In Through the Outram

I've been feeling a bit rough this week but made the effort to catch Dylan Howe's Unity4 down at The Cinnamon Club in leafy Bowdon. The band is essentially a homage to the classic Unity album by Larry Young, one I have to confess I wasn't previously familiar with. I was keen to make it as the quartet features Mike Outram on guitar. He's another one of our local boys made good, now being firmly ensconced as a premier fixture on the London jazz scene and is currently also a Professor of Guitar at Trinity College of Music - not bad eh?

It was a great outfit and there was some pretty impressive playing. Some of the tune heads were very complex and seemed incredibly hard to play but the players brushed them off with apparent ease. Some great improvising all round from Tony Kofi on sax, Dylan Howe on drums and Ross Stanley on Hammond. I like Mike's sound and feel, and he can nail a tasty fast run or two. I have a bit of a love hate one with the Hammond but Ross Stanley's swirling thick chords didn't overwhelm the sound. The Hammond is a key feature of the Unity CD and essential part of this group so I can't really complain. A good way to spend an evening down in Bowdon.

Small Objects Moving Very Quickly

So the hot weather has finally returned to this fine city of ours. I spent much of yesterday in the garden working on improvising through 'Autumn in New York'. I rather rashly suggested doing this song for a couple of duo gigs I've got coming up at the Southport Jazz Festival with Hannah Peel at the end of May. The song sounds simple enough on a surface listening but is actually quite complex in places, rapidly shifting between major, harmonic minor and melodic minor keys with a healthy dose of altered 7th chords and a whole bunch of other things going on as well.

The weather and the need to practice (and the thought of an early evening beer in the garden) all made me partially regret having got a ticket to see Bill Bruford and Michiel Borstlap at the RNCM last night. I did however make the effort and it was really worth it. Just before the Bruford gig was an RNCM student showcase of Terry Riley's minimalist masterpiece 'In C'. They started a little tentavively but soon got going and gave a great rendition of the piece which was suitably hypnotic and a good aperitif for the main course.


The Bruford/Borstlap duo immediately hit the spot for me with a great percussive intro instantly characteristic of the Bruford approach and sound, Borstlap drumming along with his fingers on the piano lid. The set was more or less entirely improvised with Borstlap wandering liberally between classic swing jazz sequences, Monkesque jagged blues riffs, Herbie style suspended chord grooves, contemplative nordic introverted sections and a whole lot more. There's just something about Bruford so that is so captivating. He sits more or less bolt upright and the playing is extremely precise but at the same time flows and grooves gorgeously in a way that's quite addictive to listen to. He can get very busy when he wants to but for me he's most engaging when he gets a strong pulse going and throws in his sneaky sporadic sideways jabs and cuts that make the whole thing so exciting. Bruford introduced quite a few of the tracks at length and he does come across just a tad public school pompous but he's interesting none the less so I think he can be forgiven for this.

Overall a really exciting and excellent concert. My only criticism really was that the pianist could have held back a little a times to allow the full Bruford effect to come across but it's a minor point. I hope I get a chance to see these two again and would recommend missing a few hours of rare UK sunshine to see them any day.

The Boy With The Thorne By His Side

I played a Freedom Principle gig down at the Revise Bar in Chorlton last Saturday with Sam Andreae on sax, Fin Panter on drums and late substitute Jon Thorne (Lamb) on double bass - we don't really have a name as yet. It was intended to be a loose low key improv thing with Sam providing us with a few recorded grooves and we just do as we see fit, so we hadn't really rehearsed. We figured as Jon had come in at the last moment however that we better do a few standards so we threw a few in for the first set.

It was a really cool gig and went down really well, even if I do say so myself. The first set was more standards based and had it's moments but I think we really hit the spot in the second set when we went for the groove improv thing big time. There was plenty of intense Miles style Bitches Brew digging in over some jazzy funky grooves from Fin. A take on Bonobo's 'Between the Lines' and a version of the Mr Scruff / Moondog 'Get a Move On' went down particularly well. A somewhat scruffy encore slant on a White Stripes track rounded the set off nicely.

Everyone in the band seems keen so we're intending to take it forward and get some more gigs. Jon promises to bring some effects pedals for the next one so that should be interesting. Thanks to Joe Jones from the Moss Freed Sextet for being especially positive and everyone else who made it down for this first outing. Join the Freedom Principle Facebook group if you want to hear about any future gigs.

