The Lie Detectors — Part III: Secret Unit (Chant, 2018)
The Lie Detectors could be classified as a jazz duo, but in fine downtown fashion, it’s jazz with hefty shots of bombast: the heavy crunch of “Rice;” the light touch of “Go” that descends into a sinister, shamanistic guitar sounds; the echoey and folky strains of “Closer” mixed with sparse improv. Punk and metal get their say in the next track, “Here and There.” Those four track are the way Secret Unit starts.
Eyal Maoz (guitar) and Asaf Sirkis (drums) have known each since age 10. Now living in New York and London, respectively, they’re charting impressive musical careers. Maoz is a member of the Lemon Juice Quartet and Shanir Blumenkranz’s Abraxis (which got to record one of John Zorn’s Masada Book II albums), and he leads bands including Edom, Wild Type and the eclectic power trio Hypercolor. Sirkis has been playing with jazzsters including Larry Coryell, Dave Holland and John Abercrombie.
They’ve released two other duo albums: Elementary Dialogues (Ayler, 2006) and Freedom Has Its Own Taste (Fasson, 1998). They don’t seem to have used the Lie Detectors name with those releases, and maybe with good reason — the name is the top secret organization that they formed at age 10. Apparently they’ve decided it’s time to reveal the secret.
Maybe that means more Lie Detectors records to come. Secret Unit‘s varied styles are held together by a cosmic constant of jagged energy and wide-grinned attitude. “Flying Horse” gets into a catchy little groove, but not after a nifty intro of spackled non-rhythm. “Circles” plays like an improv-minded mutation of surf music, with Maoz echoing away against Sirkis’ continuous wave of rolls and snare. Then there’s the relatively quiet noodling of “Sting” and the choppy rock anthem of “Green Shirt.” But it feels cohesive, like two people speaking the language of a decades-old secret society.
It’s here again: The KZSU Day of Noise, 24 hours of live noise/improv performances, broadcast across the free airwaves, streamed over the Interwebs, and stored for posterity on YouTube.
From midnight to midnight (Pacific time) on Saturday, February 9, 2019, musicians will be performing live at the KZSU studio, playing laptop electronics, analog electronics, acoustic instruments, electric guitars, and whatever other noisemakers they decide to bring. Artists will perform for 30 or 60 minutes apiece. See the full lineup here.
In the Bay Area, tune in to KZSU on the good old-fashioned radio at 90.1 FM. Elsewhere in the world, stream the show live at kzsulive.stanford.edu. We’ll probably have a live video feed running as well (in the past, it’s been on YouTube).
The last few Days of Noise have been archived on the KZSU site in both audio and video forms, so you have plenty of material to get acclimated for the big event.
We have loads of fun putting this on every year, and I’m so grateful to the KZSU staffers who make it happen. Abra masterminds the whole thing — many thanks to her for keeping the idea alive — while Smurph does the bulk of the audio engineering and Jin documents the event in video and photos. Other DJs like me chip in where they can, moving gear, delivering food, giving directions over the phone. And the musicians have loads of fun. Please do tune in, any way you can.
I’ve posted Day of Noise photos a few times before. Have a look:
I came to know drummer Alvin Fielder’s name through his improvised-jazz work with pianist Joel Futterman and saxophonist Ike Levin, as several of those CDs crossed KZSU’s transom in the early 2000s. Later, Bay Area bassist Damon Smith moved to Texas along with his Balance Point Acoustics record label, released a series of recordings involving Fielder.
Here they are in a robust duo improvisation:
And while I’m there, here’s a look at Fielder’s quiet side, backing up Smith on the Johnny Dyani composition “Roots” and taking a long solo at the end:
But of course Fielder, who died this month at 83, had an accomplished career long before I “met” him. He was a co-founder of the AACM and appeared on one of its first albums, Roscoe Mitchell’s Sound in 1966. He stayed in his native South rather than doing the free-jazz thing of traveling Europe but remained active, recording with saxophonist Kidd Jordan for more than 30 years. This 2013 release on NoBusiness Records features the two of them in concert with bassist Peter Kowald:
He also had a long association with trumpeter Dennis González and his sons Aaron and Stephen González. They played on A Measure of Vision (Clean Feed, 2007), technically Fielder’s only recording as a leader — although it’s no stretch to call him the co-leader of the many improvises sessions he recorded. Most of the album puts Fielder in a trio with with Chris Parker (piano) and Dennis González (trumpet). “Max-Well” is a bright Fielder composition quoting “A Love Supreme” and, with its free use of snare accents, probably nodding toward Max Roach as well (Fielder cited Roach as a key early influence), while “The Cecil Tayler – Sunny Murray Dancing Lesson” is a beautiful dirge with flowering piano and, in place of a bass, Fielder’s toms. (Spotify login required to hear entire tracks — apologies for that.)
