snobb
Canadian pianist Kris Davis is known as one of key figures in New York new avant-garde jazz since she relocated to Brooklyn some years ago. She studied jazz piano in University of Toronto and extended piano techniques with Benoit Delbecq in Paris.During last decade she recorded series of solo,duo,trio,quartet and quintet albums, and in 2014 formed her most ambitious project - Infrasound octet.
"Save Your Breath" is Infrasound's second album, and it's a real beast. Among Kris on piano and her different previous projects' members guitarist Nate Radley (Davis' husband), organist Gary Versace and drummer Jim Black Infrasound contains bass clarinetists quartet(Oscar Noriega,Ben Goldberg,Joachim Badenhorst and Andrew Bishop).New album is engineered by Sonic Youth / Living Colour veteran engineer Ron Saint Germain.As a result recorded music has new quality - it's impossible to separate where finishes contemporary classic composition and starts free improvisation or hammer-heavy avant-rock riffs.
Infrasound's music is heavy,quirky with complex but well controlled rhythm structures,lot of reeds soloing, all based on well-composed academic base.Rhythm section is generally avant-rock,doubled by bass reeds quartet it with no doubt is a trouble for your flat's windows if played loud. Guitar sounds as if Marc Ribot would be on board and dark organ's sound recalls Jamie Saft's passages.Despite of obvious rock aesthetics,this album is first of all jazz release - level of musicianship techniques,musicians' interplay and inventiveness that possible on advanced jazz scene only. Best tag (if tag is needed) would be Infrasound is advanced jazz collective playing modern creative avant-jazz-prog - on very their own way.
Six compositions - all longer than ten minutes,but surprisingly accessible (being in reality really complex and quirky). Great release on the border between progressive jazz,rock and academic music, excellent evidence against skeptics saying nothing new happens in today's music.