The album has been put together from recordings of German tour dates in 2012 by guitarist Willie Oteri (WD-41, Spiral Out, Dino J.A. Deane, Scott Amendola, Tony Levin, Mike Keneally, etc) with Dave Laczko of WD-41 (trumpet) together with assorted guest musicians including Sylvia Oelkrug (violin), Schroeder (drums), Jan Fitschen (bass and stick), Alex Arcuri (bass) and Konrad Wiemann (percussion). Yep, improvised jazz of nearly 70 minutes in length, broken into five ‘songs’. I was brought up listening to jazz by my dad, and have a framed album by Bunk & Lu looking down on me as I write this, but there is no doubt that improvised jazz is the hardest to ‘get’.
Over the years I have trained my ears to understand improvised jazz, as there is no doubt that it is an acquired taste even to those who listen to music as broadly as I, and I have found joy in many albums I have listened to. But try as I might, I just haven’t been able to get my head around this one at all. That they are all fine musicians is never in doubt, and that they understand what they are doing as a group is also quite clear, but I just can’t get my head around the music. It just doesn’t gel for me, and even though I have now played this numerous times it still comes across as a jumble of unrelated music that I am not interested in. But, I am convinced that this is more of a failing on my part than of that of those involved, so if you enjoy this style of jazz then please leap in. Just don’t say that you haven’t been warned - this is not for those who want to be able to follow a melody. Maybe you just had to be there..
