A persuasive album of lyrical groove-based electric free improv from the Hungarian quintet of Daniel Vaczi on saxophones & piano, Balazs Horvath on double bass, Zsolt Sarvari Kovacs on drums, Marton Fenyvesi on electric guitar & effects and Aved Janos on saxophones, Vaczi also programming the Budapest Music Center's player piano in unusual ways for the 3-art "Fabula".

Each track on this album is named for a tractor brand (Eicher, Kubota, &c.) and the liner notes are directions regarding a tractor's maintenance, as the ea-trio of UK improvisers Pat Thomas on piano & electronics, Dominic Lash on double bass, and Lawrence Casserley on a signal processing instrument provide 10 inventive improvisations that validate a sound working condition.

Recorded in 1989 and only now released, this studio album includes Pat Thomas on keys & electronics in a sextet with guitar & bass, synth, turntables, electronic wind instruments, drum machines, samplers, &c., merging ea-improv approaches with disruptively odd asides, fragmented voices, and swelling interventions, making something otherworldly out of then-revelatory technology.

Paul Dunmall's 2018 studio album in a quartet with James Owston on bass, Jim Bashford on drums, Philip Gibbs on guitar, and Dunmall on tenor saxophone, Gibbs's hollow-body opening up the band sound as Owston and Bashford trade rapid responses or provide solid grooves, the themes of the dialogs focused on space and time through intricate, complex and profound interaction.

Two saxophones take the front line in Paul Dunmall's 2018 studio album, the leader on tenor saxophone with fellow tenor player Julian Siegel, also on bass clarinet, while Mark Sanders drums and Percy Pursglove handles bass and also trumpet, as the band falls into a hard bop mode, weaving lines together over wonderfully turbulent and soulful grooves; outstanding.

A tour-de-force of solo improvisation from French trombonist Christiane Bopp, flawlessly captured by sound engineer Jean Marc Foussat, as Bopp transforms her instrument through technical skill, lyrical ability, and unusual technique, creating virtual duets, furtive expression, and thundering emotion, an absolutely impressive example of modern trombone language.

Very much in an AMM mold of electroacoustic improvisation, this album of intense cooperation and sonic depth presents five sections numbered by Roman numerals, performed in the studio by the adept and investigative quintet of Thanos Chrysakis on computer & synthesizers, Sue Lynch on reeds, James O'Sullivan on guitar, and Joe Wright on sax & dynamic feedback system.

Jakob Ullman's 5th solo work for piano is atypical for a piano performance, using electronic playback and requiring three assistants sustaining a soundscape to realize a concept of "gravity" that Ullman applies as laws in a conceptual soundscape modified by a series of abstract images, resulting in unexpected sonic environments, tones, timbres and momentum.

The sixth album from guitarist Hedvig Mollestad Thomassen's scorching Norwegian instrumental rock trio, having built a strong following through their impressive approach to rock, schooled from both early hard/progressive band but also driving fusion bands, with a penetrating edge in authoritative soloing and intense rhythmic interplay.

Recorded in the late 1970's in Canada while improvising rock, jazz, pysch, folk, country & blues guitar madman Doctor Eugene Chadbourne was living there, this is the second of four LPs documenting his work at the time, this album presenting 6 solo pieces of profound playing amidst an unusual experimental nature and a uniquely Chad sense of humor.

The final issue of the premier Canadian new music magazine Musicworks' 40th anniversary year, with Darcy Spidle on the cover, plus articles on Luke Nickel, Lina Allemano, Andre Cormier, Joseph Shabason, Thanya Iyer, the Ociciwan Contemporary Art Collective, plus a 9 track CD with music from Darcy Spidle, Shabason, Iyer, Luke Nickel & Heather Roche, &c. &c.

The 3rd album from the trio of Larry Ochs (Rova Saxophone Quartet) on tenor & sopranino saxophones, Downtown NY mainstay and West Coast migrant Mark Dresser on bass, and Ganelin Trio alumnus Vladimir Tarasov on drums and percussion, in four superb examples of collective improvisation captured live in two concerts in Berkeley and San Diego, CA in 2016.

The second volume of Lithuanian soprano and tenor saxophonist Liudas Mockunas's unusual album of water-based saxophone technique, augmenting the instrument by placing the bell of the sax into water, here in an epic live performance that uses both water and extreme technical skills and authoritative intent as he draws astoundingly diverse sounds from his instrument.

