Okkyung Lee:
Yeo-Neun [VINYL] (SHELTER PRESS)

Yeo-Neun Quartet is an experimental chamber music ensemble founded in 2016 by Okkyung Lee on cello, with harpist Maeve Gilchrist, pianist Jacob Sacks, and bassist Eivind Opsvik, in a detailed album merging melodic contemporary composition with free improvisation and unusual technique, as Lee explores her musical history and experiences through ten dramatically elegant works. ... Click to View

Various Artists (Luigi Russolo / Chris Cutler / Nick Sudnick / Andrzej Karpinski / Alessandro Monti / Silvio Mix / Pietro Verardo:
Intonarumori: Ieri Ed Oggi (Recommended Records)

Four new commissioned works by Chris Cutler, Andzrej Karpinski, Nick Sudnik and Alessandro Monti performed on futurist conceptualist Luigi Russolo's "Intonarumori", unique boxes capable of mechanically creating sounds including roars, thunderings, explosions, hissing, whistling, puffing, mumbling, muttering, gurgling, screeching, creaking, buzzing, crackling and scraping. ... Click to View

Give Guitars To People (NATuerlich / Arbeit / Rua):
The Look Of Silence, Vol 1 (Recommended Records)

The trio of guitarists Patricia Bateira (NATurlich), Jochen Arbeit (Einstürzende Neubauten) and Vitor Rua (Vitor Rua & The Metaphysical Angels) combine to create a new style of long-form electronic music, a richly continuous work seemingly without start or end, incorporating sustain, effects, & field recordings into a beautifully abstract aural environment. ... Click to View

Eddie Prevost:
An Uncommon Music For the Common Man [BOOK] (Matchless)

Percussionist, Improviser and AMM founding member Eddie Prévost's fourth book presents a fascinating series of reflections and challenging insights on music in its various forms and development of improvised music, at the intersection of contemporary compositional and conceptual forms; and a personal history of Prevost's life and his relationship with music. ... Click to View

Xavier Charles / Bertrand Gauguet:
Spectre (Akousis Records)

Using the interference points of closely pitched sound, long-time collaborators Xavier Charles and Bertrand Gauguet use acoustic and amplified clarinets and saxophones to create frequency landscapes that change slowly, ringing with harmonics while finding unison and conflict in their tones, creating meditative aural environments of great beauty and reflection. ... Click to View

Charlemagne Palestine / John Kormeling:
Meet The Frogsichord [VINYL 2 LPs] (Staalplaat)

Architect John Körmeling and maverick musician Charlemagne Palestine collaborate on a whole new system of music, reworking the harpsichord to generate notes of Pythagorean ratios, asking visionary and idiosyncratic to create a set of recordings on the instrument that Palestine dubbed "The Frogischord", this unique double LP the documentation of that music. ... Click to View

Charlemagne Palestine / John Kormeling:
Meet The Frogsichord [VINYL 2 LPs FUR COVER] (Staalplaat)

Architect John Körmeling and maverick musician Charlemagne Palestine collaborate on a whole new system of music, reworking the harpsichord to generate notes of Pythagorean ratios, asking visionary and idiosyncratic to create a set of recordings on the instrument that Palestine dubbed "The Frogischord", this unique double LP the documentation of that music. ... Click to View

Rafael Toral:
Constellation In Still Time (Room40)

A long-form ambient composition from Portuguese composer and electroacoustic performer Rafael Toral, combining piano (Joana Gama), harp (Angelica V. Salve), vibraphone (Luis Bittencourt), clavinet (Joana Baulho), Rhodes (Riccardo Dillon), and sinewaves (Rafael Toral) a generative piece that avoids repetition while creating a floating and vast sense of reverberant space. ... Click to View

Merzbow:
StereoAkuma (Room40)

A 5-part concert and encore from Masami Akita, AKA Merzbow, performing in Australia at Room40's Open Frame Festival in 2019, a wrenching performance of distinctive yet diverse noise sources and textured revealed as a controlled tumult; all profits from this edition will be donated to assisting wildlife recovery in the wake of the Australia bushfire crisis of 2020. ... Click to View

Brandon Seabrook (w/ Cooper-Moore / Gerald Cleaver):
Exultations [CASSETTE w/ DOWNLOAD] (Astral Spirits)

The title aptly describes the intense excitement and exhilaration of NY guitarist Brandon Seabrook's second trio album on Astral Spirits, performed with rhythm giants Cooper-Moore on Diddley Bow (a single-string bass) and free jazz drum legend Gerald Cleaver, the two creating a percolating interactive foundation for Seabrooks powerfully expressive and investigative playing. ... Click to View

