Jazz /
Le Déjeuner Sur L'Herbe
2024 Stock, reduced price. Remastered edition on British Jazz Explosion series. ‘Le Déjeuner Sur L’Herbe’ features key players in modern British jazz including Henry Lowther, Ian Carr, Michael Gibbs, Derek Wadsworth, Barbara Thompson, Dave Gelly, Dick Heckstall-Smith, Frank Ricotti, Jack Bruce and Jon Hiseman, under the directorship of Neil Ardley. ‘Nardis’ features solos by Ian Carr on flugelhorn, George Smith on tuba and – rarely heard – Jack Bruce on acoustic bass. Complementing this is what…
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…
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…
The Complete Recording Vol. 1 - Velocities
*2023 stock* Andrea Centazzo, LaDonna Smith and Davey Williams met for the first time in December 1978. They recorded the first part of this album in 1979 and the second in 2010. An exquisite and celebrated example of improvised music.
The Complete Recording Vol. 3 - Rituals
*2023 stock* Violinist LaDonna Smith and Guitarist Davey Williams teams up with Andrea Centazzo in this third release of their complete recording collection. Recorded in NYC at the Stone during the Ictus Nights Festival celebrating 35 years of Ictus, this CD is a must for improvised music lovers.
Wildflower
*2023 repress* "The trio takes you on an intense, meditative and spiritual musical journey that embodies the spirit of freedom. Based around hypnotic grooves laid down by Brichard’s unswervingly solid bass lines, drummer Skinner plays around artfully with the beats, grooving hard in constantly shifting, unexpected turns of rhythmic play. Rahman’s contributions range from subtle conversational interplay to loudly expressed angry passion to the most delicate of whispers, conveying a depth of emoti…
Strumento di Etimo Incerto
The singular Norwegian percussionist Ingar Zach, a long-time member of paradigm-shifting experimental ensembles like Huntsville and Dans les arbes, delivers his eighth solo recording, and his first on the superb Belgian imprint Aspen Edities. The percussionist digs even deeper into his sonic research, transforming a massive bass drum used in orchestral music, as a resonant surface for otherworldly, texture-rich excursions that mix-and-match rhythm and color in ever-shifting combinations.
Variations (LP)
* 250 copies, hand numbered * On Nils Vermeulen’s first solo album, the sound of the double bass is the main variable. Recorded at the empty Ghent Opera, where every note, attack and vibration comes through, including the creaking of the wooden floor. There is no hiding in reverb, nor in easy playing. The strings Vermeulen uses on this recording (‘Tempera’ strings by Gerold Genssler), are inspired by traditional gut strings, and have lower tension to let the instrument resonate freely. The pie…
Love
*In process of stocking* Repress of Wildflower's 2nd album. The band continued to explore areas of groove-based improvised jazz. Taking a slightly freer approach to the writing process, simple but effective melodies and bass motifs are explored to create fully realised pieces with dynamic extremes that bring a full range of emotion. Recorded over a two-day session at Studios in London, the band sounds relaxed and at ease, giving space to explore intricate improvised interplay and dialogue fully …
Meets Matthew Bourne Volume 1
On July 16 2021, Shiver (Guitarist Chris Sharkey, Bassist Andy Champion and Drummer Joost Hendrickx) met up with Pianist Matthew Bourne at his house in Airedale, Yorkshire. Hungry to make music following various lockdowns, cancellations and disappointments, the quartet embarked on a ferocious two-day journey of exploratory music-making. The weather was good, the connection was immediate. There was much laughing, tea-drinking and storytelling. In the evening, the stove was lit and we listened to …
The Art of Crashing
*200 copies limited edition* “Costa and Ernsting are assertive and confident players who don’t hesitate to claim their positions, but most of all, they are keeping up with each other, using their dialogue to explore and expand. And that is what it is about, a quest for ideas and a way for them to co-exist, make sense, keep the story moving forward on all levels. And as far as the greater story is concerned: this album is another fine addition to an endlessly fascinating mosaic of sounds.” - Guy …