Writer Clifford Allen is a longtime champion of Fielder’s and published a lengthy interview with him on the All About Jazz site in 2007. Allen apparently introduced Fielder to Damon Smith. It’s through Allen’s blog, “Ni Kantu,” that I found this: a fiery 1976 TV appearance by the Improvisational Arts Quintet, a band that included Jordan and Fielder. Their recorded output is limited to one obscure LP (1983) and one side of a Rounder Records compilation (1988), so it’s nice to have this document available.
To end on a cathartic note, here’s a live take on “Max-Well” with Kidd Jordon on sax and London Branch (of the original Improvisational Arts Quintet) as one of two bassists. It’s from a 2009 tribute to Fielder in his hometown of Jackson, Mississippi.
RIP drummer Alvin Fielder–a vital link to the early AACM who never stopped creating elastic beauty. His epic sets at Constellation after the Chicago Jazz Festival in recent years are ingrained in my memory as much as the music he made as part of Roscoe Mitchell's first quartet.
Paul F. Murphy and Larry Willis — Exposé (Murphy Records, 2008)
I know Paul Murphy’s drumming through his work with saxophonists Jimmy Lyons and Glenn Spearman. I remember the aptly named Trio Hurricane, with Spearman, Murphy, and bassist William Parker bringing heavy thunder.
Exposé is now more than a decade old, but when it showed up on eMusic’s “recent additions” list, Murphy’s name caught my eye. I didn’t know what to expect from him in a duo setting, especially paired with a piano, although he’s apparently recorded with Larry Willis multiple times. Exposé presents powerhouse drumming from a subtler angle — lots of tapping cymbals and feathery tom rolls on the solo track “Labyrinth,” for example. Willis brings the crystalline sounds of jazzy piano, but in an edgier vein than cocktail music, with the right improvisational spirit to keep the session outward-facing.
The title track starts slowly with what might be a nod to Cecil Taylor — not in terms of torrential playing but in the kinds of harmonies Taylor composed with. From there, Willis goes more lush and bright, weaving through jazz idioms while Murphy keeps up a continuous rustle, busy but not overwhelming.
The phrase “Liquid Dance” makes for an excellent track title. Murphy keeps up a busy, almost relentless patter but at a low volume, while Willis applies the right restrained, contemplative splashing to fit the name.
Some contemporary mainstream jazz leans in this direction. I’m thinking of labels like Origin Records — pleasing to the ear, but striving to create something new out of familiar cloth. This session wouldn’t be out of place there. Murphy fills space in a way that might be off-putting to some listeners, but I came here for the drums, so I’m happy to focus on the robust energy more than the relaxing moments.
You could categorize Building Block as jazz shoegazing or maybe a calm shade of post rock. Clocking in at 40 minutes, the album presents small bites of tasty trio work led by Ethan Sherman on guitar, with appropriately restrained bass and drums — a casual and grooving little session.
The 7-minute “Keltner” is a good way to introduce where the album is coming from, although it takes patience. The longest track on the album, it gradually builds on its on the stillness of a Western-tinged theme to reach a slow-burning payoff.
“Motivation” is languid and comforting, an almost too-pretty melody. I’m also partial to the cool little tune “Dangling,” with its gentle swing.
Chris Rolontz on bass doesn’t get many chances to stand out, but he turns in a nice solo on “Dangling” and does an excellent job framing and sustaining the mood on “Norway.” That track is sparse to the point where drummer Christian Euman is left to sustain the momentum, which he does fluidly.
From the joyous prog rock of Reconnaissance Fly, Polly Moller and Tim Walters have staked new turf in the realm of pensive electronics and austere set pieces.
Windfall paints a spare landscape where silence is a primary color. Moller’s voice and flute are foundational sound sources, both organically and in digitally twisted forms, and Walter adds electronics like small, bright creatures darting across a shadowy geometric plane.
“Usufruct” is a real word, referring to “the right of the people to harvest the fruits of common property.” In that spirit, the band harvests found texts, read by Moller. “Only a Test” borrows from what might be a military handbook, with Moller and Walters barking out disconnected proclamations and lists of words. “Donzerly” cuts up the lyrics to the Star Spangled Banner, backed by swirling, buzzing electronics that sound aggressive but feel solitary.
