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EFG London Jazz Festival, Day Seven, 20/11/2014.

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by Ian Mann

December 08, 2014

Ian Mann on the international sounds of Plaistow and L'Hijaz'Car and the homegrown talents of Entropi and Quadraceratops.

Photographs of Quadraceratops and Entropi sourced from the EFG London Jazz Festival website http://www.efglondonjazzfestival.org.uk


EFG LONDON JAZZ FESTIVAL, DAY SEVEN, 20/11/2014


PLAISTOW

The third lunchtime in a row at Pizza Express Jazz Club. Today’s dish is risotto.

And today’s music is by Plaistow, the second Swiss piano trio of the week following Rusconi’s brilliant performance at Kings Place on day two of the Festival. Plaistow take their name from a Squarepusher track, I doubt that they even knew it was a district of London before they showed up for the capital’s jazz festival.

The influence of dance music and electronica is often mentioned in relationship to young, 21st century jazz musicians. Sometimes that influence seems to be minimal and in some instances I suspect that it’s just a trendy thing to say as jazzers try to win themselves a bit of much needed street cred. With Plaistow it’s much more overt, where Rusconi were loveable rogues and musical magpies Plaistow are much more intense and single minded, some of their industrial strength rhythms very clearly derived from the worlds of dance, electronica and alt rock. But there are strong jazz and improv elements too with cult Australian trio The Necks also a readily discernible influence alongside minimalist composers such as Steve Reich and Philip Glass.

Plaistow were formed in 2007 in Geneva by pianist Johann Bourquenez and drummer Cyril Bondi with Vincent Ruiz having now replaced original bassist Raphael Ortis. A highly prolific band they have released eight albums/EPs to date, the latest full length recording “Citadelle” (2013) appearing on the Lausanne based Two Gentlemen label. It marks a return to shorter, individual pieces following the lengthy side long Necks like epics that distinguished 2012’s “Lachrimosa”.

All Plaistow’s compositions are credited collectively to the whole band but one can’t escape feeling that Bourquenez, actually born in France, is the leader, his playing seems to shape the direction of the tunes and he performs with an intensity that inevitably draws the listener’s attention. Unlike some contemporary jazzers who cite the influence of electronica and dance Bourquenez has actually played that music and says of Plaistow “lets pretend we are just a jazz trio but we are actually filled with techno and noise walls, let’s make that music but with acoustic instruments”.

The show at the Pizza demonstrated Bourquenez’s precept as he opened the show by producing dense layers of sound from the piano by way of fierce double handed hammered arpeggios, a veritable wall of sound that had my eyes searching the stage for some kind of electronic enhancement, but, of course there was none, just Bourquenez’s astonishing technique. It was very much like watching The Necks, your eyes can’t compute the sounds your ears are hearing, it seems physically impossible for such sounds to be produced via three acoustic instruments. Behind Bourquenez’s wall of sound bass and drums played insistent, hypnotic patterns, for all their technical abilities Plaistow are not afraid to keep things simple, and, of course, simple can be very effective. This lengthy opening sequence seemed to move through several different phases and at first I thought we were going to hear an uninterrupted Necks like performance, unlike the other lunchtime artists Plaistow had requested to play one long set rather than two shorter ones. They struck me as being the kind of artists that play with such intensity that once they have got into “the zone” they want to stay there, psyching themselves up to these levels twice over would be too demanding. This lengthy opening segue embraced Jaki Liebezeit style drum grooves, hip hop and dance grooves, bassist Ruiz in a seemingly trance like state and Bourquenez making astonishing use of the piano’s innards. Many contemporary jazz pianists have a token rummage under the lid or dampen the strings to create a groove but I’ve never seen a musician work the inside of a piano so comprehensively and convincingly, with the help of prepared piano and other techniques Bourquenez treated the Pizza’s Steinway as an entire instrument, giving it a thorough work over in the process. The group’s effective use of dynamics saw them eliciting spontaneous audience applause as Bondi’s hyperactive drumming seemed to bring the piece to a climax but this was followed by an eerily atmospheric coda featuring an almost subliminal bass solo accompanied by bowed cymbals and small percussion plus the now almost inevitable piano innards, a kind of chill out / come down episode if you will.

The next piece began with almost subsonic low end piano rumblings, gradually increasing in intensity as Bondi added brutal, monolithic drums, the music then mutating into something more groove orientated and song like. It was all too much for two ladies who had clearly enjoyed Neal Richardson the previous day but having finished their meals departed hastily with their fingers over their ears. The rest of the very substantial audience loved it, heads were nodding to the groove all around the venue.

Solo piano introduced a gentler third piece that explored the influence of minimalism upon the trio.
However it was back to more familiar Plaistow territory for a final segment that encompassed thunderous bass grooves, drum explosions and more under the lid piano wizardry. Again this was a kind of segue, the piece mutating into a kind of skewed power ballad with Bourqeunet’s prepared piano techniques conjuring up a wonderfully exotic and distorted sound from within the instrument.