Cornetist Bobby Bradford leads this quartet with soprano saxophonist Hafez Modirzadeh, also playing karna and khaen; bassist Roberto Miguel Miranda; and East Coast drummer Vijay Anderson, in a live concert at the Blue Whale in Los Angeles in 2017, a sophisticated avant jazz outing including a set of variations for Ornette Coleman, a great example of modern creative form.

The brilliant UK pianist Howard Riley is caught live in a US tour in the fall of 1976, recorded at 3 locations in NYC and in Buffalo, NY, each of the well-recorded improvisation a masterwork of extended form as he plays both outside and inside the piano, ranging from warm sections of lyrical quality to fast-paced streams of consciousness in a Cecil Taylor mode; magnificent.

In 1981 Archie Shepp and Roman Wiggins coordinated the University of Massachusettes's week-long event of workshops, concerts & lectures focused on modern jazz, the opening concert the wonderfully sophisticated duo of alto saxophonist Marion Brown and pianist Dave Burrell peforming 7 pieces of compositions from each, plus two Strayhorn pieces, ending with "Lush Life"; essential.

Uniting masterful players from across the East Coast into the Boston area, with Boston pianist Pandelis Karayorgis, Boston native/Chicago-based bassist Nate McBride, DC drummer Luther Gray, North Carolina/Chicago-based trombonist Jeb Bishop, and Chicago guitarist Jeff Parker, in a strong album of lyrical free jazz with compositions from all five players.

Using voice, kick drum, electronics with immersive spatialization, and bass clarinet, Lori Freedman presents an exhilarating and impressive live performance at Montreal's Studio 270, exploring the beauty of extremes, her playing and incredible sense of timing the culmination of her 11-city North American tour titled "The Virtuosity of Excess"; absolutely impressive.

The Montreal free improvising, experimenting duo "Not The Music" of bassist Eric Norman & bass clarinetist Philippe Lauzier invited UK saxophonist John Butcher for concerts in Ottawa and Montreal, recording the two impressive 5-part series heard on this album--"en consequence" (consequently) and "par irruption" (by bursting), of masterful and profoundly pensive prowess.

A fun, odd and eccentric album constructed from extracts of hours of tape reels and audio cassettes by Montreal turntablist Martin Tetrault, a mix of plunderphonic sources, unusual turntable technique, and experimental audio collage drawn from an insanely diverse set of sources, in this sequel to his 1992 "Snipettes!" cassette, here with 31 new fascinating miniatures.

The counterpart to Montreal bass clarinetist Lori Freedman's album "Excess" of recordings from her 11-city North American solo tour "The Virtuosity of Excess", this CD "Solor" was developed after that tour allowing Freedman to focus on her past and current creative work, presenting 5 of her solo compositions, 3 of which were written for the album, plus two improvisations.

Composer/percussionist Danielle Palardy Roger's musical satire about capitalism, performed with some of Montreal's finest improvisers using conventional & unconventional instruments and voice, captured live at the Gesu Amphitheater, in Montreal in 2018: Michel F Cote, Andre Duchesne, Joane Hetu, Elizabeth Lima, Isaiah Ceccarelli, Alexander St-Onge, and Ida Toniato.

Named for the city in which it was recorded, the trio of Karoline Leblanc on harpsichord, Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, and Paulo J Ferreira Lopes on gongs & cymbals, is a mysterious and ritualistic album, Lopes' gongs slowly intoning as the strings use unusual techniques, much of the harpsichord played inside; a subtle and beautiful reflection of historic Montreal.

Documenting the meeting of guitarist Eugene Chadbourne, also singing on "If I Were a Bell", with the Edmonton, CA-based Vertrek Ensemble of Ron de Jong on percussion and Vadim Budman on guitars and trumpet, in a city Chadbourne lived in 25 years prior, as he returns for a serious and well recorded album of informed free improv, plus one solo Chad track from a concert during his visit.

The NY based, long-running trio The Gate led by Dan Peck on tuba and effects, with double bassist Tom Blancarte and drummer Brian Osborne, in a cassette culled from live concerts in Hannover and Brussels while on a European tour in November of 2015, "a brutally unfiltered representation of The Gate's special brand of spontaneous composition."

