The Squid's Ear Magazine


Elephant9 with Terje Rypdal: Catching Fire (Rune Grammofon)

Recorded live in Oslo, the Norwegian jazz-rock trio Elephant9 of Torstein Lofthus (drums), Nikolai Haengsle (bass) and Stale Storlokken (keys) join with legendary guitarist Terje Rypdal, channeling the intensity of bands like King Crimson and Mahavishnu Orchestra as they blend and evolve layered psychedelia with angular improvisation for a raw, electric fusion experience.
 

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product information:

Personnel:



Torstein Lofthus-drums

Nikolai Haengsle-electric bass

Stale Storlokken-electric organ, electric piano, Mellotron

Terje Rypdal-electric guitar


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UPC: 7033662022366

Label: Rune Grammofon
Catalog ID: RCD 2236CD
Squidco Product Code: 35354

Format: CD
Condition: New
Released: 2024
Country: Norway
Packaging: Digipack - 3 panel
Recorded live in concert at Nasjonal Jazzscene, in Victoria, Oslo, Norway, on January 20th, 2017 by Stein Andre Hovden.

Descriptions, Reviews, &c.

In 2019, Elephant9 released two double live albums, Psychedelic Backfire I and II, the latter with guest guitarist Reine Fiske, whose favorite guitarist happened to be Terje Rypdal. With both albums out of print, Catching Fire is a most welcome addition to their discography. Recorded at a remarkable concert from 2017 in Oslo, Rypdal would turn 70 later in the year. David Fricke makes some interesting references to classic live albums in his liner notes, and Rune Grammofon would like to add King Crimson´s underrated USA and numerous Pink Floyd 1970 live bootlegs into the equation, sharing the common energy level and sense of untamed intensity. That said, there are also stretches of calm at play here, especially in the 22-minute opener where Rypdal introduces himself with some trademark, glacier melodic lines. Rypdal is on fire throughout, adding some fierce rhythm work and abstract acrobatics from his toolbox. Ståle and Terje are sometimes so interlocked that it´s difficult to tell them apart. This is partly because the album is mixed to get a sense of being at the concert, by not overly trying to separate them, but primarily due to a common understanding stemming from Ståle being the guitarist´s "right hand" both in the studio and on stage for close to 30 years. Torstein and Nikolai is the most solid of rhythm sections, a well-oiled engine, finesse and power combined. Elephant9 established their reputation as a live powerhouse well before their album debut in 2008 and have since released six more studio albums as well as the live albums from 2019. Terje Rypdal´s musical history dates back to the early sixties as a teenage member of The Vanguards, and The Dream a few years later.

Also available as a vinyl LP.

Artist Biographies

"Torstein Lofthus (born 10 March 1977, in Øystese, Kvam, Norway) is a Norwegian drummer and composer, married to Hege Lofthus (b. Sørvig, 1981), and known from bands like Shining, Elephant9, Mathias Eick Band, D'Sound and Ebersson/Zanussi/Lofthus.

Lofthus has had a major influence on Norwegian music through studio work, live concerts and teaching at Norwegian Academy of Music and at University of Agder (the Faculty of Fine Arts). Based in Oslo, he now tours Norway and Europe with different bands and artists after finishing his master at the Norwegian Academy of Music spring 2006. He plays several genres, well known with both jazz and pop music. He has been the most sought drummer in Norway recent years, if not on tour with Vamp, Jarle Bernhoft, Oslo Gospel Choir, Mathias Eick or Marit Larsen, he collaborates with Maria Mena, Kurt Nilsen, Torun Eriksen, Bertine Zetlitz, Silje Nergaard, Eivind Aarset, D'Sound, Noora Noor, The Norwegian Radio Orchestra, Jon Eberson and Per Zanussi, to mention a few, both in studio and on stage."

-Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Torstein_Lofthus)
11/4/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Nikolai Hængsle (previously Nikolai Hængsle Eilertsen, born 24 June 1978) is a Norwegian bass guitarist. He is primarily known as a member of BigBang (1999-2004, 2009-) and The National Bank (2004-). Eilertsen, who was born in Skotselv, also participates in the bands Lester, Needlepoint and Elephant9.

Honors

- Spellemannprisen 2004 in the class Pop band for the album The National Bank

- Spellemannprisen 2010 in the class Jazz for the album Walk the Nile"

-Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nikolai_H%C3%A6ngsle)
11/4/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Ståle Storløkken (born 22 February 1969 in Dombås, Norway) is a Norwegian jazz musician (keyboards, organ and piano) and composer, known from co-operations with artists like Terje Rypdal, BigBang, Supersilent and Motorpsycho. He is married to the Norwegian singer Tone Åse.