Brandon Seabrook (w/ Cooper-Moore / Gerald Cleaver):
Exultations (Astral Spirits)

The title aptly describes the intense excitement and exhilaration of NY guitarist Brandon Seabrook's second trio album on Astral Spirits, performed with rhythm giants Cooper-Moore on Diddley Bow (a single-string bass) and free jazz drum legend Gerald Cleaver, the two creating a percolating interactive foundation for Seabrooks powerfully expressive and investigative playing. ... Click to View

Liebman / Brecker / Copland / Alessi / Gress / Baron:
QuinT5T (Inner Voice Jazz)

Compatriots in bands over many years, the quintet of David Liebman on saxophones, Randy Brecker on trumpets, Marc Copland on piano, Drew Gress on bass and Joey Baron on drums, joined by trumpeter Ralph Alessi on 2 tracks, come together to bring joyfully lyrical enthusiasm and masterful skill to works by Liebman, Gress, Baron, Brecker, and Ellington. ... Click to View

Bob Drake:
The Gardens of Beastley Manor (Recommended Records)

Bob Drake takes his listeners on a 22 piece instrumental journey through a "Beastley" garden of confident melodic foundation and experimental forays, captured by day and night, at fountains or on balustrades, walking paths or in pavilions, Drake's concise and endearing vignettes paint aural images of wit, introspection, curiosity and wonder, a tour de force of conception and execution. ... Click to View

Sangliers (Dave Rempis / Keefe Jackson / Christine Wodrascka / Didier Lasserre / Peter Orins):
Minuscules (The Bridge Sessions)

The Bridge is a transatlantic network that connects improvisers across national boundaries, here connecting US Chicago-based musicians Keefe Jackson (saxophones & bass clarinet), Dave Rempis (saxophones), with French improvisers Christine Wodrascka (piano), Didier Lasserre (drums) and Peter Orins (drums) for a 2018 recording in Lille, France. ... Click to View

Eric La Casa :
Interieurs (Swarming)

A stunning exploration of interior architecture through recordings of the elements of three spaces including La Casa's own apartment, finding micro and macro-scopic sound in common elements that he uses to create fascinating compositions reflecting both the captivating fullness and stillness of each space, as the composer questions his relationship with each space. ... Click to View

Phill Niblock:
Music for Organs (Matiere Memoire)

Two massive drone works for organ and pre-recorded tracks commissioned by Musica Festival Strasbourg for organist Hampus Lindwall, with tapes by Emanuel Schmelzer-Ziringer, each pieces titled anagrammatically (ie. Nagro = Organ) and recorded with the composer at the Manufacture d'orgues Thomas and Orgelbau Klais organ in the Collegiale Sainte-Waudru, in Mons, Belgium. ... Click to View

Nate Wooley / Torben Snekkestad :
Of Echoing Bronze (Listen! Foundation (Fundacja Sluchaj!))

Two trumpeters--Nate Wooley from New York City, and Torben Snekkestad from Norway, also performing on soprano sax--met in Copenhagen in 2015 for this live concert "KoncertKirken – Blagards Plads", a monumental meeting of exploratory and investigative improvisation, using unusual and unorthodox techniques to their instruments to present 3 unique and singular dialogs. ... Click to View

Joel Futterman / Greg Foster:
Alabama (Shipwreck)

Greg Foster has been merging poetry with music since the 60s, including work with Miles Davis, Art Blakey, and Thelonious Monk, here joins pianist Joel Futterman also on curved soprano saxophone and Indian flute, accompanying Foster's potent words and messages in 8 poems, including the 19 minutes "Alabama Exequy" examining the pain and horror of racism. ... Click to View

London Jazz Composers Orchestra:
That Time (Not Two)

Released for their 50th anniversary, The LJCO, in configurations of up to 21 musicians including Derek Bailey, Trevor Watts, Evan Parker, Peter Brotzmann, &c., perform works by Kenny Wheeler, Barry Guy, Paul Rutherford and Howard Riley, captured live at the Berliner Jazztage in 1972; at Donaueschingen Musiktage in 1972; in the studio in 1980; and London's Round House in 1980. ... Click to View

Dave Rempis / Elisabeth Harnik / Michael Zerang:
Triple Tube (Not Two)

Recording in Graz, Austria in 2019 at the club Tube's, Chicago alto saxophonist Dave Rempis and drummer Michael Zerang, frequent collaborators with Ken Vandermark and The Resonance Ensemble, joined with Austrian improvising and classical pianist Elisabeth Harnik to record three exuberant and incredibly informed improvisations: "Triple Tube" I through III. ... Click to View

Barre Phillips:
Thirty Years In Between [2 CDs] (Victo)

The title to be taken literally, these two solo concerts recorded in Canada by French-based US bassist Barre Phillips, the first recorded at Vancouver Western Front in 1989, the 2nd from the 35th International Festival Music Festival of Victoriaville in 2019, both exemplary concerts showing his masterful skills and ability to captivate then and now. ... Click to View

Joelle Leandre / Lauren Newton / Myra Melford:
Stormy Whispers (Listen! Foundation (Fundacja Sluchaj!))

