Foto: © Zippo Zimmermann, www.designladen.com

The liberation of the drums in jazz and improvised music has been one of the most incredible, yet neglected, stories of the past thirty years.

First Kenny Clarke, then Max Roach in the Forties set aside the steady four-four beat of the bass drum, opting for a lighter, more legato style on the cymbals, roundly punctuated by occasional bass drum “bombs” and/or snare and high-hat accentuations. By the early Fifties, Art Blakey had drawn the various polyrhythmic conclusions from this, interpolating into his playing actual counter-rhythms or whole lines filled with new rhythmic suggestions. (As two examples, hear his work on “Little Willie Leaps,” Charlie Parker, One Night At Birdland, Columbia 34808, June 1950; or especially on “Dig,” Miles Davis, Dig, Prestige 7012, October 1950.)

(more…)

Track One: ‘au noeud couland’ by Louis-Ferdinand Celine performed by himself. Track Two: ‘mort à crédit’ by Louis-Ferdinand Celine performed by Arletty. Track Three: ‘règlement’ by Louis-Ferdinand Celine performed by himself. Track Four: ‘voyage au bout de la nuit‘ by Louis-Ferdinand Celine performed by Michel Simon.

(more…)

Metropolis proudly presents a first bunch of ZERX records in our shop. Each record for 9 Euro ( incl. world-wide shipment ).

Home of the Bubbadinos & other world / class musicians & poets who happen to live in New Mexico or would like to or visited some time or ‘nuther.

(more…)

Photo: Cal Haines

…there is a theory that some people are able to slow time down or, as drummers say: divide the time and hear more & more deeply into the space than us mere mortals.

I also posit that Charlie Parker had these sort of powers and then there’s this drummer in Santa Fe name of Cal Haines who also, obviously hears between the cracks in Time..Mark Weber | 30may07

(more…)

Kent Carter: Beauvais Cathedral Emanem 3306

Kent Carter / cello, double bass, melodica, piano strings, radio,
Phillip Pochon / second cello (one track), Michala Marcus / flute (one track).
Recorded: approximately June 1974.

Fernando Grillo: fluvine Cramps CRSLP 6203, DIVerso n. 3

Fernando Grillo / bass.
Recorded: 1975 or ‘76.

Maarten van Regteren Altena: Tuning the Bass ICP 019

Maarten van Regteren Altena / bass.
Recorded: May 2, 1975 in performance, Amsterdam.

Tristan Honsinger and Maarten van Regteren Altena: Live Performances SAJ-10

Tristan Honsinger / cello, voice (side one only)
Maarten van Regteren Altena / bass (side two only).
Recorded: Honsinger: November 7, 1976} Altena: October 29 & 31, 1976.

Barry Guy: Statements V - XI for Double Bass & Violine Incus 22

Barry Guy / double bass and violone.
Recorded: October 30, 1976.

Throughout the literature of jazz and improvisation, probably less has been written about bass players than about any other type of instrumentalist - the reason being that the bassist’s role, while generally acknowledged (as in bop) to be crucial, has almost always been a subordinate one. Even the free-form advances of the Sixties offered the bassist only a modicum of room for individual expression. The ideal player was still mainly expected to lay some kind of foundation for the work of the others, and his worth was measured by the extent of his ability to do that while obscuring it. Henry Grimes or Gary Peacock come to mind as great players of this sort. It is only quite recently, as in the work of Sirone (with the Revolutionary Ensemble), that the bass has begun to assume a near co-equal ensemble function.

(more…)

the world is just too much for some of us coming on strong we grip the teeth of this monster pulling ourselves out of it’s throat it’s gullet churning and sucking at our toes.

[an excerpt from ” plain old boogie long division”/ Mark Weber]

(more…)

THE GENTLE HARM OF THE BOURGEOISIE Emanem 3305

Paul Rutherford / trombone.
Recorded: July 2, August 20, and December 17, 1974.

WE PLAY FMP 0120

Gunter Christmann / trombone, Detlef Schonenberg / drums.
Recorded: February 24, 25, 1973.

REMARKS FMP 0260

Gunter Christmann / trombone (solo on three tracks), bass (one track), Detlef Schonenberg / percussion, Harold Boje / synthesizer (four tracks).
Recorded: March 3, August 8 & 16, 1975.

It was Roswell Rudd who, in the last decade, reopened the investigation of the trombone. He not only extended the instrument’s range and range of possible effects, but utilized those effects to the fullest to create an at times abstracted, at times melodic, but always essentially dramatic art. Its strength lay in that and in its implied technical openness; in the latter respect, Rudd has probably influenced every trombonist to come since.

(more…)

This shot is of my small mount tom on the Taye set. Cal Haines © 2007

Listen to: It’s a long walk and On the Acoma-Zuni Trail

Poems and spoken word by Mark Weber, Drums by Cal Haines.
Engineer: Quincy

more on Mark Weber and Cal Haines …