality. On this project, Zoh Amba is jo…
Shine Hear (Vol. 1)
Collaborations are unique to their combinations, producing totally original and innovative ideas with the addition of a single factor. In this case, legendary musicians and 577 mainstays join together in this unique arrangement for the first time, allowing for yet another reinvention. Saxophonist and multi-instrumentalist Daniel Carter, pianist Leo Genovese, bassist William Parker (also playing Gralla and Shakuhachi on this album), and drummer and vocalist Francisco Mela, unite for another impro…
Puna
Huge Tip! Oiro Pena is a Finnish jazz collective helmed by prolific composer Antti Vauhkonen. Their last album, Puna, recorded in bedrooms, studios and other salubrious locations around Helsinki during 2022, is a mix of lo-fi spiritual jazz, experimental, and avant-garde music forms. It includes four vocal tracks recorded with Merikukka Kiviharju, which feature both original lyrics and those sourced from traditional Finnish folk songs. Vauhkonen first attracted attention as saxophonist in the gr…
Braids
"Here, then, are three men who have, if you will, won the argument already. They don’t need excess volume or headline soloing to get their message across. Their message is inscribed in elegant lower-case and rarely used aural fonts. You will find yourself leaning forward because not a note or whisper should be missed ..." - Brian Morton
Extensions
Pianist and composer Simon Nabatov has played with "who's who" of the jazz and improvised music community, given concerts in over 60 countries, appeared on the numerous international festivals, received prizes and documented his music on 30 CD's under his own name. His musical activities include Jazz, improvised, experimental and world music. Nabatov’s initial idea to extend his Cologne-based quartet - hence the CD title – resulted in this exciting musical document. Both tracks, while fully impr…
déluge
Tip! "Trombe’s 2019 self-titled debut LP kicked off the Nantes unit’s ongoing two-piece experiment with a short and sweet exercise in minimal brut-jazz, with percussionist Erwan Cornic rattling chains and trinkets just as often as he plays full drum set and Thomas Beaudelin yanking the sax valves like root vegetables. But even though the duo has garnered praise from devout skronk stalwarts like Mats Gustafsson, their particular style has always had a distinct, almost delicate melodicism at its h…
Una ofrenda a la ausencia
“Una ofrenda a la ausencia” (an offering to absence) explores in depth the rawness, harshness and roughness of sound embracing the intense and unfiltered expressions that emerges from absence.
Aphelia
Berlin trumpeters Axel Dörner and Lina Allemano team up to create experimental improvised sonic explorations, both in duo and in larger trumpet-ensemble form. The pieces' titles reference the small lesser-known objects circling around the sun in our solar system; the album’s title Aphelia being the furthest distance away in orbit around the sun.
Primitive
“Primitive” is Jessen’s first full-length release. A raw solo saxophone recording born out of anger and isolation. At times, it screams violently. At others, it slowly pierces. At all times, it is a reaction to Jessen’s surroundings.
Basenezmen
*2023 stock* Recorded in Royal Alzheimer Hall, Thessaloniki, Greece, January 2015, Limited release of 500 unique record covers for the 500 hand-numbered copies of the Basenezmen music project. Two of the most important musicians in Greece are currently together for the first time to present ‘basenezmen’ project. They improvise under rythmic structures in form of jazz, rock, ambient and folk music.
Something There
*2023 stock* "Almost two years of inactivity have passed. The main reason was the pandemic, of course, but there was also a second one, an eight-month period when I could not use my left arm because of a shoulder fracture. But still, on the 21st of October 2021, I performed solo at the Open Jazz events of Demetria Festival. In one of the old warehouses in the port of Thessaloniki which have been converted into cinema halls. Right across the port authority where I served for three years. The tens…
Skra’s Confession
*2023 stock* The Orange Blue Green band improvises freely in the true sense of the word. An improvisation initiating from the very first sound produced without any prior coordination regarding the style, structure or anything relating to the overall musical form. An acoustic, almost classical trio that has embraced the fundamental features of the sound of chamber music, along with the various musical idioms and experiences of the members’ multi-dimensional course. Their music features a primal e…
Reflection And Passage
Michael Fischer is an Austrian musician, composer and instant composition conductor. He works on the immanence of language within sounds, their sculptural and dramatic evidence, on the tenor saxophone, the violin, on cd-player setting and conducted instant compositions, in improvised and experimental music. Since 1999 he connects the electro-acoustic phenomenon feedback with acoustic instrumentation by creating and playing the feedback saxophone. He also collaborations with literary writers, dan…
Fulufulu Paupepa Paupapa
GBK are an Austrian free jazz trio that isn't afraid of being groovy. The band was founded in 2007 after a first meeting the year before, being thrown together in an improvised music session. They performed many years under the name of KGB before changing their name recently due to Russian war against Ukraine. All three musicians are happy to swap roles in their trio, therefore abstract experimental sounds have the same place in their repertoire as groove and melody. Drummer Didi Kern works both…
Outspan No 2
Tip! Recorded a month after Outspan No 1, this album offers up four more sonic delights from the core trio of Brötzmann, Van Hove, and Bennink. Rarely has free jazz/Euro improv/circus music/[your identifier here] sounded so unfettered and delightful -- adventurous without seeming self-serious, silly yet not without gravity. A must for any fan of these three maestros.
Outspan No 1
Tip! It's hard to imagine how this record -- and it's mate, Outspan No 2 -- managed to remain more or less out of circulation from the CD era onward. Outspan No 1 is nothing less than an ideal distillation of the broad approach to sound creation utilized by the three-ring circus that is Brötzmann, Van Hove, and Bennink, here with the added bonus of Mangelsdorff. Two short numbers, two long, too perfect.
We Insist! Max Roach's Freedom Now Suite
One of the major statements in the history of Jazz and African American liberation movements. Originally released in 1960 on Candid Records, Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite consists of five original compositions and performances staging and celebrating different moments and aspects of the African American history and culture. Here is a wonderful cast of musicians reunited around Max Roach – drums and Abbey Lincoln – vocals. Throughout the album you can find great contributions from the likes of Bo…
11th Street Fire Suite
11th Street Fire Suite is a post-BAG (Black Artists Group) classic. An emotionally ranging set of blues-drenched duets by alto saxophonist Luther Thomas and flutist Luther C. Petty, it's one of the great documents of the St. Louis creative music diaspora, a wild ride through turbulent and beautiful terrain on a slab of vinyl that's as rare as hen's teeth in its original form. Relocated from their midwestern hometown to New York City, Thomas and Petty entered the studio in 1978 with a fellow musi…
Hidros 9 - Mirrors
Conducted by Mats Gustafsson for two 9 piece chamber ensembles, 4 soloists, tape machine, turntable. Recorded at the Avant Art festival, Warsaw, Poland, 2022. The monumental composition for 27 musicians by Swedish saxophonist, improviser and composer Mats Gustafsson is an in-depth exploration and continuation of the previous piece Hidros o.T. (2019), commissioned by NyMusikk Trondheim, inspired by the mirrored forms and visual structures of artist Mathias Pöschl. Controlling 3 different groups o…
Opus One
'The initial idea behind Ensemble E was to combine traditions of Contemporary Music, Noise, Improvised music, Free Jazz and other experimental music fields and traditions with the deeper music traditions. This is deeper research of traditional and non-traditional ways of expressing folk music of Scandinavia, Portugal, Poland, Ukraine and more. Much more. By putting them next to each other/ on top of each other/ inside of each other. Creating new ways. The instrumentation of Ensemble E is spectac…