Two implicitly lyrical players -- trumpeter Kirk Knuffke and drummer Whit Dickey -- in their second album together of well-paced, thoughtful dialog, an intimate set of recordings that show the adept skills of both as they promote their inherent melodic intentions on their instruments, neither overpowering, but conversing in a warm and rewarding give and take.
Format: LP Condition: New Released: 2019 Country: Poland Packaging: LP Recorded at the Studio 2, in Brooklyn, New York, on January 12th, 2018, byMax Ross.
"Drone Dream isn't Whit Dickey and Kirk Knuffke's first dance together. The drummer and cornetist met under similar studio circumstances several years ago for a session released under the auspices of the Clean Feed label. This time the commercial conduit is the Lithuanian No Business imprint and it's an equally apposite fit for the spontaneous investigations that are their parlance. The title of the earlier outing colorfully emphasized the duo's shared skill in lacing segments of silence through their dialogue. The old musical adage arguing parity of importance between what is played and what isn't echoes regularly in the give and take between their instruments.
Packaged as a limited-edition LP (per No Business standard), the album partitions neatly into three improvisations per side. "Soaring" sets trajectory in both title and content as Knuffke blows curvaceous tones over a string of snare rolls and cymbal accents that incrementally gains volume and velocity. A sudden dual downshift resets direction and the piece concludes at a porous lope halted by a final furtive blast of brass. "Weave 1" debuts Dickey's painterly brushes and Knuffke's natural wah-wah effects. Its immediate sequel covers adjacent ground with sparely deployed sticks and legato brass shapes that mix melody with melancholy before turning ominous with tom-tom rolls and open bell growls.
Another improvised dyad dominates the album's second side in "Legba Sequence Dream 1 & 2." Dickey sets up fields of percussive texture with mallets, gongs, and cymbals as Knuffke blows billowy vapor trails that fluctuate between airborne musings and sharper-edged cries. Dickey dials up the rhythmic density in the final minutes as if invoking the African spiritual entity indexed in the title. "Oblique Blessing" returns a sense of comparative calm with Knuffke once again spooling what feels like Mobius Strip of melody over a swirling terrain of struck cymbals and drum skin. The feeling that these two could continue their clairvoyant colloquy indefinitely pervades even after stylus and vinyl groove part ways."-Derek Taylor, Dusted Magazine