First, let’s please define what music needs to include: melody, rhythm and harmony. Next, the fluid definition of “jazz” tends to include: improvisation, swing/syncopation and “blues.” Here are three recent releases that may make you question either a) these definitions or b) what “jazz” is or c) who these players of instruments are.
Look, I can take some outside music, and actually enjoy some of the freer jazzers. However, this one by Jeff Platz/g, Jim Hobbs/as, Luther Gray/dr and Timo Shanko/b is a major head scrather. Is it music or just sound effects?
Screaming guitars and thunderous drumming on the title track, space age noodlings on “Knufus Tomb,” flailing guitar and screaming sax on “Fudgie,” chirping and fuzzy strums on “Epic” and air piercing sax screams on “XYZ” make you wonder if you bought an album of sound effects. Melody? Harmony? Meter? Hmmmm.
Free Nelson Mandoomjazz consists of Rebecca Sneddon/sax, Colin Stewart/b and Paul Archibald/dr. These three make sounds that actually make you wonder what their music instructors would think if they heard this trio in concert. Di Sneddon’s teacher envision catatonic screeches coming from his student on material such as “Sunn Ra))” or tonguing effects and overblown harmonics as on”The Land Of H eat And Greed”? The plodding and heavy hitting beats and rhythms by Stewart and Archibald at least give a semblance of a line to follow, but it’s such a trudge that the March to Bataan seems like a more pleasurable trip. Who paid for their lessons?
Just what is “live electronics”? Isn’t that an oxymoron? Anyway, things get a bit more interesting on Spin Marbel’s album, which has the team of Martin France/dr, Tim Harries/b, Nils Petter M olvaer/tp and Terje Evensen, who plays the aforementioned living creation. The mix of dreamy synthesized sounds and trumpet make for some dreamy landscapes as on the Wagnerian “Canonical” while “Minus Two” with guest drummer Emre Ramazanoglu creates a mix of eerie sensations and thunderous rumbling. Harrie’s bass forms an intriguing line on ”Tuesday’s Blues” while gentle trumpet beginnings on “Leap Second” and “Two Hill Town” slowly build up into cataclysmic climaxes, not unlike the Germanic operas, but with fewer horns on the head and within fewer hours.
Glitch Records
Rare Noise Records