(Avant-garde / Experimental music / Free improvisation) No Spaghetti Edition - Pasta Variations - 2002, FLAC (image+.cue), lossless

What do you get if your seven- to 12-piece improvising group has only three stable members? Answer: a different group with each album. And Real Time Satellite Data sounds as different from Pasta Variations as the latter did from Listen...And Tell Me What It Was. This time around (and that is, during two days in June 2003), the core Norwegian trio of Ivar Grydeland (guitar), Tonny Kluften (double bass), and Ingar Zach (percussion) was joined by cutting-edge improvisers from France (clarinetist Xavier Charles and saxophonist Michel Doneda), Germany (Axel Dörner on trumpet and Andrea Neumann on inside piano), and the U.K. (Rhodri Davies on harp). All these musicians share a certain similar approach to free improvisation, rooted in the legacy of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble but striving to find new sounds in the inner depths of their respective instruments. Real Time Satellite Data is thus a demanding album that lacks the relatively more immediate appeal of Pasta Variations, but is significantly stronger than the first CD. There are two long pieces ("In Gasping Death," 21 minutes, and "Who Is Changing Places," 31 minutes) and a flurry of very short ones (three minutes and under), creating a strange, uneven album flow. "In Gasping Death" is a stunning ensemble piece driven by acute listening and minute yet meaningful contributions from all the musicians. "Who Is Changing Places" is less of a success; some passages stall and Dörner's soaring trumpet line two-thirds in is not enough to salvage it. On the other hand, the short tracks display a lot of imagination. The closing "Super Opposition" almost sounds like a mock field recording, replete with clarinet birds, saxophone insects, a bass motorway in the distance, and the hum of electric (guitar) wires.
-- Eugene Chadbourne, All Music Guide

«Few improvisors have understood Tony Oxley's discovery of timbral serialism inside Elvin Jones's subdivided beats, but the musicians behind Norway's Sofa label, Ivar Grydeland on guitar and Ingar Zach on percussion, are blessed with such an understanding. This approach - utterly distinct from the swelling detail of the Spontaneous Music Ensemble or the Waiting For Godot endlessness of AMM - opens up time, packing in more changes per second than seems musically impossible. Philipp Wachsmann, on violin and electronics, and Charlotte Hug, on viola and electronics, are a canny choice for a quartet, since their bowed instruments imply a horizontal continuity far removed from the pushy split-splat which Zach and Grydeland excel at. Choice of engineers (Toby Robinson and Lee Bowman) and studio (London's Moat Studio) is likewise canny, since Robinson's Moat operation is emerging as the best for improvisors.
Wazahugy doesn't give a stereo illusion of four musicians in real space, but the way it renders each instrument so intoxicatingly present makes for a thrilling listen, even if one objects to certain musical decisions. Hug's repeated riff 13 minutes into the opener puts a brake on the collective energy, and occasionally Wachsmann's Viennese melancholy sounds mannered. There's also an unlisted fore minute encore where a new energy sweeps the musicians along.
No Spaghetti Edition deliberately jettison the poise of pure Grydeland/Zach projects, being an opportunity to entertain a host of other musicians. For Pasta Variations, the guests at Tou Bryggeri, Stavanger and Blå, Oslo were; Phil Minton(voice), Pat Thomas(keyboard), Håkon Kornstad(tenor), Frode Haltli(accordion) and Tonny Kluften(bass, though Kluften is a Sofa regular too). There's some crunchy, delirious stuff, along with less vertiginous passages (eg eight minutes into «PVE», as the accordion feebly evokes European street musics). Phil Minton is his hair-raising self, cutting through the septet clutter to achieve remarkable moments.»
-- Ben Watson, The Wire

Recorded live, this effort represents one of several new releases from the Norway-based avant-garde record label SOFA. The collective features British vocal improviser Phil Minton and fellow compatriot, keyboardist Pat Thomas as the duo augments a group of forward thinking Scandinavian artists. Here, drummer Ingar Zach and others align their improvisational wares for a set teeming with twisted dialogue and discombobulated tone poems. Nevertheless, the septet investigates a plethora of soundscapes via a sometimes, playful approach atop alien soundscapes. The musicians pursue cartoon-like imagery thanks to their generally, odd harmonic voicings and intermittent doses of wit and whimsy. Even though guitarist Ivar Grydeland is apt to put the pedal to the metal on occasion. They perpetuate an unusual balance of voicings, consisting of tenor saxophonist Hakon Kornstad’s boisterous escapades and Minton’s affable yet rather unruly vocalise. The listener might detect spirits hovering atop their listening quarters, as the band integrates chaotic passages into what might appear to be weird and wonderful dwellings. With this outing, the musicians simply goad our imaginations. Recommended.
-- Glenn Astarita, All About Jazz

«The five septet improvisations on Pasta Variations benefit from the unique combinations of instruments on display. Ivar Grydeland plays guitar; Frode Haltli plays accordion; Tonny Kluften plays bass; Håkon Kornstad plays tenor sax and fluteonet; Phil Minton plays (with) his voice; Pat Thomas plays keyboard and electronics, and Ingar Zach plays percussion. Whoop stop zing, rattle rattle bash blurt zoing. With the full ensemble playing together on every track, it's almost no surprise that the coherent music occurs after the improvising has filtered down to one or two musicians, with each additional member slowly edging back in. “PVD” begins with scattered percussion and whittling electronics, adding fluteonet, then Minton murmurs, and, just-like-that, quick punctures of accordion compressings and exhalings enter the scene so that by 5 minutes into it the whole band is flowing. Instead of being overwrought freneticism, it's just dense, compact with inventive communication. Haltli's accordion adds particular depth throughout these recordings, charging the sonorous sense of musician and audience alike with surprise, challenge, and reward. The saxophone pops and accordion squeals during “PVE” meet in equal riffing pleasure, blending well with the sounds of crickets at night. Thomas alternates between keyboard and electronics with magisterial aplomb, sensitive to the overall atmosphere, and possessed of ears tuned to know when the music needs that little something extra – like a squiggle in the distance, a run of keys in front of the whole ensemble's note slurry, or a pitter-patter of pianistic punctuation. This was recorded in 2002 in Oslo and Stavanger , Norway . I can only hope that No Spaghetti Edition tour farther from home, and keep putting it on record.»
-- Andrew Choate, Coda

Exact Audio Copy V0.99 prebeta 4 from 23. January 2008
EAC extraction logfile from 25. July 2008, 0:08
No Spaghetti Edition / Pasta Variations
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