Plaistow said very little, preferring to let their music do the talking. Four pieces of music may not sound like a lot but this was a gig that lasted for nearly an hour and a half. I liked Plaistow’s uncompromising attitude, their intensity and their phenomenal technique, particularly that of Bourquenez. Like their compatriots Rusconi they were one of the revelations of the week.

Aside from geography and instrumentation Rusconi and Plaistow are very different but what they do have in common is that even in 2014 they are taking the piano trio to new places, expanding upon the legacy of E.S.T. and taking it to a place far beyond The Bad Plus. Like Rusconi Plaistow would have no difficulty in transferring their set to a rock club and they also work with lighting and visual artists. “Citadelle” is an excellent album, its eight tracks readily accessible to listeners of adventurous music of all genres.

It’s easy to see why Debra Richards of the Swiss Vibes website http://www.swissvibes.org (who was also here today) is such a champion of both bands. The much respected critic Richard Williams was also in attendance and gave Plaistow a great write up on his Blue Moment blog. http://www.thebluemoment.com


L’HIJAZ’CAR

For today’s free early evening slot I took myself across to the Barbican to see the French quintet L’Hijaz’Car performing upon the Freestage. The music of the group reflects the influence of North African music upon French culture and the quintet is led by its oud player and musical director Gregory Dargent. It also features the sound of the tarhu as played by Nicolas Beck plus bass clarinet (Jean-Louis Marchand), double bass (Vincent Posty) and percussion (Etienne Gruel). 

On Tuesday at the Purcell Room I saw the tarhu being played for the first time by Michalas Cholevas of Arifa, now another one comes along almost immediately! Talk about London Bus Syndrome!

Based in Strasbourg the quintet’s music has obvious similarities with Arifa’s but to my ears sounded more North African than Middle Eastern with Dargent’s oud the dominant instrument. L’Hijaz’Car’s sound was also more rhythmic with Posty and Gruel providing a sturdy backdrop for the soloists. Dargent’s oud was deployed both as a solo instrument but also to impart rhythmic impetus as the quintet passed melodic and rhythmic duties around in the spirit of so much contemporary jazz.  Opener “Istanbul” saw oud and bass clarinet sharing the melody with Marchand also entering into dialogue with the bowed bass of Posty, the latter also taking a solo with the bow. Similar dialogues were typical of the band’s performance with Beck and Gruel subsequently entering into a similar discussion.

Dargent acted as the band’s spokesman and announced that the next tune had been written about Colonel Gadaffi! Any misgivings this might have evoked were rendered redundant by music that included a lengthy solo oud introduction plus solos from bass clarinet and bowed tarhu above a percussive backdrop. The piece made effective use of dynamics with leader Dargent playing his rhythmic parts so forcefully that his spectacles fell off!

The next piece retained the rhythmic drive as oud combined with pizzicato bass and vigorously bowed tarhu plus percussion, Marchand taking the main solo on bass clarinet.

The series of musical dialogues between band members continued with the double bass and bass clarinet intro to the next piece, the use of pecked bass clarinet sounds then helping to establish the now familiar rhythmic drive as the piece progressed.

Oud, bowed tarhu and bass clarinet featured on the next piece and solo double bass on the one after as L’Hijaz’Car continued to pass the baton around, Marchand’s bass clarinet at one point skipping lightly above Gruel’s martial rhythms.

Bowed tarhu introduced the penultimate piece, this followed by an enthralling oud and percussion dialogue plus a wailing bass clarinet solo that drew a great reaction from a rapidly expanding crowd that was convening to see Tomasz Stanko in the main house.

L’Hijaz’Car concluded an enjoyable and well received performance with “1973”, a piece celebrating the meeting in that year of Ethio-Jazz master Mulatu Astatke with Duke Ellington.

Less rarefied and more obviously rhythmic than Arifa L’Hijaz’Car delivered an equally valid and equally enjoyable take on the jazz of the Mediterranean and beyond. 


ENTROPI / QUADRACERATOPS

In recent month I’ve been in regular email contact with Cath Roberts, an enterprising young musician based in London. Together with fellow saxophonist Dee Byrne she organises regular jazz and improv evenings at the Long White Cloud in Hoxton, these events taking place under the collective name of LUME.

Tonight was the last of three performances curated by LUME under the EFG London Jazz Festival banner with both musicians taking the opportunity to showcase the work of their own bands, Byrne’s Entropi and Roberts’ Quadraceratops.   

The Long White Cloud is a tiny bar/bistro on Hackney Road, presumably owned by a New Zealander although the Kiwi connection isn’t made particularly obvious. It’s small, friendly, does good food and represents a delightfully intimate place to watch live music. Crucially it gives Byrne and Roberts complete artistic freedom and the chance to present often quite challenging fully improvised music.

However both Entrpoi and Quadraceratops represent the composed part of their leaders’ output. The eponymous d?but from Quadraceratops is an excellent album, one of the best recording d?buts I’ve heard for quite some time so I was particularly keen to catch up with these enterprising young musicians and to check out LUME and the Long White Cloud for myself.

ENTROPI

Dee Byrne appeared first with her band Entropi. They have also recorded an album which is due to be released on the F-ire Presents album in 2015. At present the art work and distribution details are still being worked out but the appearance of the disc will be keenly anticipated.

