William Parker – Wood Flute Songs, Anthology / Live 2006-2012 - December 2013 December 15th, 2013

Nine hours of music, from six years, on eight discs, consolidates the bassist-composer-bandleader Parker’s position in New York’s improvisation scene. Appearing in his intuitively telepathic quartet, and with augmented ensembles, Parker’s partnered throughout by the percussionist Hamid Drake, who always makes spontaneous music swing. On the uncompromising 26 minute Tears For The Children of Rawanda,…

Chris Forsyth – Solar Motel - December 2013 December 1st, 2013

New York guitar gurus Television recently completed a British trek. The last of the psychedelic bands, their gargantuan grooves disguised in punk trousers, their set currently contains a new fifteen minute burn that could easily check in to Chris Forsyth’s Solar Motel. Four expansive instrumentals take Television, and the ‘70s art school No Wave massed…

Tony Oxley – A Birthday Tribute 75 Years - November 2013 November 24th, 2013

Tony Oxley floated Free Improvisation’s Northern English spearhead on implausibly arrhythmic pulses in the ‘60s. A rigorous retrospective could have included collaborations with talents as diverse as Georgie Fame and Cecil Taylor, but this appropriate 75th birthday celebration offers five unreleased slices of Oxley accompanying more sympathetic souls. Most welcome is a thirty minute 1993…

Earthless – From The Ages – Tee Pee Records - November 2013 November 24th, 2013

Earthless, a Californian instrumental trio of ‘90s post-punk veterans, realise the uninhibited bedroom guitar solo space rock jams of adolescent lore at a level of mathematical super-competence beyond that of mere stoned boys. Untroubled by the fundamental decency of European fellow travelers Liquid Visions or Samsara Blues Experiment, Earthless’ low slung insolence is positively priapic.…

Bardo Pond – Peace On Venus - November 2013 November 17th, 2013

Hardy perennials of the boutique arty indie festival circuit, Bardo Pond have spent two decades dowsing Terrastock and All Tomorrow’s Parties punters with reliably transportative swathes of feedback drenched psychedelia. But, quietly and incrementally, they grow ever more majestic. Isobel Sollenberger’s whale mother vocals and delicate flute parts float through a stew now equal parts…

Motorhead – Aftershock - November 2013 November 3rd, 2013

Separate Motorhead’s 20th album from the Lemmy legend, and it’s a set of effective punk metal belters. But the 67 year old frontman’s ravaged growl remains unique, unexpectedly suggesting a speed-damaged Louis Armstrong on the contemplative Dust And Glass. Keep Your Power Dry sees enduring outlaw truisms coagulate into the gnomic, but the album’s fatally…