The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble - From The Stairwell (Denovali Records)

The infinite spiral staircase on the album cover, spiralling upwards into pitch black shadow rises out of the very core of The Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble’s newest release. Sinister and yet somehow inviting, like the music inside, it recalls the noir atmosphere of art house cinema: dark Paris streets, the smell of rotten wood, empty rooms in the dilapidated parts of the sprawl.

Native of the Jazz-mad Netherlands and originally banded to write music ‘for existing and non-existing films’, TKDE’s emphasis on ‘the mood’ as they call it is achieved by a dense layering of sound and by creepy, jarring changes (‘All Is One’ begins on a windy, rugged plane before moving into a seedy and shadowy bar where an unnerving bastardisation of lounge Jazz is being crooned.) Seamlessly blending techniques and styles plucked from many genres, it flickers from Bonobo, Jagga Jazzist, Massive Attack and the grandiose approach of A Silver Mount Zion Memorial Orchestra. Is it Post Rock? Is it futuristic Jazz? Is it IDM?

Even though these days the term has been pretty well worn thin, From The Stairwell is very much a concept album taking the listener on a surreal trip up that staircase on the cover. But the story they’ve attached to the album doesn’t necessarily define it. Records like this remind you that categories are ultimately pointless. TKDE’s music has always been perfectly happy to melt into the background and play out as a backdrop to the musings of the interpreter.

At first, ‘Godard Delusion’ calls us in with a troop of gypsy violinists over breezy and expressive drums. Then, gradually, it opens out into a watery guitar melody. ‘Giallo’ slithers along with its low saxophone while ‘Celladoor’ (yes, Donnie Darko does come to mind) builds from a drifting and dangerous atmosphere into an air of dark romance.

These four tracks I streamed from their record label’s website were enough to certify a few things: From The Stairwell retains the recognisable down-tempo tone and instrumental structure of their previous work (echoing trumpets, slow drones and brushes on cymbals) but it also sees the band pulling the mix back and refining their improvisational style for a more acoustic flavour. A stunning mixture of musicianship and late night, candle lit cool, this is music to smoke clove cigarettes and read Beat poetry to.

(© Copyright 2011 Brendan Morgan)

Erland And The Carnival – Erland And The Carnival:

I think it’s safe to say this record is exactly what comes from a bunch of middle class guys “making a folk album”, unable to keep their wrists from jangling out an Arctic Monkeys’esque riff every minute or so. Ultimately, Erland and The Carnival are no more folk than Bob Dylan is. But who cares? Not me. A single play revealed only a small portion of its charms. Later on, it changed into something very different: an anatomical splicing of NY Jazz’ swinging body to 13th Floor Elevator’s head full of acid.

If any of you get off on literary references, my advice is not to listen to this record in public to avoid embarrassment. The band salute an assortment of frightfully British Britons, such as William Blake and Vaughan Williams, and use their artistic licence to adapt the high brow material. Tricks like this generally appeal to the kind of dicks who congratulate and fondle themselves while reading poetry at a Costa and want to be seen doing it. There’s none of that here. Erland and The Carnival’s loving inclusion of the old world is seamless, effective and very unpretentious.

Without the support of Simon Tong (the busybody ex-guitarist from The Verve, now following closely in Damon Albarn’s shadow) and the superior drumming talents of David Nock, this lounge indie concoction might be easily shelved and forgotten. This is not to say that Mr. Erland Cooper, a baritone songwriter with his own tale, would be unable stand up on his own. I mean that without them, the record would be missing a huge chunk of its allure. ‘My Name Is Carnival’, with its stumbling rhythms, trippy guitar slides topped with Cooper’s lazy jazz crooning, is a personal favourite – as is the impossibly catchy ‘One Morning Fair’.

