The culmination of nineteen days of rigorous rehearsal in southern Vermont plus a decade’s worth of compositional study under the Harmonic Experience author W. A. Mathieu, this week America’s self-styled favourite tenor saxophone quartet return to complete their trilogy on New Amsterdam Records. Following their work on Palace of Wind and Blade of Love, as Battle Trance the foursome of Travis Laplante, Patrick Breiner, Matt Nelson, and Jeremy Viner augment their focus on tonal harmony, melody, and counterpoint with skronking swirls and breathy lulls as Green of Winter reaches a climax. Like whirlpools and river rapids rushing downstream or creeks and rivulets finding their way ineluctably seaward, the record resolves in short choral motifs as the tenor quartet explore every inch of their instrument.
Leaking pipes and passing cars provide the panorama as Jon Collin swaps his guitar for the nyckelharpa, producing a staggered and soaring sequence of drones all recorded to tape while cloistered under some of Stockholm’s myriad bridges. The Guatemalan cellist Mabe Fratti gets on the front foot for an album of raw feeling and sinewy muscle. From Montreal the composer Jessica Moss combines with the drummer Jim White and contrabassist Thierry Amar for more uncanny studies on the violin. And from the windswept and sheep-strewn peaks of rural Wales, the relocated songwriter Johanna Warren swallows down a Piscean lover.
The stunning title track ‘Aura’ from the debut album by Hatis Noit, Panda Bear’s soft-footed incursion on the pads of the French touch pioneers Braxe and Falcon, and the centrepiece to Intimate Publics by Osheyack from Shanghai, composed almost entirely of Vocaloid samples, each in turn receive newfangled video treatment. Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith foregoes airy conjectures for contortions of neon-clad sound, while with the aid of Laurie Spiegel’s algorithmic compositional software Music Mouse, the Bitchin Bajas strive for infinite oscillations of chilled-out gamelan music.
Bad Bunny pays homage to ‘Suavemente’ by Elvis Crespo, described by the amorous Puerto Rican superstar as the greatest music video of all-time. Engorged in bronze as a sort of second skin, Lucrecia Dalt dabbles in palindromes and floats amid the syncopated sounds of the tropics. For a palette cleanser Will Vinson overdubs layers of experimental sax, at the heart of a record which also features Matt Penman on bass and Eric Harland on drums plus a special guest in the form of Melissa Aldana. An embattled Lowertown and the swarming duo of Aaron Turner and Jon Mueller complete the roundup of new music.
Playlists: Spotify · Apple Music · YouTube
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Johanna Warren – ‘Piscean Lover’
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Aaron Turner & Jon Mueller – ‘Piteous Cur’
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Bad Bunny – ‘Neverita’
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Jon Collin – Årstabron Arch No. 2
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Alan Braxe & DJ Falcon – ‘Step By Step’ (feat. Panda Bear)
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Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – ‘Unbraid: The Merge’
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Battle Trance – ‘Green of Winter III’
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Jessica Moss – ‘Uncanny Being (Violin Study #2)’
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Lowertown – ‘Bucktooth’
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