Sunday, May 25, 2014

Fusion CD of the Month - "Machine Mass: INTI"

Fusion CD of the Month
Machine Mass: "INTI" (MoonJune) 2014

Rating: **** (musical performance & sound quality)

Produced by Machine Mass
Recorded @ Red Rock Recording Studios (Saylorsburg, PA, USA), on October 10, 2012
Recording engineer: Kent Heckman
Mixed and mastered by Jon Wilkinson
Executive Producer: Leonardo Pavkovic
Liner notes: John Kelman
Design, Graphics & Photos: Elisabeth Waltregny

Featuring: Michel Delville (electric guitar, Roland GR09, electronics), Tony Bianco (drums, loops, percussion), Dave Liebman (soprano & tenor saxophones, wooden flute) with Sara Twelde (vocals on Track 7, "The Secret Place")

Highlights: an intriguing and extremely creative rendition of Joe Zawinul's "In A Silent Way" (yes, the now "classic" tune that the late Austrian genius composed for Miles Davis, with Liebman playing wooden flutes blended with Delville's sitar), Bianco's tribute to "(Charles)Lloyd", "The Secret Place," "Elisabeth" and the title track "INTI." 

Much more than just a meeting of modern progressive jazz heavyweights, Machine Mass's "INTI" witnesses the seamless cohesion of extraordinary creativity fusing with technology. Reformed with renowned modern jazz legend, Dave Liebman, Machine Mass (formerly known as Machine Mass Trio) utilizes rhythmically-complex loops "on the fly," while fusing their spontaneous interactions into a group dynamic that challenges music-making convention in the broadest sense.... and the results are spellbinding.

Recorded live in the studio with no overdubs (in just one afternoon, no less!), this monumental session bears witness to three seasoned musicians in top form -- producing music that is fresh, challenging, profound and moving. Rules are acknowledged and rules are discarded, and the resulting sonic bouillabaisse, Inti, signals some truly exciting new directions for progressive music!
*********
Machine Mass' leader, Michel Delville was born in Liege, Belgium. He has been performing and composing alternative music since the mid-1980s. His most recent projects include the internationally acclaimed Nu-Rock-Jazz quintet The Wrong Object (founded in 2003), a band which has collaborated with luminaries of British jazz such as Elton Dean, Harry Beckett and Annie Whitehead, and toured extensively throughout Europe. Their latest studio album, Stories from the Shed, has generated countless raving reviews in such leading publications as Jazzwise, Guitar Player, Musica Jazz and All About Jazz. In 2010, he created the trio douBt with Alex Maguire and Tony Bianco. Other recent bands and projects include Belgian-Swiss punk-jazz combo TZGIV, Belgo-Dutch rock quintet The Moving Tones, Alex Maguire Sextet, and Comicoperando (tribute project to the great Robert Wyatt; feat. Chris Cutler, Dagmar Krause and Karen Mantler).

Anthony 'Tony' Bianco was born in New York City. He has played and recorded with some of the most influential musicians of the international jazz scene, such as Dave Liebman, Evan Parker, Paul Dunmall, Elton Dean, Alex von Schlippenbach, Simon Picard, Reggie Workman, Paul Rutherford, Keith Tippett, Paul Rogers, Elliot Levine, Marcio Mattos, Luther Thomas, Jay Oliver and John Edwards. The sheer diversity of his discography reflects his need to be “loose and tense, free and strict” combine the sounds of straight and free jazz, closed and open form. His most recent releases include douBt's debut album Never Pet a Burning Dog (with Alex Maguire and Michel Delville), "Vesuvius" (Alex von Schlippenbach/Paul Dunmall/Paul Rogers/Tony Bianco), "Line Ish" (Tony Bianco/Dave Liebman/Tony Marino) and "In a Western Sense," as well as the more groovy and post-Milesian experiments of "Free Beat" (with the late Elton Dean, and John Wilkinson) and "Monkey Dance" (feat. Dave Liebman).
 
Dave Liebman is a living jazz legend whose list of album appearances is a "who's who" list of the greatest modern jazz luminaries over the last five-plus decades. In a storied career which started back in 1967 (with his "Open Sky" trio, starting a long-standing musical affiliation with the great jazz drummer, Bob Moses), Dave has appeared as a band member or featured sideman with Miles Davis, John Abercrombie, Jack DeJohnette, Pat Metheny, Eddie Gomez, Wayne Shorter, Ritchie Beirach, the Quest quartet and many more. Dave has traveled the world, many times, as an ambassador of jazz, both as a performer and an instructor. He has received numerous awards, has been inducted into the Hall of Fame of the International Association of Jazz Educators and was twice nominated for Grammys. His list of accomplishments is staggering (far too extensive to list here!) ... to view a more comprehensive biography of the incredible body of work amassed by Dave Liebman, CLICK HERE.

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