Peter Brötzmann/Peeter Uuskyla - Born Broke (Atavistic, 2008) ****

You know I'm not a fan of Brötzmann - and I therefore do not know everything he has released - but if he keeps going like this, I might get to appreciate him better. In a duo setting with Swedish drummer Peeter Uuskyla, the two musicians bring some staggering free improv, for more than an hour and a half of relatively accessible music - relative, that is, to Brötzmann's standards. He typically wails and screams of course, but often the music is sad, slow, sometimes even subdued and quietly moaning. Especially at the end of "Born Broke", the title track, but also at the beginning of "Beautiful But Stupid", which starts slowly, evolving into a typical high energy blowing session. "Ain't Got The Money" starts with plaintive wails, evoking the misery the title suggests, with Uuskyla creating great reaction to Brötzmann, urging him on, playing counterrhythms at moments, but always very rhythmic, and in a way not free at all. And that recipe explains the quality of the music. No matter how wild Brötzmann is, the rhyhtmic foundation is rock-solid and rich. The third track collapses into silence about halfway, going back to the sad crying it started with. "Dead And Useless" is the only track on the second CD, which lasts close to 40 minutes. Uuskyla is a real revelation, and on this CD, right now, to me, Brötzmann too. The two musicians seem to be led on by the same feelings of love and rage, subtlety and power, sensitivity and brutality. The duo combines the directness of street musicians, with the skill of real artists. And have you have read a more desperate list of titles on one CD?

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