NY Tuba-driven trio The Gate led by Dan Peck on tuba & effects, with Tom Blancarte on upright electric bass and Brian Osborne on percussion, in a studio album of shorter pieces exploring the dark side of the huge brass instrument and the band's dark, enormous sound, with tongue-in-cheek titles like "Black Bird of Death Spewing Death Puke"; ominously impressive.

The Edmonton, Alberta, Canada Vertrek Ensemble of Vadim Budman on guitars and trumpet and Ron de Jong on percussion, in their first album, collecting solos, duos, and trios with guests Mark Kelly on banjo and Ian Birse on guitar & effects, predating their albums with legendary improvisers Derek Bailey and Euguene Chadbourne.

After only their first album as a duo, the Edmonton, Canada duo Vertrek Ensemble of Vadim Budman on electric and acoustic guitar & cornet and Ron de Jong on percussion, travelled to London in 1998 to record a session with legendary free improviser Derek Bailey, this album of open-minded, uniquely voiced and beautifully captured improvisation the result.

The original motion picture soundtrack for a true crime documentary about the Lawson Family Murders on Christmas Day in 1929 from pianist and sonic experimenter Judson Hurd, presenting six tracks that accompany the movie through dark and mysterious passages of keys, synth and percussive tones; the profits of each copy sold will benefit victims of Hurricane Florence.

Separated by 1,000 KMs and speaking a different language, the collaboration of Quebec bassist Eric Normand and Australian saxophonist Jim Denley, both dedicated experimenters, share a common aesthetic in free improvisation as they release their third album: five dialogs using reeds, electric bass, drums, objects and tools to create unusual sonic conversations.

Acoustic guitar intermeshes with electric guitar as Canadian guitarist Pascal Landry and New York guitarist Mick Barr, both of whom play in heavy rock and free improvisation settings, meet in Queens, NY to record this intense album of free playing using a diverse set of approaches, intertwining their strings in an insectile swarm of notes and timbres.

Slyly crossing modern improv and EAI approaches in a surreal take on early bottleneck, banjo and slide blues styles from the Quebec quintet of Arthur Bull on harmonica, voice, guitar & electronics, Eric Normand on banjo, voice & bass, Ben Grossman on "old wheel", Anne-Francoise Jacques on engines, and Gabriel Rochette on trombone; sincere and eccentric.

Two compositions, one by composer Michael Pisaro-Liu and performed by the electroacoustic ensemble "Ordinary Affects" including violinist Morgan Evans-Weiler, then an acoustic composition from Evans-Weiler himself performed with violin, clarinet, cello, harpsichord and piano; both exquisite works that draw out tone and time in patiently unfolding fluidity.

Submerging the listener into the immediacy of pure perception through the economy of materials and atemporality, Catalan guitarist Ferran Fages presents the 3rd piece of his trilogy for guitar and sinteones, referencing Feldman, Lucier and Szlavnics as he specifies tunings for the guitar accompanied by pure resonating sinetones used as memory vehicles or shadows.

4 compositions from violist/composers Catherine Lamb & Johnny Chang, the 1st focusing on the mysterious compositions of Vedic-era composer Viola Torros, exploring monady, melody and harmony; the second, one composition each from Chang performed with the Suidobashi Chamber Ensemble, and from Lamb using the secondary rainbow synthesizer she developed with Bryan Eubanks.

A beautiful rendering of French composer Eric Satie's 1918 masterwork "Socrate", originally for four sopranos and chamber orchestra, here stripped to its essence as a duo with Olalla Aleman on soprano and Guy Vandromme on piano, maintaining Satie's characterist reserve and refinement in the 3 parts: "portrait of socrates"; "banks of the ilissus"; and "death of socrates".

The long-running association of Chicago legends, trombonist George Lewis and saxophonist Roscoe Mitchell, are recorded live at CTM Festival at HAU Hebbel am Ufer, in Berlin in 2018, accompanied by Lewis' laptop adding a third voice that responds and generates textural and rhythmic accompaniment in response to the playing of both improvisers; impressive and exotic.