The rest of the album is on more of an even plateau and slips into the background. The atmosphere that’s left behind, of familiar Romanticism crossed with modern London, is none-the-less enticing. Erland and The Carnival is Britain’s answer to the hipster Folk of Fleet Foxes; only smarter, more daring, rougher, denser, better. Its breezy and cool headed effortlessness could only be the work of true professionals.

(© Copyright 2010 Brendan Morgan)

The Clientele - Bonfires on the Heath

Red wine, curling smoke trails, brown anoraks, orange leafed trees; these are a handful of the images that The Clientele zoetrope through your brain on their newest release. Bonfires on the Heath, their sixth outing, feels husky and weather worn, as if each track was hung over the fire for a smokey flavour. But enough about salmon, because wandering romanticism and long scarfs are back in. Whoopie! Let’s not kid ourselves now, they never went out of style in the first place.

Through Classical training and years of recording experience, The Clientele have tended and grown a level of pop songwriting and musicianship that feels good and right to envy. Their simple but effective arrangements, assimilated from just a typical selection of instruments, is further evidence of their ability. Bonfires on the Heath strolls on safely down the same path.

The record poses a dreamy, autumnal mood and evokes the season’s particular poignancy and sadness. It combines twinkling guitar lines (drunken sliding on the album title track), jazzy chordal structures and soft brass with the silky vocal harmonies of those two 60’s bums Chad and Jeremy (‘Jennifer and Julia’ being a near forgery). Their luscious ganja-pop, reminiscent of The Zombies, The Turtles, Love and The Small Faces, is offset by a funky, off beat guitar showing later influences, perhaps closer to Orange Juice.

Yes, it has it’s patchy moments and compositional sleep walking (‘I know I will see your Face’ oddly breaks into sub par flamenco during the chorus, scrabbling for some kind of variation.) Even so, after ending with two beauties: ‘Graven Wood’ and ‘Walking in the Park’, the resounding silence is a reflective one. Despite being only mild escapism, the literary equivalent of a holiday read, Bonfires on the Heath is so calm and relaxed (groovy even) that, as long it’s spinning, someone could be yelling bile directly in your face and you’d just sit there, smiling to yourself, in a dribbling coma, like a lobotomised Labrador. Has that convinced you?

(© Copyright 2009 Brendan Morgan)

The Thing - Bag It!

For about a decade, Norway has been producing some seriously innovative instrumental Jazz and if this is news to you, then sweet Jesus where have you been? A Cave?

A few bands, like Jagga Jazzist, have relied on the wizards at Ninja Tune to assist them in their Scandinavian blend of Jazz electronics. The label has also culled The Cinematic Orchestra and Bonobo from Britain. All joyfully kick sand at the rules of traditional Jazz, throwing everything and anything into the mix.

I expected The Thing to follow suit seeing as they're from Norway. I was wrong. Approaching downright preposterous, they are on a different drug altogether and live up to what their name suggests - an indescribable creature if there ever was one.

Signed to Crazy Wisdom and produced by Steve Albini, their album, Bag It!, is an assertive fusion of Jazzpunk. It combines a hardcore, alternative ethic (the blurry photos on the sleeve recall the iconic grunge shots of Mudhoney) with a rhythmless, harmonic freedom. While covering other artists - Duke Ellington and 54 Nude Honeys for example - they also drop in two tracks of their own.

All of the searing instrumental work is attributed to the band themselves. Albini's industrial/distortion expertise gives a boost where it's needed but mainly serves as a frame for their art. The drummer, Paal Nilssen-Love, breaches the abstract with psychotic vigour. Mats Gustafsson, the saxophonist, imitates a punk singer by expelling a range of flesh ripping tones, expressions, whines and squeals.

The Thing are true free Jazz, so free that they've ran from structure and order, into the jungle and gone guerrilla. For some, they will be alienating and unbearable; for others, nihilistic improvisation at its most playful. Bag It! will divide opinion and no amount of blabber from the press will describe them accurately to you. Ingenious or daft, The Thing demand your own reaction.

(© Copyright 2009 Brendan Morgan)