Talibam!/ Wasteland Jazz Unit - Ecstatic Jazz Duos

Talibam! / Wasteland Jazz Unit
Ecstatic Jazz Duos
(10.2008, Thor’s Rubber Hammer)
File Under = Jazz with a healthy dose of noise

The folks over at Thor’s Rubber Hammer (home of the recently highlighted Chartreuse debut) have just released the first split LP in their inspired 3-part Ecstatic Jazz Duos series. The series already boasts an impressive line up for the remaining two installations in the series but I can’t imagine that those LPs could do much to eclipse what we’ve been blessed with here from Talibam! and Wasteland Jazz Unit. Let’s start with who I’m familiar. Talibam! (one of very few bands who have earned their mandatory exclamation mark) is America’s very own free-jazz/noise-rock terrorists. Bursting onto the seen fairly recently, Talibam! has secured a nod of reliability through a slew of maddening releases mostly put out on CDr. In the world of free form prog and jazz, reliability is key. With the ranks of improvisation swelling, it is hard not to get suckered into some second rate jam session pitched as some new hipster salvation. Fortunately, Talibam! is the real deal. Coupling inhuman drum schizophrenia (a requirement for successful free jazz in my book) and synthesized electronic buffoonery, this drum n’ keys duo plows through 18+ minutes of manipulated prog rock lunacy. The piece constantly evolves into various contortions of noise addled madness that even breaks away momentarily at about the midway point to introduce vocals to the mix with some type of alternate reality rap. Yeah, it’s definitely out there and, yes, it’s definitely good. On the flip, I was happy to discover my new best friends, Wasteland Jazz Unit. This duo leans much farther into noise territory with two extended jams that reach just past eight minutes. Both are experiments in audio brutality. Using a saxophone and clarinet to unrecognizable ends, Wasteland Jazz Unit produces an abrasive aural commotion that sounds a little bit like a batch of Axolotl tracks layered on top of each other and then pounded together with a jackhammer. It really is a beautiful destruction (emphasis on the destruction). Yep, with two more records left to go in the series, it is going to be hard to top the level ridiculously enjoyable confusion the two duos have served up.

-Mr. Thistle

Talibam! on Myspace
Wasteland Jazz Unit on Myspace

Chartreuse - No More Paths To Sounder Sleep

Chartreuse
No More Paths To Sounder Sleep
(10.2008, Thor's Rubber Hammer)
File Under = Moody drone/ambient

No More Paths To Sounder Sleep sounds like a murky machine whose components are created completely from clouds. Now that sounds nice, doesn’t it? Well, if you agree then you’re obviously thinking of the wrong kind of clouds. The clouds in Chartreuse’s machine are the dark, graying, polluted kind that are as dense and heavy as they are soft around the edges. There is a pervasive feeling of anxiousness, the kind you might feel navigating a decrepit industrial factory (again, if it were made of clouds). Yet, even while Chartreuse’s eerie machine pumps away rhythmically with clouded droning loops, there is an elusive sense of comfort in each piece, something familiar. In the press packet for No More Paths To Sounder Sleep, Eluvium, Nadja and Brian Eno are identified as similar artists and that’s a pretty spot on assessment. In fact, the Chartreuse sound is like an accumulation of endearing traits from the aforementioned artists. The arsenal includes an organ style drone that shifts slower than the tectonic plates, sparse occasional field recordings and an intermittently emerging guitar. Using these tools, Drew Smith, the man behind the cloud machine, creates dense textures that are drowsily layered and looped like a self propelled toy that has been wound and let loose to amble along aimlessly. There are no real climactic moments, just slow realizations and tiny epiphanies amidst the haze. No More Paths To Sound Sleep is a devastating trip that increases in beautiful with each step.

-Mr. Thistle

Chartreuse on Myspace