by S. Victor Aaron
Oftentimes the battle for getting the recorded music of experimental and forward-thinking musicians out to the public is largely undertaken by hundred if not thousands of tiny record labels. These labels are not founded by those with the idea of making a lot of money, but are started up my folks who have a real passion for this music and are willing to give these musicians a fair shake that they won’t get anywhere else. If lucky, the owner hopes to recoup a modest living for their efforts. ESP-Disk was such a label in the 1960s, and such iconic figures in the avant garde scene such as Albert Ayler and Milford Graves may have stayed in obscurity if not for that little start-up record company.
Today, ESP-Disk is still with us…it made a comeback, actually…and is probably a little bit bigger now, but still proudly a maverick. One of the “ESP-Disks” of today is one started back in 2002 by Steven Walcott, named Engine Studios. Brooklyn-based Engine Studios may not present the total whackiness of, say, Talibam!, but the artists they record fly in a fierecely independent orbit that’s not far from that historic label. Close enough, in fact, that ESP-Disk distributes Engine Studio records.
The music that comes from this outift have been self-described as anything from “progressive redneck” to “naughty hobbit rock.” Whack jazz is well-represented there, too. Last month, Engine released three new recordings by practitioners of this most blissful of jazz, and these are the three that are the focus of this installment of Quickies.
A record company whose motto is “just say no to dumbass music” lives by its creed.
Tom Abbs & Frequency Response Lost & Found
Multi-instrumentalist Tom Abbs’ main tool is the acoustic bass, and it was in this capacity that he was utilized for Bruce Eisenbeil’s grand concept record Inner Constellation, Volume One. But Abbs is a guy who likes to scare up ideas, too, and for his third album as leader of Frequency Response, he does plenty of that. He fronts a band that finds Brian Settles on various reeds, Chad Taylor on drums and for about half the tracks, Jean Cook on violin. Abbs himself dabbles in cello and tuba when he’s not playing bass.
Lost & Found is a real treasure for those who like their pot at the end of the rainbow to be filled with jarring, opposing directions within each song. Abbs is an absolute master at that, creating jittery, eerie sonorities. As explained in the liner notes, this is accomplished by deriving the music “from 22 numbered melody fragments, randomized and paired with visual, audio and narrative score structures.” The results provide the strangely sad “Torn,” the whack-a-mole random bombs of “Parse” and the perfectly blending of sax, violin and cello on the freak-out fest “Strung.”
Most of the songs run less than three minutes, so it seems the players are racing to complete their statements before the songs end. But instead of sounding incomplete or rushed, it’s intensified and concentrated instead. That combined with the stark contrasts and conflicts Abbs sets up make for very vivid listening. For those reasons, I get the feeling that Lost And Found is going to be one of the more creative and standout free jazz records of the year.
Fred Anderson Staying In The Game
Just last week we took a look at Chicago’s vibrant improvised music scene and the key role Delmark Records has played in its development. But that development was furthered along by the contributions of individuals, too, and saxophonist Fred Anderson has been one of them. He was a founding member of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians, a collaborator with Joseph Jarman and Billy Brimfield and the operator of several seminal clubs that promoted the jazz and underground music scene there, like the Birdhouse, the Beehive and the Velvet Lounge. In spite of having worked actively as a musician since at least the sixties, Anderson didn’t record as a leader until the late 70’s and even then didn’t regularly record his own records as a leader until the mid-90’s. Some of those records have been some live sets issued under Delmark.
However, Anderson’s latest offering Staying In The Game comes courtesy of Engine. As the title strongly implies, this octogenarian (Anderson was born in 1929) is not anywhere near done making music that’s vital, challenging and loose. Anderson’s tenor sax has got this huge-assed, Gene Ammons-sized tone that speaks in an intelligent, swinging Sonny Rollins dialect. The Rollins connection is reinforced by his bringing along only Harrison Bankhead (bass) and Tim Daisy (drums) into the studio with him. Playing with no full, chordal instrument like a piano or guitar, Anderson plows through his half dozen open-ended compositions baring the soul of his sound.
He’s the rare jazzman who thirstily drank from both the cups of Parker and Ornette Coleman when both burst onto the scene, and the music in Staying In The Game fuses the best of both worlds. The blues-based twenty-four minute jam of “Sunday Afternoon” isn’t so much a structured melody as it is a range of chords that the participants move around in to fit with wellspring of ideas presented by the leader. “The Elephant And The Bee” is an engaging conversation between Anderson’s horn and the bass—both bowed and plucked—of Bankhead. “Wandering” is a gentle, meditative song made a little exotic by Bankhead’s thumb piano.
Throughout it all, Anderson plays with the energy and passion of someone a q
uarter of his age, but with the advantage of first-hand knowledge from having experienced all the important touchstones of jazz since the bop era. Staying In The Game is not just a album name, it’s a declaration that’s made with a superb performance, not words.
Warren Smith and the Composer’s Workshop Ensemble Old News Borrowed Blues
The common thread of these three Engine Studios records besides the artists’ penchant for unconventional and challenging acoustic jazz is that they all place a high value on group interplay and group improvisation. That can be said more about Warren Smith’s record than the other two, however. When you assemble a band of fifteen players as Warren Smith did for his new release Old News Borrowed Blues, group interplay becomes a must.
The percussionist and drummer Warren Smith, like Anderson, has been around the block quite a few times. His long and impressive list of sideman credits include Anthony Braxton, Charles Mingus, Henry Threadgill, Van Morrison, Aretha Franklin, Count Basie, Sam Rivers, Tony Williams, and Joe Zawinul. The other trait shared with Anderson is that Smith can go “inside’ or “outside” with equal ease, and this album shows off Smith’s ability for combining the melodic with the abrasive, and tossing in a bunch of different styles to boot.
The big band is loose and loquacious, and its apparent refusal to play the scores so tight and tidy only adds to its appeal; that anything-goes esprit de corps is similar to what made Sun Ra’s Arkestra one of the unique and forward thinking large ensembles of all time. Smith’s crew revitalize old compositions of Smith, each of which have a distinctive flavor to them. “Lock The Toilet Door” is the slightly campy swing tune, the “Rivers State Suite,” moves from reggae to funky West African syncopation. “One More Lick For Howard Vick” is a post-bop delight tribute to the great, under-appreciated tenor player, while the four-part “Free Forms” is as advertised: experiments in free-flowing improvisations.
Old News Borrowed Blues might have a moldy-sounding title, but this isn’t creaky old big band music of your grandparent’s. It lives mostly in the here and now.
- McCoy Tyner and Joe Henderson – ‘Forces of Nature: Live at Slugs’ (2024) - November 21, 2024
- Lydia Salnikova, “Christmas Means a Different Thing This Year” (2024): One Track Mind - November 19, 2024
- Darius Jones – ‘Legend of e’Boi (The Hypervigilant Eye)’ - November 15, 2024