When the flute is unadulterated, Moller draws forth a sense of color and stillness, augmented by trilling or tilted embouchure. On “Upside Down Wedding,” Walters plays back the melodic lines to create an intertwining vine climbing through the ether.
Here’s Usufruct performing at the 2018 Outsound New Music Festival:
Tania Chen and Jon Leidecker — Morton Feldman: Triadic Memories (Knitted, 2018)
Tania Chen (with Thurston Moore, David Toop, and Jon Leidecker) — John Cage: Electronic Music for Piano (Omnivore, 2018)
Tania Chen champions the piano music from the quadrant of Cornelius Cardew, Morton Feldman, and John Cage. It was one of her John Cage albums that inspired me to start writing something here. But then I found out Chen is going to be performing Morton Feldman’s 90-minute “Triadic Memories” with real-time electronics responses provided by Wobbly (Jon Leidecker) and Thomas Dimuzio. So I took a detour to hear her 2018 recording of the solo piano piece.
The composition is what you’d expect from late Feldman: lingering, drifting phrases, more relaxing than ominous, organized in delicate, spacious rhythmic doodles, and while you can run the piece as comforting background noise, you can also use the stillness to focus yourself into the moment, clinging to the notes and phrases against the deep silence. It’s also an interesting exercise in perception. The piece consists of arpeggios that spell out dissonant, prickly chords, but the melting-ice pace turns them into sparkling gems.
The added electronics are based on what’s coming out of the piano — Leidecker presumably attached microphones to the instrument, as he and Dimuzio will do in the Jan. 16 performance. On the CD, electronics appear sparingly, trying to accent the sound without being distracting. A passage starting around 17:20 includes a deep-water aftereffect. Another at around the 26-minute mark is more overt and mischievous but still doesn’t upset the overhanging atmosphere.
But that’s not really what I sat down to write about. I wanted to write about John Cage.
As you’d expect from a Cage piece, there’s a game aspect and a touch of whimsy behind Electronic Music for Piano, and I think it’s more enjoyable if you listen knowing the rules. Producer Gino Robair recorded Chen performing the piece three times — in separate duets with Toop and Moore in London, and with Leidecker in Berkeley. The CD knits the performances together with help from a “chance-based system” deciding which sound sources would play at which times.
“Sound sources” seems to include not just the six players (counting Chen three times) but also multiple angles, as microphones were all over the place — under the piano soundboard or at different points in the room, all to capture the mix of sounds persisting in air. Pure silence counted as a source and was weighted into the system, as were special options for “piano tracks only” and “non-piano tracks only.”
The overall mood is a fuzzy darkness: Lots of buzzing and roaring (not just Thurston Moore, but also the amplified piano soundboard), alternating with plinks and plucks from the piano, alternating with thick silence.
About the silence — you don’t put on a John Cage record if you can’t tolerate silence, and this one delivers, with slabs of blankness lasting one to three minutes. “Silence” also factored into the original performances. One silence at around the 8-minute mark is broken by the tiniest flicker of piano strings, almost accidental. That, and the organic way in which the piano sound returns, suggest this was “organic” silence — a very quiet moment that really did happen in the studio.
That said, Thurston Moore’s roar tends to dictate the tone at any given moment — especially in the early minutes, where he’s either ON or off. Much as I enjoyed the chance aspect of the recording, I have to admit it creates jarring results, especially when the guitar kicks in or out. Take the excerpt below, for instance. In the spirit of the recording, I’m starting it at exactly the 15-minute mark, and it includes two silences of roughly one minute apiece.
Yoni Kretzmer’s New Dilemma — Months, Weeks and Days (OutNow, 2018)
Eight years after I stumbled onto his music, Yoni Kretzmer has again recorded with New Dilemma, the group matching his sax with a string trio. It’s a welcome reunion-of-sorts and, considering the double-CD span of Months, Weeks and Days, a heftier dive into the possibilities for this grouping.
This time, the compositions mostly take the form of longer suites, such as the 19-minute opener, “Sunday Oct. 12th.” The band is also augmented with one more low voice — Josh Sinton on bass clarinet, acting as a foil to Kretzmer and complementing the low-string trio of viola, cello, and bass (Frantz Loriot, Christopher Hoffman, and Pascal Niggenkemper). Flin Van Hemmen rounds out the band on drums.
