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Pfmentum is a jazz label and
newsletter based in the states aiming to 'support and advocate new music'. This
seems to me a rather understated claim; most record companies claim to
promote 'new music' in the sense that they release debut albums, but much of
this is 'new music' in a far more fundamental sense. This is certainly true
of Zugzwang, a collaboration between
Pfmentum's founder Jeff Kaiser and guitarist Tom McNalley. Certainly I have
personally never heard jazz with such a strong electronic element. The album
is recorded live, with no overdubs, with Kaiser using a quarter-tone trumpet,
McNalley on guitar duties, and both clearly doing a lot of knob-twiddling and
box-stamping. The variety of sounds this produces is astounding, with the
guitar in opening track 'Carbon Fianchetto' sounding more like an abused
collection of scaffold poles and springs than any conventional instrument,
and the quarter-tone trumpet punctuating the first minute or so with abrasive
bursts of distorted noise. This is not to say that audio violence is the sole
attraction; further into the track the trumpet has been looped, and creates
ethereal, bass-laden swells as the guitar clangs and shimmers on top, and
'Aristotelian Blockade' even has some straight-up conventional brass sounds
coming through. However in many tracks it is far harder to spot which
instruments are making which sounds, made even more complicated by the use of
loops and delay to build up the textures of each song, with a special mention
going to the beautiful, watery feedbacks in 'Opening Demand'. The most
impressive thing about this though is that it is nigh impossible to detect
the loops, since any repetitions are treated with different effects and the
whole piece is therefore always changing; they donāt settle for setting up a
backdrop and then playing over it.
The name of the album refers to a situation in chess where a player is forced
to make a move, even though it can only be a harmful one. It is a well chosen
name. The different oscillations, filters and panning in the music produce a
tangible sense of movement very hard to describe; you can feel literally pulled
and pushed in different directions, particularly if listened to at a high
volume. It strikes me that it is also relevant to challenge faced by Kaiser
and McNalley in making this sort of music; the question of musical interplay
is so dramatically different to other types of jazz. The pieces move from
substantially thick and noisy passages to moments of otherworldly stillness,
from being grating and menacing to eerily calm. While open to accusations of
pretentiousness, I feel this huge variation in mood saves the album from
simply being a sourcebook of sonic research. There were times listening to
this when I found it alien to think of what I was listening to as being made
by musicians because of the kind of atmosphere and effect it is capable of
producing. Although it does always change, the sense of organic growth in
these shifts allows the listener to drift with the sound, and the unique
perceptual effects it offers. This is not dinner party music of course, in
fact I think even if you have plenty of friends who share this interest it is
still best experienced alone and without distraction, but this is a great
opportunity to see some of the more outlandish places that music and sound
can take you to.
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On now to Hello the Damage by the Empty Cage Quartet, which although innovative and
loose is more recognizable as a jazz release than Zugzwang, whose
experimentation would not sound out of place on the roster of electronic
labels like Warp Records. This is a double CD covering two live performances,
and it must be said that the production instantly gives off a very live,
though clear, feel. Audience sound is retained, cropping up occasionally
during the tracks as well as the start, when some of the more intense moments
give rise to whoops and cheers that would be more expected at a rock concert.
Each track (two on the first disc, just one on the second) is credited as
either two or three actual compositions, but the liner notes help clarify
that these are more in the line of prepared motifs to be improvised around.
Due to the smooth development throughout itās often hard to spot where these
shift into the other, and the variety in the pieces might just as easily
indicate a dozen different movements. One of the particularly noticeable
aspects of this group is their tight control of dynamics, and the swift
reaction to change instigated by another player. The rhythm section is
constant, using kit and contrabass, but the two wind players range from using
trumpet, flugelhorn, alto sax, clarinet and wood flute, and these two players
in particular have an excellent instinctive relationship.
