Free flowing ideas are delivered in various group settings from albums ranging from the 1970s to recent times on this recent cache of material from No Business Records. Hang on tight!
Liudas Mackunas plays tenor sax, soprano sax, contrabass clarinet and prepared clarinet on this 2018 oting with Christian WIndfeld on prepared 
drums, cymbals and percussions. There are two extended tracks. “Face” includes an almost electric sounding percussive rumble, puffing reeds, haunting scratches and long tones on woodwinds. “Maker” is more outside, with mouthpiece effects, duck calls on the soprano sax gliding over a percussive avalanche, and a breathy tenor sighing over a jungle drum beat. Any local guides to help you through the brush?
Frode Gjerstad plays alto sax, Kent Carter is on bass and John Stevens hits the drums on one two part piece entitled “Detail-90” from 1990. Stevens’ cymbals start things off before shifting gears and digging into a hard bop mode with Gjerstad’s bright sax before slowly flittering away on “Detail-90A”. High pitched bowing and cymbal scratching is guaranteed to make your skin crawl with Gjerstad’s staccato’d 
sax work on “Detail-90B” before Stevens’ fierce pounding brings things to an exhausting close. A two song marathon obstacle course.
Lao Dan plays alto sax and Chinese flute, forming the Tutu Duo with drummer/percussionist Deng Boy for three shortish pieces and a three movement “Supranatural Suite”. The 2019 session includes a 
Wagnerian screaming alto sax and flailing drums on “The Prophecy” with puffing and huffing flutes mixed with a drum solo for “Tournament of Chopsticks”. High pitched squealing arguments between reed and sticks make up “Waltzing On The Square” while “Supranatural Suite” includes serene and open flute, dark ominous thunderings and melancholic woodwinds hovering over the restless desert. Soundtrack to a torrential rain storm?
Tenor saxist Rodrigo Amado teams up with pianist Alexander von Schlippenbach, cellist Miguel Mira and drummer Gabriel Ferrandini for a 56 minute opus recorded at the Vilnius Jazz Festival back in 2019. Some dreary piano turns blue before a series of cymbal scratching, bass finger plodding and bowing and all around tenor squawking takes over for a wall shaking climax. Scrambling cello and drums form a traffic jam with von Schlippenbach, with Amado’s basic theme throughout the hour being “When in doubt, scream”.
You get a walk through some deep reeds with a front line of Mototeru on tenor sax, Susumu Kongo on alto sax, flute and bass clarinet and Nao Takeuchi on tenor sax, flute and bass clarinet, all propulsed forward by drummer Shota Koyama on this 1999 gig in Japan. The three songs include a 40 minute “Yokoham Iseazaki Town” with “nonbreathing flute” and the reeds sounding like electronic background. A didjeridoo-sounding bass clarinet gets bluesy on the 12 minute “Yokohama Yamashita Town” with things finalized by a 20 minute “Yokohama Yamate Town” featuring Koyama driving in 4th gear under the flying and floating flutes, with Takagi searing up above. Woodwind wanderings.
Playing both flute and trumpet, Itaru Oki leads a team of Yoshiaki Fujikawa/as-fl, Keiki Midorikawa/b and Hozumi Tanaka/dr through five improvised and free “Combo Sessions” during a 1975 gig. “Session 1” has trumpet and flute going rubato over a high hat before the horns pitch high into the stratosphere. Midorikawa bows his bass while trumpet and alto sax flail on the overdriven “Session 2” Oki’s horn ins featured on his 5 minute aria “Session Three” while he takes part in the avalanche after the subtoned bass and drum bring in “Session 4”. The tones are so high throughout the gig, particularly in the slash and burn “Session 5” that you might alert your dog with some of these songs.
The band Total Music Association consists of two bands. The first includes Andreas Boje/tb, Wilfried Eichhorn/bcl-ts, Hans-Jorg Hussong/bs-ss, Erich Schroder/va, Helmut Zimmer/p, Matthias Boje/b and Rudi Theilmann/dr for 1971 recording of two songs. The 17 miute Walpurgisnacht” includes a dark piano intro, bowed bass, chaotic horns and sounds like a dog gnawing on a toy. The 13 minute “Incubus-Succubus-Pestilentia” includes some bass and drum bop lines, splattering trombone, a piano solo between a Neopolitan traffic accident and strings scratched like there was an ant hill on someone’s back. A 21 minute “Improvisation” from a 1988 German session retains Hussong and Boje and brings in drummer Willi Schneider for a trio that as tenor alto and baritone saxes wailing, screeching, squawking and screaming over the frenetic and frantic support. Why isn’t fee improvisation ever mellow?
If you like basses and low tones, step right up! This 2018 recording features the tuba of Kornel Papista and four, count ‘em, four bassists in Ervin Malina, Erno Hock, Zoltan Csanyi and Szilard Mezei. This fun filled session includes a mix of bowing and plucking with the tuba delivering running blocks on “Hep 34”, a walking bass line that struts its stuff on the harmonious s”Hep 26”, deep muddy waters trudged through on the low bow and high pick of “Hep 33G’ and a deep magma of mourning on “Pihent Turkiz/Rested Turquoise”. The tuba leads the charge on “Hep 31 1/2 “ and the blues are bowed on “Simfle Sonk”. This one is a hoot!!
Last but not least, the latest edition of the Sam Rivers Archive comes to light for a 1981 concert with Rivers on tenor sax, flute and piano, accompanied by Jerry Byrd/eg, Rael Wesley Grant/eb and Steve Ellington/dr. The hour plus concert is essentially one long piece broken down into 13 sections. Everyone gets a solo pieces, with Rivers mournful on tenor, dreamy on flute and creating ripples on piano. Ellington gives a high hat workout, Grant’s fingers get blisters and Byrd takes you to the delta blues for the remaining sonatas. Together, The “Tenor Saxophone Section I and II” have a free stampede opening and kinetic conclusion. Ellington gives a hip backbeat to “Flute Section III” and the funky “Flute Section I”, with a wild white knuckler on “Flute Section II”. Don’t look away-you might miss something!