Entropi features Byrne on alto sax, Andre Canniere on trumpet, Rebecca Nash on keyboards, Olie Brice on double bass and Matt Fisher at the drums. The vibes like sound of Nash’s electric piano introduced “Orbits” ,with Byrne and Canniere subsequently stating the theme before delivering fine individual solos.

“Mode For C” was based on John Coltrane’s “Miles Mode” and was introduced by a horn chorale, the latter boppish theme leading to an opening solo from Byrne, her alto subsequently coalescing with Canniere’s trumpet prior to further solos from Canniere and Brice on arco bass.

Byrne introduced “Crippled Symmetery” with the comment that it was about “chance encounters”. Introduced again by solo electric piano it developed a hard hitting, rock influenced groove with searing solos coming from Byrne on alto and Canniere on trumpet. Incidentally this was my second sighting of the latter this week following the lunchtime performance by his quintet at the Pizza Express a couple of days earlier.

“In Flux” featured a pecked alto/trumpet intro followed by solos from Byrne, Canniere and Nash. The leader was visibly growing in confidence by now, her playing becoming increasingly fluent and assured.

“Space Module” featured an appropriately other worldly intro complete with arco bass, distorted keyboards and extended horn techniques before Brice’s bass pulse moved the music somewhere else with solos from Byrne on alto and Nash on shimmering keyboards plus a closing drum feature from Fisher, hidden away behind the rest of the band in this most intimate of venues.

The closing “Exploration” was a well structured composition that boasted an urban, New York style vibe with strong rhythms supporting the squalling horns of Byrne and Canniere. The piece also included features for Brice and Fisher plus a sudden ending that threatened to catch the crowd, many of them fellow musicians, on the hop.

I very much enjoyed this set which exhibited a lot of promise and suggested that that Entropi’s d?but album should be well worth hearing when it finally emerges in 2015.


QUADRACERATOPS

The Quadraceratops album was actually recorded at around the same time as Entropi’s but has seen the light of day quicker thanks to the DIY/punk spirit of the Manchester based label Efpi on which it appears (see review elsewhere on this site).

I was highly impressed with the album both in terms of the playing and of Roberts’ writing and arranging. It’s a highly mature and accomplished d?but and it was good to see some of the tunes performed live.

The Seven piece group takes its name from a mythical dinosaur conceived by Roberts to reflect the fact that this is a band with a four horn front line consisting of the leader on alto sax, Tom Ward on tenor, Magnus Dearness on trombone and Henry Spencer on trumpet. The band is completed by Dave O’Brien on keyboards, Jason Simpson on double bass and Olly Blackman at the drums.

From the outset it was clear just how big a sound those four horns are capable of generating, particularly in such a confined space. They sounded great. Quadraceratops began with “Dinner With Patrick”, also the opening track of the album, a helter skelter piece depicting the varying moods of Patrick Bateman, the protagonist of Brett Easton Ellis’ novel “American Psycho”. Solos here came from Dearness on trombone and Ward on tenor and with O’Brien generating a fascinating array of sounds on keyboards. He and Nash had shared the same instrument but it was obviously O’Brien’s set up, the settings programmed to meet his needs. O’Brien was formerly leader of the short lived but fondly remembered Porpoise Corpus (Ward was also a member) and the influence of that band can also be heard in the music of Quadraceratops.

“Calico” featured an exceptional solo from Henry Spencer on trumpet with O?Brien?s Django Bates styled keyboards also figuring prominently.

“Flying South”, written about Roberts’ move to accommodation in South London saw the leader cutting loose for the first time alongside Dearness and Simpson, the piece also being notable for its closing four horn chorale.

“Chair-O-Planes was the first piece Roberts wrote for the band and featured a powerful Ward tenor solo plus another of the group’s characteristic massed horn chorales.

“Song For The Worker Bee” rounded off the evening with a wailing trumpet solo from Spencer and a series of turn on a dime tempo changes from this well drilled and immensely talented young band.

It had been rather a short set, the evening had started later than planned and Byrne’s set had arguably overrun, it was definitely the longer of the two. In terms of length (but not in terms of quality) I was disappointed with the Quadraceratops set, there were still two tunes on the album we hadn’t heard and I?d have loved to have seen these too. Nevertheless I’ve since taken some consolation from the fact that Quadraceratops and Entropi are due to play a double bill at Dempsey’s in Cardiff in May 2015 and I hope to catch rather more of them then.

In the meantime Quadraceratops played another EFG London Festival show when the played at Jez Nelson’s Jazz In The Round at the Clore Ballroom on the Southbank. I missed that but it is due for broadcast on Jazz on 3 this evening ( Monday 8th December 2014) at 11.00 pm. Catch it you can.

Despite my reservations about the running time I was impressed with both the LUME set up and with the music of both tonight’s bands. Thanks to Cath, Dee, Olie Brice and Dave O’Brien for finding the time to chat.

Check out LUME’s activities at http://www.lumemusic.co.uk     

 

 

             

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