Meeting in sound artist and vocalist Yan Jun's studio in Berlin in 2017, trumpeter Axel Dörner and no-input mixer artist Toshimaru Nakamura recorded these four active and bristling improvisations, Dörner using every inch of his instrument and treating it with electronics to create the controlled chaos and richly jarring recordings that make up this, their 2nd album together.
Format: CD Condition: New Released: 2019 Country: Japan Packaging: Cardstock Sleeve, sealed Recorded in Yan Jun's studio in Berlin, Germany, on May 15th, 2017.
"With his innovative performances, Berlin-based trumpeter Axel Dorner has been a leading figure on the improvised music scene since the 1990s. Internationally popular no-input mixing board player/improviser Toshimaru Nakamura structures sound by controlling mixer feedback. These two musicians released the CD Vorhernach on the Ftarri label in 2007, and In Cotton and Wool is their second duo album.
The four tracks on this album (each between 7 and 12 minutes) were recorded in a studio in Berlin in May 2017. Dorner uses electronics in addition to trumpet. In striking contrast with the 2007 first release, which is permeated with delicate sound creation making extensive use of soft tones, this second album is sure to overwhelm listeners with its radical, aggressive musical back-and-forth. What's more, there's never a monotonous moment--the overall structure is diverse and richly varied. This is a powerful masterpiece born of the two musicians' incomparable technique andmusicianship."-Ftarri
"Ftarri is a Japanese label with some extreme sonic variations. These discs are further proof of that. For no particular reason, I started with the duet of Axel Dörner on trumpet and electronics and Toshimaru Nakamura on no-input mixing board. Now the latter might be known for some of the extreme music he produces as 'no-input mixer' basically means routing the output to the input and the result is feedback; feedback that has actually a lot of possibilities. Dörner is someone who plays the trumpet as an object that produces quite a bit of sound when amplified. On May 15, 2017, the two of them met at Yan Jun's studio in Berlin and on this single day they recorded the four pieces on this disc. Pieces that were mixed by Nakamura later on. It starts with 'Hemp', which serves us the full treatment of radical tones; a collision of feedback, distortion and noise. It's raw and untamed, never, so it seems, there is a very quiet moment. Dörner very occasionally blows tones on the trumpet, most notable in 'Feathers', but it has trouble sticking out above the playing field of all the electronics working overtime. It is, and this is no exact science, perhaps 80% of all electronic sounds and 20% acoustic sounds sticking up its head in selected places. [...]"-Frans de Waard, Vital Weekly