Storløkken was educated on the Jazz program at Trondheim Musikkonservatorium (1988-90), and subsequently did his postgraduate there too. During the studies he started the band Veslefrekk together with fellow students Arve Henriksen and Jarle Vespestad (Helge Sten joined the band at a later stage). In 1997 the name of the band changed to Supersilent. They have released six critically acclaimed albums on the label Rune Grammofon. From 1995 he played in the trio BOL along with his wife Tone Åse and Tor Haugerud.

Storløkken has been active in many contexts, both as a band leader and member, for example The Stoken Experience, and Terje Rypdal's Skywards. Along with Christian Wallumrød, and he composed the commissioned work Eight Thirty to Kongsberg Jazz Festival 1994. He has collaborated on a number of albums with the named bands, and otherwise at such musicians as Gunnar Andreas Berg, Eldbjørg Raknes, Audun Kleive and Thomas Strønen.

Storløkken together with Thomas Strønen has the Humcrush duo, which has released three albums. He also plays in the trio Elephant9, along with Torstein Lofthus and Nikolai Eilertsen. He co-composed Berit Opheim's commissioned work An angel with for Vossajazz 2007, and in 2010 composed and performed his one commissioned work for Moldejazz with the band Motorpsycho, Trondheim Jazz Orchestra and Trondheim Soloists."

-Wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St%C3%A5le_Storl%C3%B8kken)
11/4/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.

"Norwegian guitarist and composer Terje Rypdal, tone poet of the Fender Stratocaster, was born in Oslo in 1947. The son of a military conductor and clarinettist, Rypdal began piano lessons aged five and took up the trumpet three years later. When he was twelve he began teaching himself the guitar. While still in his teens, he became a member of the Vanguards, a Norwegian instrumental rock group that climbed the local pop charts, and then, after hearing Jimi Hendrix, he formed a psychedelic rock band, Dream, in 1967. But Rypdal's influences have always been eclectic: he was drawn to the music of Ligeti and Penderecki as well as Coltrane and Miles Davis. He recalled in an interview with Notes on the Road: "I heard Ligeti's music and I decided then to try to make a living as a composer and guitar player." Michael Tucker has described "Rypdal's blending of rock and jazz phrasing with a rubato concern for tone colour and dynamics often redolent of the classical world".

Rypdal's relationship with ECM dates back to 1970, when he was part of Jan Garbarek's quartet on Afric Pepperbird, the saxophonist's own label debut. Some Rypdal material that didn't find its way onto Garbarek's Sart the following year led ECM's Manfred Eicher to suggest Rypdal record his own album, thereby beginning one of the label's most fertile and long-lasting collaborations. Rypdal's eponymous debut as leader was recorded that same year.

A 3-CD set released in 2012, Odyssey in Studio & in Concert, brought together some landmark early Rypdal recordings from the mid-1970s. A BBC review identified in the set "shades of prog, psychedelia and a foretaste of Rypdal's later atmospheric tone poems". A logn series of collaborations with fellow ECM artists have followed, including Palle Mikkelborg, Jon Christensen, Miroslav Vitous, Jack DeJohnette and John Surman.

Yet, having studied composition with Finn Mortensen, he is also a prolific composer, with an opus list that includes six symphonies, choral and chamber music and pieces for mixed groups of classical players and improvisers. Undisonus received critical acclaim on its release in 1990 and won Work of the Year prize from the Society of Norwegian Composers. ECM released an album featuring his Double Concerto/5th Symphony in 1998 and Lux Aeterna in 2000, an intense, personal celebration of nature, light and the mountains of Rypdal's childhood."

-ECM Records (https://ecmrecords.com/artists/terje-rypdal/)
11/4/2024

Have a better biography or biography source? Please Contact Us so that we can update this biography.


Track Listing:



1. I Cover The Mountain Top 22:18

2. Dodovoodoo 21:12

3. Psychedelic Backfire 12:36

4. John Tinnick 4:51

5. Fugl Fonix 10:28

6. Skink 8:20

Related Categories of Interest:


Rock and Related
Progressive Rock
Improvised Rock
Improvised Music
European Improvisation, Composition and Experimental Forms
Trio Recordings
Quartet Recordings
Guitarists, &c.
Staff Picks & Recommended Items
New in Rock Forms
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Rune Grammofon.


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