It has taken some years to finally release this heavyweight collaboration between bassist Guy Segers, percussionist Charles Hayward and guitarist Kawabata Makoto. Recorded live in Brighton back in 2013, the album consists of three extended improvisations and follows nicely on from the Uneven Eleven release on Sub Rosa back in 2015. Where that album captured the show at Café OTO on the previous evening of 24 May 2013, on the next night at Sticky Mike’s Frog Bar the fluidity of the trio and their egalitarian approach had clearly started to gel.
Hayward’s drums definitely add structure to their twisted fuzz template, with Guy’s warm insistence helping the trio to touch lightly on Public Image Ltd‘s “Albatross” here and there before shooting off at tangents, Kawabata’s guitar exploding into fireworks before throttling back. Guy lays a bed for Kawabata, but he manages to effect the bass in ways that change the sound, providing unexpected textures while Hayward batters in his unique way. The pieces change minute by minute over the course of sixty-six minutes, but the democratic nature means that even when there may be a brief battering-ram pummel, an explosive burst of phased guitar or a neck-throttling bass run, the strength of the trio prevails.
Hayward’s guttural mantra-like vocals, a few words intoned rhythmically, add some post-punk vigour, while looped chiming guitars hint at a simple minimalism that ignores what came before. There are the faintest hints of Cream and Metal Box-era PIL in the long-form approach but they drive and drive, pushing the separate pieces on and on. Stripped down to basics, second piece “Limpid Intone (Psalmodie Limpide)” really merges the three players as sudden intense explosions are assimilated until cohesion is lost. Things eventually coalesce again, but into an abstraction of pointillist slashes as tempos change and tides surge. If you try focusing on just one of the players you really start to lose yourself, the other elements bubbling up overwhelmingly in the background and there is absolutely no dropping of energy levels. They are on it all the way through, so by the time the punk jazz fusion of the final track “Mineral Knot” arrives, you are already a bit worn out. Here more of Hayward’s simplistic vocals over a feedback drone once again change the atmosphere, with the bass a low-end smear that coats everything. There is a satisfying singularity to it that suggests you could dance to it; just don’t blame them if you break your hip.This is a fantastic recording of a one-off trio with all three players at the top of their game; a union that, although trading on their strengths, still manages to shed new light on their playing and gives up more with every listen.
-Mr Olivetti-
