The trio of Spaces Unfolding (Emil Karlsen on drums, Neil Metcalfe on flute, Philipp Wachsmann on violin) has been reviewed here on this site before and was, still is, a main feature on the resurrection of the great Bead Records. This trio channels the very essence of the experimental ethos in music, using improvisational techniques and practices as a means to a collective feeling about music. It’s not an easy task and they make it even more difficult for themselves by adding the complex electronics of Pierre Alexandre Tremblay. To clarify things, by more difficult I mean that, always, adding another person takes time and energy to continue in the same vein. Improvisation is demanding, that’s why its fruits are so juicy.
The presence of Tremblay marks a shift in the jazz based free improv stance of the trio. He helps create atmospheres where the respected instruments of the trio move freely without any hesitation. I’m, as a listener but also as someone who feels that the less amplification the better nowadays, quite skeptical about the use of electronics in any kind of freely improvised musics. Apart from my latter comment, electronics can easily saturate the music, leaving the acoustic nature of it behind, making it many times barely inaudible.
But on Shadow Figures this isn’t the case, quite the opposite. It seems that Tremblay’s use of the ambience of the recording space opened up new possibilities for them. Both the violin and the drums seem to be ever-expanding in every audio way is possible. The duo of Wachsmann and Karlsen offer the listener an alternative way to hear. The percussive nature of the violin (sounds from its body and strings) is at the forefront, while Karlsen’s playing is full of ideas, gestures and small scale energetic playing. Metcalfe’s flute is a part of the electronic dialect between him and Tremblay’s humble use of electronics. In some tracks, like the two part Refractions, Tremblay takes the upper hand, transforming Shadow Figures into almost an ambient record. But that’s one of the facets of the quartet’s music. Quite thrillingly there are many of them, and in terms of listening and exploring this CD is one of the most demanding I’ve listened to the whole year. One of the best and most rewarding too.
Listen here: https://beadrecords.bandcamp.com/album/shadow-figures
@koultouranafigo
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