The Squid's Ear Magazine


Keune / Lash / Noble: And Now (FMR)

A searing album in the European Free Jazz tradition from the trio of Stefan Keune on tenor sax, Dominic Lash on double bass, and Steve Noble on drums, performing live at Cafe Oto in London in 2020 for an explosive set that at times catches its breath, but which always returns to their assertive and astounding displays, ultimately ending with a unique introspection; magnificent.
 

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product information:

Personnel:



Stefan Keune-tenor saxophone

Dominic Lash-double bass

Steve Noble-drums, percussion


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UPC: 642415162722

Label: FMR
Catalog ID: FMR583
Squidco Product Code: 29434

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2020
Country: UK
Packaging: Digipack - 3 panel
Recorded at Cafe Oto Project Space, in London, United Kingdom, on January 22nd, 2020, by James Dunn.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"If you like Albert Ayler's explosive improvisations from Spiritual Unity and Prophecy albums, Evan Parker from the seventies on eighties, Brötzmann bent under the percussive deluge of Han Bennink or Mats Gustafsson with Gush or Lovens, you will find here the ultimate piece of evidence. There is no "melodic" line, only articulations of frenzied sound, mouthpiece and reed bites, a destroying fire on breathing breath. Stefan Keune's style is akin to the vitriolic and explosive Evan Parker when he played in a duet with Paul Lytton or Derek Bailey or in a trio with Alex Schlippenbach and Paul Lovens or the extraordinary Michel Doneda on soprano sax.

After the first ten volcanic ten minutes of "Well Then" (26:48), an egalitarian dialogue takes place where the detailed sounds exploring the margins of the instrument create a kaleidoscopic vision of the musical flow. When a melodic form appears on the tenor sax, it becomes the pretext for doubling or tripling the licks on the mouthpiece and using "forked" fingerings which open the field to the multiplication of melodic fragments crushed and superimposed as if the column of d he boiling air was about to explode with a projection of high on pitched bursts and very short growls in the bass or midrange. We then think of the ethics of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble as documented by Face To Face with percussionist John Stevens and Trevor Watts on soprano sax. I am focusing on the description of the saxophonist because, even if this music is egalitarian and collective, it is indeed a tenor saxophone cum trio, whose expressive on expressionist peculiarities color and define their musical universe. Underlying this surge of pointillist sounds, high on pitched harmonics, jumps of registers, friction of timbre, exasperations of a surgical breath, we perceive complex harmonic constructions and intelligent variations of fingerings which make his improvisation captivating and keep you spellbound.

During the last fifteen minutes of "Well Then" and the beginning of "Whatsoever" (16:31), the trio builds renewed flows where each improviser is immersed in an intense mutual listening by exchanging and sharing their individual research of tones, movements and lines. / curves / points with a sense of openness, a dynamic closer to mezzopiano than forte / fortissimo, an obligatory register of hard free jazz. However, the lava smolders under the ashes: we feel that the spirits are heating up and all of a sudden, the engine races at maximum speed, Steve Noble's battery bursts, and Stefan Keune's demented breath chops the minute. its orgiastic tenor: maximum nihilistic expressionism is sheared by its delirious articulation sending slag, crushed notes, tears in the timbre, shards of exceptional brevity into space. Guts in the air. It is the notion of time that is shattering. In the third and final track,

"Finally" (23:18), the trio put the cake back together by re on ordering the exchanges. The double bass acquires more space and we discover that Dominic Lash's playing is subtly nourished by the saxophonist's rhetoric by adapting it to the characteristics of the large violin. The drummer carefully organizes percussive waves in crescendo over the long term alternating his accents and white spaces in close coordination with the blades of hazardous trills of the blower, the latter always involved in his spasmodic style but with beautiful nuances. As the minutes go by, the tension inexorably mounts, the game becomes more and more intense, intense enough near a possible final blast. Steve Noble measures his Machiavellian work by closely monitoring the pressure cooker which seems to threaten, heated to white. Dominic Lash's enormous pizzicati hold the whole thing to the surface of the ground, and around the sixteenth minute, the bassist plays alone for a moment, then initiates a pointillist exchange with the blower where he explores the vibrations of the bowstrings with a remarkable work on the timbre, the harmonics, spinning and carding the sound, striking the key, while Keune seeks barely audible highs on one or two notes triturated to the extreme. It is almost in a ghostly silence that the music disappears, reducing itself to a spontaneous decrescendo, but played by masters.