New Dilemma’s self-titled debut highlighted the compositions and the chamber-music potential of the strings. This second album emphasizes the edge of hard-digging improvisation, with raspy horns and gutty strings. Here’s a span of “Sunday Oct. 12” that features some hard-blazing soloing against composed lines.
“Nov 27th – Dec 1st” is an impressive track that starts with a chamber feel — unison melody as a backdrop to some sublime Kretzmer soloing, fast but restrained, working in a currency of burly knots and tangles. “Friday May 13th” likewise veers into the orbit of traditional chamber music, with its fluttering baroque cello line and floating melodies (and Van Hemmen clattering away with some abandon).
“Tishma” is the only title that isn’t a calendar date, and it’s a departure in another way as well, opening with a creeping overhang built of long tones, with cymbal tapping and Pascal Niggenkemper’s plucked bass breaking the surface tension. The rest is a patient piece built of small sounds.
You can sample parts of Months, Weeks and Dayson Bandcamp.
This one got a lot of superlatives after it was released, and it’s easy to see why. Each piece on Blueprinting was written for the Aizuri Quartet and developed collaboratively between musicians and composer, so the album is well crafted to put forth an Aizuri personality of verve, electricity, and casual attitude. They exhibit the elegance and precision you’d want from a group calling itself a String Quartet, but they feel like a rock band.
The highlight is “Carrot Revolution” by Gabriella Smith, which opens with the sounds of a manic clockwork: chugging, grinding scrapes and stabbing glissandos, like darts of lightning, all manufactured organically with strings and bow. The piece gets melodically sublime but builds tension with rubbery tone waves and a lively pulse, and one sublime moment where chaotic mad scraping halts in unison and shifts into a downright pretty passage. It’s not just the composition; it’s the screaming energy that the players put into it. They even stick the landing (watch cellist Karen Ouzounian in the final seconds):
“LIFT,” by Paul Wiancko, is built around robust furrows of melody, with touches like bow bouncing and offbeat glissandos showing up in the slow second movement. The three-movement piece splits Part III into three further segments: a “Glacial” set of heavy chords, a “Maniacal” phase inspired by a springy square dance, and the brightly dramatic “Lift.”
The title track has the feel of “normal” classical music, being based on the harmonic skeleton of Beethoven’s sixth string quartet (Op. 18, No. 6), but is sprinkled with pranksterisms. Violist Ayane Kozasa gets to play melodica on “RIPEFG,” a piece stuffed with jittery virtuosity. And composer Lembit Beecher adds sound sculptures to “Sophia’s Wide Awake Dreams,” a dreamy piece taken from a chamber opera about a 9-year-old girl, her music box, and her imagination.
Grex appears at Bottom of the Hill (1233 17th St., San Francisco) on Jan. 23, 2019.
The art-rock band Grex charms you with upbeat indie-pop melody and then blasts you with psych-driven guitar grit, often in the same song. That mix anchors the band’s personality, honed over years by founders Rei Scampavia and Karl Evangelista, and their steady drummer Robert Lopez. Each album or live show is a workout for multiple brain centers: rock, prog, free jazz, even goofy whimsy.
Scampavia’s airy vocals can make for charming melodic leads. “Martha” is one of the highlights, a sad little tribute to the last of the passenger pigeons. “Mal and Luma” has the slightly silly sound of a kids’ TV theme. Both songs then get a dose of more searing guitar — mournful on the former ebullient on the latter (with some Beatlesesque applause randomly added to contribute to the silliness). “Transpiration” uses guitar blasts in a satisfying power-pop mode before slipping into a tougher psych-rock attack.
That rougher side, with Evangelista’s growly vocals, makes for some satisfying excursions too, with crunchy guitar leading the way on “Husk” and the soulful, pumping riff of “Saints.” Guest horns sometimes add choppy free jazz to the mix, but they also arrive in melodic form, strengthening the rolling pop sounds of “Round Trip” and “Quicksilver.”
Even as any given song flips through disparate ideas, it doesn’t lose its core feeling. Grex knows where it wants to go. There needs to be a place for this kind of pop/rock: music that can smartly flip through many influences to build something exciting.
The Lie Detectors could be classified as a jazz duo, but in fine downtown fashion, it’s jazz with hefty shots of bombast: the heavy crunch of “Rice;” the light touch of “Go” that descends into a sinister, shamanistic guitar sounds; the echoey and folky strains of “Closer” mixed with sparse improv. Punk and metal get their say in the next track, “Here and There.” Those four track are the way Secret Unit starts.
Memory Select: Journeys in Creative Music 