The Squid's Ear Magazine


Bootstrappers (Elliott Sharp / Melvin Gibbs / Don McKenzie): Xenolith (Klanggalerie)

The first new Bootstrappers album since 1992, joining band leader Elliott Sharp for this 3rd album are longtime collaborators Melvin Gibbs on electric bass and Don McKenzie on drums, for seven assertive rock-based improvisations fueled by electronics, free jazz, no wave and electroacoustic sound, manifesting a hardboiled NY ethic of focused grooves and free playing.
 

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product information:

Personnel:



Elliott Sharp-guitar, electronics

Melvin Gibbs-electric bass

Don McKenzie-drums


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UPC: 5052571095522

Label: Klanggalerie
Catalog ID: gg390
Squidco Product Code: 32037

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2021
Country: Austria
Packaging: Digipack
Recorded live at Silver Cord Studio, in Queens, New York, on June 11th, 2021, by Robin Hood.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

"Bootstrapping manifests a self-organizing sonic system from nothing. The seed is the impulse, the mechanism is improvisation. Bootstrappers is the name for Sharp's improvising rock trio. This latest edition of the group features longtime collaborators Melvin Gibbs on electric bass, drummer Don McKenzie, and Elliott Sharp on 6 and 12-string guitars and electronics. The music reflects the classic rock trio filtered through the ethos of cyberpunk, techno, and free jazz: raging, psychedelic, and filled with fantastic extrapolations. One may hear strains of Jimi Hendrix "Band Of Gypsies", Bela Bartok string quartets, and Ornette Coleman's harmolodics.

The history of Bootstrappers begins in 1990, with Sharp, then signed to the California label SST (started by Black Flag's Greg Ginn) calling on the Minutemen/Firehose rhythm section of bassist Mike Watt and drummer George Hurley to play some concerts and record an album mixing studio and live tracks. The gigs and sessions were exhilarating and the results were released as the eponymous album Bootstrappers on the New Alliance imprint from SST. The group played a number of concerts in California (including opening for Joe Satriani!) as well as the Rotterdam Jazz Festival.

The next edition of Bootstrappers was manifest in 1994 for the Dossier label in Berlin with the rhythm section of Jan and Tom Kotik on drums and bass. In later versions from then to now, Sharp has called upon various friends and colleagues to take part in bootstrapping. This roster has included Tony Lewis, Anton Fier, Dave Hofstra, Brent MacLachlan, Russ Flynn, Sim Cain, and Andrew Weiss. Future editions of Bootstrappers may see the group expand to orchestral dimensions."-Klanggalerie



This album has been reviewed on our magazine:

The Squid
The Squid's Ear!

Artist Biographies

"Elliott Sharp is an American multi-instrumentalist, composer, and performer.

A central figure in the avant-garde and experimental music scene in New York City for over 30 years, Elliott Sharp has released over eighty-five recordings ranging from orchestral music to blues, jazz, noise, no wave rock, and techno music. He leads the projects Carbon and Orchestra Carbon, Tectonics, and Terraplane and has pioneered ways of applying fractal geometry, chaos theory, and genetic metaphors to musical composition and interaction.

His collaborators have included Radio-Sinfonie Frankfurt; pop singer Debbie Harry; Ensemble Modern; Qawwali singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan; Kronos String Quartet; Ensemble Resonanz; cello innovator Frances Marie Uitti; blues legends Hubert Sumlin and Pops Staples; pipa virtuoso Min-Xiao Feng; jazz greats Jack deJohnette, Oliver Lake, and Sonny Sharrock; multimedia artists Christian Marclay and Pierre Huyghe; and Bachir Attar, leader of the Master Musicians Of Jajouka.

Sharp is a 2014 Guggenheim Fellow, and a 2014 Fellow at Parson's Center for Transformative Media. He received the 2015 Berlin Prize in Musical Composition from the American Academy in Berlin. He has composed scores for feature films and documentaries; created sound-design for interstitials on The Sundance Channel, MTV and Bravo networks; and has presented numerous sound installations in art galleries and museums. He is the subject of a new documentary "Doing The Don't" by filmmaker Bert Shapiro."-Elliott Sharp

-Elliott Sharp website (http://www.elliottsharp.com/bio.html)
3/13/2024

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

"Melvin Gibbs is an American bass guitarist, composer, and producer who has appeared on close to 200 albums in diverse genres of music.

A native of Brooklyn, New York, Gibbs attended Medgar Evers College and the Brooklyn Conservatory of Music. After attending and graduating from the Berklee College of Music, Gibbs first came to public notice as a member of the group Defunkt which was a mainstay of the early 1980s downtown New York scene. Throughout most of the 1980s, he played in drummer Ronald Shannon Jackson's Decoding Society alongside guitarist Vernon Reid, as well as playing with guitarist Sonny Sharrock and saxophonist John Zorn. Additionally with Jackson and guitarist Bill Frisell he was also a member of the group Power Tools. Gibbs co-led the band Eye and I with D.K. Dyson who also co-founded the Black Rock Coalition of which he is also an original member.

