Clayton Thomas, Burkhard Beins - Rhythm Complication (Remote Resonator, 2018) ****

By Keith Prosk
Berlin’s Splitter Orchester is a goldmine of great musicians that make great recordings. I enjoy the orchestra’s recordings, particularly 2016’s Creative Construction Set™ with George Lewis, but the real treats are the recordings of its members in smaller formats. Matthias Müller’s Solo Trombone was one of the albums I listened to most last year; Blurred Music from Biliana Voutchkova and Michael Thieke is in my heavy...

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Latest from Norway

By Eyal Hareuveni
Three distinct Norwegian composer - guitarist Kim Myhr, tenor sax player Hanna Paulsberg and double bass player Ole Morten Vågan, released this year their most ambitious and best albums so far. Kim Myhr / Quatuor Bozzini / Caroline Bergvall / Ingar Zach - pressing clouds passing crowds (Hubro Music, 2018)   “The question of change is in the nature of clouds. The nature of clouds is in the...

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Satoko Fujii and Joe Fonda – Mizu (Long Song Records) ****½

By Nick Ostrum
A long time ago, a friend introduced me to the music of Satoko Fujii. He loaned me a few albums and, at first listen, I immediately realized I had been missing out on something special. Fujii is thoroughly contemporary in her mastery of styles. She combines and configures influences unpredictably and seamlessly. And, she does so not for the sake of novelty, but, it seems, because she perceives some common emotive...

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MoE and Marhaug – Capsaicin (Utech, 2018) ****½

By Nick Ostrum
Lasse Marhaug, the Norwegian noise-extraordinaire, has been covered on this blog numerous times before, usually through his collaborations with Paal Nilsen-Love. MoE was more of a mystery to me. Also from Norway, MoE consists of Guro Sklumsness Moe on bass and sound processing, Håvard Skasett on guitars, and Joakim Heibø Johansen on drums. The former two are core members of the acoustic...

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Trumpet Trios

By Stef Gijssels
Always worth sharing: some new trumpet trios. One from a new international trio, one from some of the leading Polish musicians, one from a totally unknown Finnish trio and one from last year by three icons of free improvisation, and music to everybody's taste: from lyrical and accessible to uncompromising sonic explorations. Ramon Lopez, Percy Pursglove, Rafał Mazur ‎– Threefold (Not Two, 2018) ***½ Percy Pursglove, a...

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Ingrid Laubrock - Contemporary Chaos Practices (Intakt, 2018) *****

By Nick Metzger
With Contemporary Chaos Practices the celebrated saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock has provided a conclusive highpoint of creative music in 2018. The album combines Laubrock’s excellent orchestral scores with improvisations from soloists Mary Halvorson, Kris Davis, Nate Wooley, as well as from the composer herself. I didn’t have the chance to listen to this album properly before I submitted my...

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Ken Vandermark/Paal Nilssen-Love live at Underflow record store, Athens. 12-1-2018.

Paal Nilssen-Love (dr) and Ken Vandermark (sax, cl) By Fotis Nikolakopoulos
Ken Vandermark and Paal Nilssen-Love are sitting right there on the small stage of Underflow’s basement, chatting casually like two friends during the half hour interval of their two sets. Which is true because they are friends. They have known each other for quite a while and have collaborated in various groupings with other great artists,...

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Solo Percussion - Twelve Albums Overview

By Stef Gijssels
In September, we already reviewed Chad Taylor's Myths & Morals, and Lucas Niggli's Alchemia Garden, but there is more percussive power that requires our attention. Amazingly enough, a lot of solo percussion works were released this year. An overview. We will add a lot of improvised material, ranged from complete free form to composed modern music, from jazz to techno, from intimate to exuberant, from minimalistic to expansive. Whatever...

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New Ears 2018 Vote: Happening Now

We invite you to vote on the "New Ears Award" for 2018. Please enter your choice below. Loading... If you are running into trouble using this poll, you may also access it he...

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Free Jazz Blog's 2018 Top 10 Lists

From: It's OK to Like Free Jazz Today we present the Collective's top 10 albums of the year and invite you to vote in the annual New Ears Awards. The contenders for the award were drawn from the lists below and can be found here. The collective also votes on the same list, but in a separate poll. The award winner for both polls will be announced on January 1st. As you know, it's not so easy to come up with a top 10 list. There is teeth gnashing,...

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