A mix of songs and instrumentals, with 11 country classic covers, recorded in the studio and on tour from 2017-2018 in Germany, Italy, Switzerland, Slovenia, and Bulgaria, and the UK including one track from Cafe Oto, in the company of Titus Waldenfels (guitar), Thilo Kuhn (keys), Schroeder (drums), Gary Cherwonka (pedal steel) and Steven De Bruyn (harmonica).

Influenced by progressive rock, kosmiche, and fusion forms, the UK trio Das Rad of Nick Robinson on guitars & electronics, Martin Archer on sax, reeds, winds, keys and electronics, Steve Dinsdale on drums and percussion, and Julie Archer on voice, bringing 70s sounds to modern sensibilities and superb creative playing, a great achievement.

Saxophonist Ron Caines, who led the innovative band East of Eden in the late 60s, joins a septet including Martin Archer on reeds & electronics, Laura Cole on keys, Gus Garside on bass, Johnny Hunter on drums, Graham Clark on violin & guitar, and Herve Perez on live sound processing & shakuhachi as they merge improv with real time processing and studio collage.

Pianist Laura Cole's first solo album presents 2 CDs; the first a collection of arrangements of pieces given to Cole for the album from friends and colleagues, including Robert Mitchell, Alex Wilson, Nikki Iles, Jason Yarde and Corey Mwamba; the 2nd disc, "As Warm As The Sun" is a collection of compositions and improvisations by Cole herself.

Recorded on the last night of 577's Forward Festival 2017 in Brooklyn, the quintet of Daniel Carter (reeds & trumpet), Patrick Holmes (clarinet), Matthew Putman (piano), Hilliard Greene (bass) and Federico Ughi (drums) take their audience on three remarkable journeys of almost chamber-oriented collective free jazz, adventurous and not-to-be-missed examples of modern jazz.

A subtle album of soundscape from the French trio of Violaine Gestalder on saxophones, Louis Michel Marion on double bass, and Stefania Becheanu on field recordings, depicting 3 virtual aural views of a single landscape, the field recordings conveying a sense of location as the bass and sax use extended techniques and subliminal playing to create their vista.

Recording at the Pied Nu Festival, in Le Havre, France in 2018, the trio of Ernesto Rodrigues on viola, Guilherme Rodrigues on cello, and Carlos Santos on electronics present an extended and mysteriously subtle album of electroacoustic improvisation, detailed and remarkably controlled conversation of near telepathic anticipation from three intimate collaborators.

Portuguese guitarist and experiementer Abdul Moimeme, once a student of US free jazz saxophonist Patrick Brennan, now joins him as Moimeme employs two electroacoustically altered guitars played simultaneously with objects, Brennan performing on sax and cornet, as they create unusual and assertive abstract sonic environments, intensely detailed and gripping.

The debut for this acoustic free improvising Amsterdam trio of Ziv Taubenfeld on bass clarinet, Henk Zwerver on guitar, and Maya Felixbrodt on viola, in a set of abstract improvisations of an active nature using unorthodox and extended techniques, with an upbeat sense of excitement and enthusiasm that allows for solo forays amongst great collective discourse.

Hanna Schorken is a published German writer & poet, jazz vocalist and free improviser, since 2005 living in Koln and developing a personal and idiosyncratic approach to sound poetry and experimental voice recordings, heard here in a 7 part work where each movement completes the titles of the poem "I So Liked Spring"; "You"; "Told"; "Me"; "How"; "To"; "Dance".

Improvising Japanese guitarist Riuichi Daijo joins Spanish Bass & Sopranino saxophonist Ferran Besalduch for a series of non-idiomatic dialogs, from bright restrained to assertive interactions, unusual techniques from Besalduch and percussive asides on the guitar adding engaging ornaments to their conversation; a nice accompaniment to a bright day.

With two magnificent albums and more than 100 concert performances, the masterful dialog from this working string trio of Canadian, European and American players--Tristan Honsinger on cello and voice; Joshua Zubot, on violin; Nicolas Caloia on double bass--is evident in their thrilling exchanges and dynamic approaches to both rapid and reflective improvisation.

Live recordings of the performance on March 1st, 2018 at the Galerie arToxin in Munich, presenting compositions from Udo Schindler performing on bass clarinet, soprano saxophone & euphonium, Gunter Pretzel on viola, and Georges-Emmanuel Schneider on violins & live electronics, three artists of diverse background crossing boundaries to create something unique and exciting.