He was a member of the avantmetal Rollins Band from 1993 to about 1998, and again in 2006 when the group briefly reformed. As a member of the Rollins Band, he performed at Woodstock '94 in 1994 and was nominated for a Grammy Award in 1995. Gibbs has also recorded with hip-hop artists Dead Prez, Brazilian artists Caetano Veloso and Marisa Monte, Latin jazz artist Eddie Palmieri, Nigerian artist Femi Kuti, and guitarist Marc Ribot. He has also produced albums by guitarist/singer Arto Lindsay and turntablist DJ Logic.

Gibbs formed the Punk-Funk All-Stars with James Blood Ulmer, Defunkt leader Joseph Bowie, Vernon Reid and Ronald Shannon Jackson. He co-leads the band Harriet Tubman with guitarist Brandon Ross and drummer JT Lewis. His other current projects include Melvin Runs the Hoodoo Down with guitarist Pete Cosey and keyboard player John Medeski, the JFM Trio featuring guitarist Jeff Parker and percussionist Francisco Mora, and the Geechee Seminoles, a duo featuring Gibbs and drummer/hand-body percussionist/dancer David Pleasant.

Ancients Speak, the first album by Melvin Gibbs' Elevated Entity, was released on March 17, 2009, by Livewired Music.

In 2009, he joined the group "SociaLybrium", alongside Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee keyboard player Bernie Worrell and long time Parliament-Funkadelic guitarist and musical director DeWayne "Blackbyrd" McKnight as well as J.T. Lewis on drums. The group's album, For You/For Us/For All was released by Livewired Music in December 2009.

Gibbs took on the role of record producer while with the Rollins Band in the 1990s. He worked in that capacity, producing records for other artists on Rage Records."

-Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Melvin_Gibbs)
3/13/2024

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

"Don McKenzie (born June 28, 1974 in Brooklyn, New York) is a drummer known to many through his tenure with Living Colour guitarist Vernon Reid, in the band Masque. Reid the founder and leader of Masque has described its music as: "the place where rock, jazz, hip-hop and technology meet." When asked for his views on McKenzie's drumming, Reid says "His sense of pocket is very firm. I've always been fortunate to work with great drummers, like Marlon Browden and Ronald Shannon Jackson and Will Calhoun. Don is right up there at that level." McKenzie has also played with multi-instrumentalist/composer/producer Elliott Sharp, who says that: "Don McKenzie not only has the hands to play deep-pocket hip-hop and rock grooves, hard-hitting and asymmetrical jazz flavors, a la Tony Williams, and light-fingered sonic abstractions; most importantly, he has the ears to turn his authoritative gestures into music." Other artists McKenzie has played with includes Pharoahe Monch, New Kingdom, Sweetback, Martin Luther, Marc Ribot, The Persuaders, Mr. Complex, DJ Spinna, Cody Chestnutt, and jazz legend Roswell Rudd.

McKenzie's first instrument was guitar, but at the age of six he switched to drums. McKenzie's playing has a strong grounding in music theory and technique and for a period of time was a student of Everett Collins, who played with The Isley Brothers.

Keyboardist/singer Leon Gruenbaum, who has worked with Don on a number of projects (including his own Math Camp), notes that: "Don is a total powerhouse who can play in any style. He never overplays, instead allowing his extremely solid groove to provide a bed on which other musicians can feel completely comfortable to express themselves." For the latest Vernon Reid and Masque album, Other True Self, McKenzie composed Kizzy, inspired by a close friend."

-Academic Dictionaries and Encyclopedias (https://en-academic.com/dic.nsf/enwiki/5621675)
3/13/2024

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


Track Listing:



1. Telentelechy 8:35

2. This Magnetic Moment 7:26

3. Harmolalia 6:25

4. Seize The Mement 9:35

5. Lo Shu 9:09

6. Astrocytes 7:43

7. Unkettled 4:32

Related Categories of Interest:


Rock and Related
Improvised Music
Improvised Rock
Free Improvisation
Electro-Acoustic
Collective Free Improvsation
NY Downtown & Metropolitan Jazz/Improv
Trio Recordings
New in Rock Forms

Search for other titles on the label:
Klanggalerie.


Recommended & Related Releases:
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Live @ Victo
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A wild and adventurous concert and one of the highlights of the 39th Festival International de Musique Actuelle de Victoriaville from the electric improvising quartet of Elliott Sharp on electric guitar & electronics, Colin Stetson on bass, alto & tenor saxophones, Billy Martin on drums & percussion and Payton Macdonald on marimba, vibraphone & African xylophone.
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Assembling a world-class ensemble of 24 string players drawing from the Quartets JACK, Sirius, Flux, and Bergamot, here performing as SysOrk, Elliott Sharp's large-scale algorithmic composition provides simple instructions to the participants, creating a seething sonic tapestry of shifting, swirling tones and acoustic drones, exceptionally immersive and detailed.
Sharp, Elliot
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Aube
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Other Recommended Releases:
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