(Modern Creative, Free Jazz, CIMP) Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell Quartet (Hilliard Greene, Barry Altschul) - Desert Songs & Other Landscapes - 2004, FLAC (tracks+.cue), lossless

Exact Audio Copy V1.0 beta 3 from 29. August 2011
EAC extraction logfile from 3. May 2012, 19:37
Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet / Desert Songs & Other Landscapes
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        6  | 58:09.31 |  7:42.26 |    261706    |   296381
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Track  3
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Track  4
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Track  5
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Track  6
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==== Log checksum 3772F06CFB4994C1B492E80B90AFD0EF3927604CCD57E765340D5F16C6C227F8 ====

REM GENRE Jazz
REM DATE 2004
REM DISCID 4E0F6F06
REM COMMENT "ExactAudioCopy v1.0b3"
CATALOG 0786497562220
PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
TITLE "Desert Songs & Other Landscapes"
FILE "01. Box Set.wav" WAVE
  TRACK 01 AUDIO
    TITLE "Box Set"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
    ISRC US23Z0400231
    INDEX 01 00:00:00
  TRACK 02 AUDIO
    TITLE "Flutist With Hat and Shoe"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
    ISRC US23Z0400232
    INDEX 00 10:51:03
FILE "02. Flutist With Hat and Shoe.wav" WAVE
    INDEX 01 00:00:00
  TRACK 03 AUDIO
    TITLE "Seven 9-8"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
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  TRACK 04 AUDIO
    TITLE "Camel`s Gait/Desert Sands Part 1"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
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FILE "04. Camel`s Gait,Desert Sands Part 1.wav" WAVE
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  TRACK 05 AUDIO
    TITLE "Under The Other"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
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FILE "05. Under The Other.wav" WAVE
    INDEX 01 00:00:00
  TRACK 06 AUDIO
    TITLE "Desert... Bleue... East"
    PERFORMER "Gebhard Ullmann & Steve Swell 4tet"
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Desert Songs & Other Landscapes features a working group co-led by tenor-saxophonist Gebhard Ullmann and trombonist Steve Swell. This is a fiery set full of explorative colorful solos and dynamic group interplay. Much of the time Ullmann and Swell improvise together, being pushed by bassist Hillard Greene and veteran drummer Barry Altschul. Most of the themes (which are inspired in an abstract way by Swell's time spent in the Sahara desert and Gebhard's desert experiences in the American West) are brief although sometimes they return between improvised sections. The interplay on some of the more spirited pieces is a bit like a Mingus group, or perhaps Archie Shepp's band with Roswell Rudd. Of the standout selections, "Flutist With Hat and Shoe" is an avant-garde ballad that features a warm Swell trombone solo while "Seven 9-8" (which alternates between being in seven/eight and nine/eight time) is episodic and continually surprising. Fans of the more rambunctious side of avant-garde jazz will find this set of strong interest.
***
Economical improv groups are CIMP's stock and trade. Rare are the sessions that employ ensembles larger than quartet size. For this reason critics often complain of a relative homogeneity amongst the label's roster of projects. The responsibility falls on tapped bands to say something fresh within instrumental formats that quite often have reams of precedence. Producer Bob Rusch has an uncanny knack of picking groups able to rise to the challenge.
The jointly officiated Ullman-Swell unit certainly contains the improvisatory clout to shoulder the task. Ullman's horns favor a dryly sardonic and occasionally ornery phrasing that mesh well with the arid imagery of the disc's title. His bass clarinet displays few Dolphy traits, though his tenor carries a bulky Shepp-styled rasp that works particularly well on the few balladic interludes. Both reeds are ideally suited the sections of unfettered blowing that regularly arrive as tags to the composed sections.
Swell adopts a comparably roughhewn disposition, his friction-flecked brass sounding like a sheet of corrugated aluminum buckling in a typhoon wind. Unamplified, Hill Greene slips in and out of audibility during the more raucous ensemble sections. As such he ends up shaping more of a recurring pulse than clearly discernable lines. One of his few reprieves comes when the others leave him to his lonesome during a pizzicato prologue to "Under the Other." The skill imbued in the solo makes the shrouding of his patterns elsewhere all the more luckless. Altschul draws on the masterful yield of nearly a half century behind the drum kit, crafting off-kilter patterns that keep the band centered while they simultaneously ensure maximum diversity of rhythm.
The disc's six pieces offer a tightly-stitched fabric of improvisation and composition, opening with the Swell-scripted "Box Set." Tracing overlapping combative phrases over a clattery percussive backdrop, the horns eventually settle upon a joint course. Greene and Alstchul converge to provide sprinting undercarriage for solos from the dual leads. Altschul's tidal statement that serves as capstone is the first of several show-stopping stomps. "Flutist With Hat And Shoe" keeps the bar raised with a solitary extemporization by Ullman's plush tenor, which wobbles and exhorts with a weary lust-laden purr. The addition of Swell's moribund brass in full funeral mode flanked by peripatetic brushes of the drummer completes the picture. Ullman isn't content to stick to a single reed for the entirety of most pieces, and his whim-driven change ups add a welcome sense of unpredictability.
The music isn't undemanding listening by any stretch, but readers familiar with these players likely won't expect anything less. When it comes to coarse and uncompromising energy-fueled free jazz, these four deliver the goods. In the bargain they stay true the often-derided CIMP statement of purpose of providing uncompromising creative expression free from the mitigating shackles of commercialism.

Gebhard Ullmann - tenor saxophone, bass clarinet
Steve Swell - trombone
Hilliard Greene - bass
Barry Altschul - drums