Workshop
In October 1974, the first number of “L'Indépendant du Jazz”, a small self-produced magazine DIY -before punk supposedly invented the concept- was launched by Jef Gilson, Gérard Terronès, Jean-Jacques Pussiauand a few other specialists of a different kind of jazz in France, it looked at the already long career of Jef Gilson and in detail at the album with saxophonist Philippe Maté : The "Workshop" is, with Philippe Maté (alto-sax), an undeniable success. Maté is genuinely ‘the’ most inventive Fr…
Memoirs of a Dream
*Limited edition of 600 copies* Nomadic spiritual jazz duo The Sea Ensemble embodied the ethos of their era and art to a uniquely poetic degree. Founded in the early 1970’s by ethnomusicologist Zusaan Kali Fasteau and versatile instrumentalist Donald Rafael Garrett (sideman to John Coltrane, Archie Shepp, and Roland Kirk, among others), the couple’s lifestyle mirrored their music: restless, questing, collaborative, and improvised. Their itinerant journeying spanned Senegal, Congo, Morocco, Haiti…
Green Money
Steve Day, poet, writer, percussionist has been around Discus Records for several years contributing sleeve notes for Keith Tippett recordings as well as reviews and other wordplay. Although he and comrades Peter Evans, Julian Dale, Mark Langford, have recorded for other labels, the Day Evans Dale Ensemble is a completely new venture with regular live dates in a range of venues. This seemed like an appropriate time to bring their 'new thing' to Discus Music; a mix of spoken word and spontaneous …
Were We Where We Were
Were We Where We Were is a recording of set of compositions by Michael Formanek, and performed here by him, saxophonist and clarinetist Chet Doxas, and drummer Vinnie Sperrazza, collectively as the Michael Formanek Drome Trio. These pieces were loosely grouped together as Palindrome Series 1 and Palindrome Series 2, from 2020. They started out as a series graphic scores that were then reinterpreted as conventionally notated music for this trio. The Drome trio learned the music and rehearsed outs…
Opinions
Torbjörn Zetterberg’s new record, Opinions, is not a conventional “solo” outing. It doesn’t represent the bassist, composer, and bandleader stepping away from all that to prove his mettle as a virtuoso unaccompanied improvisor. Anyone familiar with Zetterberg’s small group recordings needs no confirmation of his prowess. And anyway, strutting his stuff is not his vibe. Certainly not the vibe of this record, where the bassist plays more than bass, a solo venture on which he is occasionally joined…
Let Our Rejoicing Rise
*2022 stock* In the year that Juneteenth was finally declared a national U.S. holiday, 2021, Joe McPhee and Tomeka Reid united for a live concert in celebration. Multi-instrumentalist McPhee was deeply moved by the historical nature of the circumstances, the incredible freight of that history of oppression and liberation represented in the legislation, both the insanity of its overdueness and the joy of its institutionalization. As a preamble to the music, McPhee led off with two poems, read wit…
An Offering
Flowing water is an essential element of Earthly existence, a living force, a process of nature, a path-making which combines infinite sources mixing imperceptibly into a singular energy. It’s also a potent metaphor. A childlike wonder at flowing water’s presence and power, all the impressions it makes and creative neurons that it fires, happens to be a personality trait shared by Evan Shornstein (aka Photay) and Carlos Niño. The two producers/musical connectors may have grown up and reside a co…
Karaoke (7")
If you ever witnessed an Alvarius B. show you are probably aware that there are a few things only in underground music matching this level. If you haven't, don't miss him when he's coming close next. Karaoke shows one of the many characters you could explore during his shows. As his brother Richard, the other keyholder of Sun City Girls legacy, Alan Bishop played a lot of shows not only under the Alvarius B. moniker on various Unrock stages through the years. "Solo Nostalgia" (E. Morricone) and …