The 13th International Festival of Improvised Music "Ad Libitum" in Warsaw, 2018, themed "Women Alarm!", presented the new trio of Joëlle Léandre (double bass), Myra Melford (piano), and Lauren Newton (free improv voice), performing a masterfully energetic, quirky and indescribably enthralling set of trio and duo improvisations titled "Whisper" 1 through 8. ... Click to View

Conference Call (Gebhard Ullmann / Michael Jefry Stevens / Joe Fonda / Dieter Ulrich):
Prism (Not Two)

The tenth Conference Call album and the first with drummer Dieter Ulrich taking over for former drummers Matt Wilson, Han Bennink, George Schuller and Gerry Hemingway, the 20 years journey for this transatlantic band leading to this album captured in the studio in Central NY while on tour, performing 3 original compositions from Ullman, 2 from Fonda, and 2 from Stevens. ... Click to View

Philippe Lauzier / Eric Normand :
Not the music : Les temps fluos [PRINT w/ DOWNLOAD] (Tour de Bras)

An album of quiet improvisation focused on timbre, rhythm and pensive pacing from the duo of bass clarinetist Philippe Lauzier and bassist Éric Normand, also using objects to create mysterious tones and acoustic sonics, released as a limited 300g paper card hand-printed by Normad with an accompanying download code, 1 of 2 art cards initiating an 8-card series. ... Click to View

Michel Doneda:
Monstre (PRINT w/ DOWNLOAD) (Tour de Bras)

Performing on soprano and sopranino saxophones, French saxophonist Michel Doneda is heard in concert at Tiasci in Paris for three "Monstre" solo improvisations of quietly emphatic playing using extended techniques and unusual phrasing, released as a limited 250g paper card hand-printed by Normad with an accompanying download code, 1 of 2 art cards initiating an 8-card series. ... Click to View

Von LMO:
Future Language (Flemish Masters)

The 1981 debut studio album of Von LMO, released independently in 1981 through his label StraZar, dedicated to the advancement of the United States space program, described by music journalist Chuck Eddy as being one of the 500 best albums of heavy metal in his Stairway to Hell book, here in the Flemish Masters edition with the track "Shake, Rattle and Roll". ... Click to View

KNW :
<<NORTH ov GOD>> (Psykomanteum)

An album of ecstatic noise improv with an experimental edge from the trio of Ulrich Krieger on tenor saxophone & contrabass clarinet, Nandor Nevai on "throats" & drums, and Wolcott on oscillator & electronics, viciously assertive music in seven track of mostly succinct statements composed or conceived by each of the band members; cathartic. ... Click to View

Cecil Taylor / Tony Oxley:
Birdland / Neuburg 2011 (Listen! Foundation (Fundacja Sluchaj!))

Performing in the intimacy of the Birdland Jazz Club in 2011, New York innovative pianist Cecil Taylor met with London free jazz legendary percussionist and long-time associate in The Feel Trio, Tony Oxley, Taylor's rapid often percussive approach to the keys pairing with Oxley's percussive work, and both invoking lyrical beauty from the other. ... Click to View

John Coltrane Quartet:
My Favorite Things Graz 1962 (ezz-thetics by Hat Hut Records Ltd)

The 2nd volume from tenor & soprano saxophonist John Coltrane 1962 tour of Europe and Scandinavia, heard here in late November at Stefaniensaal, Graz with his quartet of pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison, and drummer Elvin Jones, the band playing classic numbers under the influence of Coltrane's expanding drive to transform his music toward greater freedom. ... Click to View

George Lewis / Ozana Omelchuk (Studio Dan):
Breaking News (ezz-thetics by Hat Hut Records Ltd)

Two works commissioned by the Austrian Studio Dan ensemble: "As We May Feel" by George Lewis, referencing visionary engineer Vannevar Bush's concepts of data linking & association, in a work reminding how music recombines and associates; and Oxana Omelchuk's double concerto for two trombonists, "Wow and Flutter", taking listeners on a profound journey through recording technologies. ... Click to View