The opening of the first track is marked by weaving, rhythmic interplay
between the two brass players that balances free and slightly dissonant
playing with a comfortable groove and enjoyable quirkiness, given a strong
counterpoint by drums and bass that hold it together without taking away the
spontaneous feel. As the track progresses the drums drop slightly but the
beat becomes steadier, and the bass more rolling, allowing the track to gain
momentum even as the brass lines break off into freer improvisation. All
players are capable of tremendous restraint as well as the exuberance so
instantly apparent, in fact there are moments of near perfect silence, and it
is noticeable that there is no sound to be heard whatsoever from the crowd. I
can imagine why. As sound creeps back in the quartet comes into its own,
sonorous bass swells and clanging cymbals and bells build up at a snailās
pace, as one of the wind players switches to clarinet, engaging in more
beautiful interplay with his brass counterpart. The drama of this piece is
excellently balanced, with sometimes extreme bending and vibrato, and sudden
dynamic swells and contractions. This builds to the moment that really sold
me on this group, despite my limited experience of free jazz; 22 minutes into
the track it creeps into what I assume is the third and last movement, 'The
Mactavish Rag'. This is, plain and simple, fun. A nursery-like, jaunty tune,
it shows quite ably that these are musicians who are in it for enjoyment, not
some highbrow standard of 'appreciation', and that's all to the good. While
this is my favorite moment of the album, both discs contain excellent
performances that take a listener far beyond clichs of noisy, atonal, free
jazz, and into an atmosphere where propulsive, exciting grooves can sit
alongside floating, lounge-like passages and carnival excitement. The long
silence between the perfectly restrained end of the performance on the second
disc and the enthusiastic applause hints at what a great spectacle these
players would be live.
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Finally, an album in some ways
even odder than the Kaiser/McNalley release, Duos. Composed by flautist Ellen Burr (although she points
out in the liner notes that 50% of the tunes are improvised in collaboration
with the various other musicians) several of the tracks utilise 'graphic
scores'. Inspecting the samples given in the liner notes in some ways
confuses more than it explains. Using a variety of card systems, and one similar
application of the method to a painting (which is not reproduced),
instrumentalists interpret the density, movement and direction of line-based
illustrations to produce some frequently manic pieces. I must admit that
since only portions (usually the middle section) of the pieces are shown, and
in one case there is simply a rather obtuse explanation of method, I found it
easier not to attempt to analyse how these had been used to create the
finished product. At times listening to this CD I could imagine a casual
observer thinking that I had either gone completely mad or become
irredeemably pretentious. Sometimes the purpose of listening to music like
this, beyond an intellectual interest in methodology, evades me.
This is not to say that this release doesnāt have some excellent musicianship
on display, though, and the opening track is an excellent showcase for Burr's
virtuosity and unique style. Her playing in 'Ball of Yarn' mixes flurries of
notes with frequent vocal interjections, squeaks and breaths, and most
interestingly the production at points emphasises the clicks of the keys to
the point where they can be used as a percussive tool. This tumbling,
freeform approach can be very expressive at times, and some of her slow bends
contain a tortured kind of rasp, mixed with the use of breaths, that
illustrates well the breadth of her playing. This variety and the contrast of
sparse, stuttering moments with sections of unhinged energy do show
playfulness at work, and I would be doing the album a disservice to present
it as a simple piece of chin-stroking. 'Canon-Cards-Canon 1' is probably the
track where this sense of fun comes across most. A duet between alto flute
and bassoon, using the aforementioned card-based graphic scores, it sounds at
times like a deliciously wonky setting for a childrenās cartoon. The two
instruments work well together, and the bassoon often serves to provide
balance to the squeakier flute moments. Indeed itās somewhat easier to enjoy
the more abstract sounds Burr utilises when another instrument is present,
even if, as with the prepared bass of 'Senbazuru', the extra instrument is
being used in an unconventional way. In fact the prepared bass, like the keys
of the flute in 'Ball of Yarn', adds some much appreciated rhythmic structure
to the piece, and by having something to play off it seems that Burrās
natural timing comes through more clearly. In fact not to seem too
'conventional' about this but I would like to have heard more points when
this timing comes through, particularly in the only piece to actually use
percussion, 'Four Square', where Burr gets into a groove with the drums
briefly before moving back into more abstract territory. Her masterful
technique is still put to good use in this portion, but for slightly less than
a minute the music made a more visceral connection with me, and while it is
enriching to hear music that places demands on the listener it can only go
for so long before I want to be grabbed by the guts and taken somewhere. For
flautists this is an album that could seriously widen your ambitions and
palette, for others it is an interesting release, but one I would take in
small doses.
© Nicholas Hunt 2007
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