It is undoubtedly one of the collective performances of radical improvisation involving a tenor sax, this one as violently expressionist and spontaneous as it is austere and methodical, the most astonishing that I have been given to listen to by the through a recording, the replay of which allows the understanding of its progress and the analysis of the precise process. Fascinating! [...]"-Orynx Improv And Sounds Blog, translated by Google


Get additional information at Orynx Improv Sound

Artist Biographies

"Stefan Keune: Born in Oberhausen, Germany, 1965

From 1982, Stefan Keune studied privately with various teachers starting on the tenor saxophone. He was attracted to free improvised music from the beginning while using classical techniques from contemporary music as the basis of his playing. Keune began playing in local groups from 1985 (with Martin Blume amongst others) and since then he has intensively dedicated himself to the different kinds of improvised music. In 1990 he established contacts, first of all with Paul Lytton, then also with Dietmar Diesner, Matthias Bauer and others. In 1991, together with Lytton and bass player Hans Schneider he founded the "Stefan Keune Trio", and in 1992, the CD Loft was released. This was followed by an intense chamber-music-like phase of work, for example in a quartet with Paul Lovens, John Russell and Hans Schneider. He has played in close association with British free improvisors such as Roger Turner, Phil Durrant, John Butcher and others as well as with the other European improvisors such as Mats Gustafsson, Raymond Strid, Radu Malfatti and Peter Kowald. Recent groupings include a duo with John Russell, a duo with Paul Lovens, a trio with Dominic Lash and Steve Noble, a trio with Georg Wolf and Jörg Fischer, a quartet with Hans-Peter Hiby, Raoul van der Weide and Martin Blume and also one of the seminal groups within German free improvisation, XPACT (with Erhard Hirt, Hans Schneider and Paul Lytton)."

-Stefan Keune Website (https://stefankeune.com/)
3/27/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Born Cambridge, England, in January 1980; played bass guitar since 1994; studied with Hugh Boyd and Pascha Milner and at Basstech (London) with Rob Burns, Terry Gregory and others. Played double bass since 2001; basically self taught, with grateful thanks to Simon H. Fell. First class BA in English Literature from Oxford University (2002). Received MA Composition from Oxford Brookes University in 2003, having studied with Paul Whitty, Ray Lee and others. Received PhD from Brunel University in 2010, having studied the work of Derek Bailey, Helmut Lachenmann and JH Prynne and been supervised by Richard Barrett and John Croft."

-Dominic Lash Website (http://dominiclash.blogspot.com/p/dominic-lash_5.html)
3/27/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Steve Noble is London's leading drummer, a fearless and constantly inventive improviser whose super-precise, ultra-propulsive and hyper-detailed playing has galvanized encounters with Derek Bailey, Matthew Shipp, Ishmael Wadada Leo Smith, Stephen O'Malley, Joe McPhee, Alex Ward, Rhodri Davies and many, many more.

In the early eighties, Noble played with the Nigerian master drummer Elkan Ogunde, Rip Rig and Panic, Brion Gysin and the Bow Gamelan Ensemble, before going on to work with the pianist Alex Maguire and with Derek Bailey (including Company Weeks 1987, 89 and 90). He was featured in the Bailey's excellent TV series on Improvisation for Channel 4 based on his book 'Improvisation; its nature and practise'. He has toured and performed throughout Europe, Africa and America and currently leads the groups N.E.W (with John Edwards and Alex Ward) and DECOY (with John Edwards and Alexander Hawkins)."

-https://www.cafeoto.co.uk/artists/steve-noble/ (Cafe Oto Website)
3/27/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. Well Then 26:51

2. Whatsoever 16:34

3. Finally 23:18

Related Categories of Interest:


Improvised Music
Jazz
Free Improvisation
Collective Free Improvsation
London & UK Improv & Related Scenes
Trio Recordings
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FMR.


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