A bit of rough and ready video from the gig:

Mike Walker Interview on ALL FM

A world exclusive tonight on mine and Sam Andreae's EXR Jazz Unsigned radio show on ALL FM. We've got guitarist Mike Walker coming in with sax player Iain Dixon. Mike's new and first CD, 'Madhouse and the Whole Thing There' is at last finally completed and will be available soon from Jazz CDs. We'll be interviewing Mike and Iain about the new CD and playing some tracks. This will be the first time any of the material from the CD will have been aired so we're really excited to have this exclusive. Mike is not one short for words and there's quite a story behind the CD so we should be in for an entertaining show.


We'll also be playing tracks from a couple of new Manchester jazz ska bands, Skamel and Baked A La Ska . Like buses these new jazz ska bands. There'll also be the usual listings for the next couple of months and a few previews from the last two.

Listen online or tune in if you can. The show runs from 11pm to 1am tonight.

Happy-Go-Mike-Leigh

I've been in film mode for the last couple of days. Yesterday I went to the Cornerhouse to check out the new Mike Leigh film, 'Happy-Go-Lucky' which was introduced by the director himself and followed by a Q&A with Mike and one of the actresses, Kate O'Flynn who played Suzy in the film.


I'm pleased to report that it's a great fun film with a lot of laughs without being flippant and overly light. It tells the story of Poppy, a thirty year old primary school teacher renting a flat in Finsbury Park who goes about being happy, positive and generally getting on with life. A quite intentional aspect of the film is that she at first appears quite surface to the point of being annoying but you soon realise that she has great wit and intelligence and has a very positive influence on her friends and the world around her. Actress Sally Hawkins who plays Poppy gives a great performance full of charm and humour whilst delivering the more serious scenes with the perfect balance. The film was also a fab little nostalgia trip for me as it was set very near where I used to live in north Camden.

It was interesting to follow with a question and answer session that illuminated on some of the themes of the film. Mike confirmed that he wanted to show a more positive outlook than portrayed in many of his previous films but without ignoring the fact that Poppy is living in the same tough world, the difference being that she deals with life's difficulties in her own way. He also talked about his method of film making using improvisation around ideas and themes, in this case for six months before doing any filming. One questioner suggested that the film is quite feminist potraying women as succeeding in coping with life and the men the one's struggling, a view that Mike agreed with. He also talked about the somewhat ironic fact that he's seen by many as the London film maker despite being from Salford. He said that he'd like to make more films in the north but that it's too expensive up here and actually cheaper in London. This does seem very surprising but he didn't explain why this is the case. It would be a great shame for film making in Manchester if this is generally true. All in all it was a great evening and I'm really glad I went along.

The film theme unexpectedly continued into today. I've just got back from having lunch with my other half and a good mate Helle at the Continental Cafe in West Didsbury where lo and behold, legendary director Ken Loach was there having lunch as well. There were rumours he would be at the Q&A last night as he's in Manchester making a film at the moment. I'm not sure what the film is about or where this is happening. Somewhere near West Didsbury perhaps? Maybe some film buff could let me know.

A Tale of Two Cities

I'm on a brief trip to New York staying with an old friend Frank (François) in the Lower East Side. Frank has been living here for quite a few years now and we've had a few conversations about the rapid gentrification and dramatic change of his neighborhood. The New York Time Out guide suggests the locale is now being referred to as 'BelDel' (short for below Delancey St), much to Frank's horror. It seems like a similar story to the development of our Northern Quarter with bars and cafes replacing the shop fitting stores and clothing wholesalers, and the moniker of 'BelDel' being somewhat like our various new 'quarter' names. There's an implicit assumption that this is a bad thing driving rents up and forcing the artists out but I'm not sure this logic applies to Manchester. Having said that, everyone I meet in New York seems to be a film maker, model or musician so it doesn't seem too bad. Frank is a film editor on a reasonable income but still needs the assistance of a protected rent scheme to afford to stay, a legacy of the fact that he's been here since the area's pre-hip days. In Manchester's case maybe there's more positives than for the Lower East Side and I welcome at least some cafe culture appearing.

That aside I'm having a great time hanging out here, writing this post in one such hipster cafe, Brown on Hester St (pic above). Great coffee and baked eggs. I also checked out guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel at the Village Vanguard and spent a night in the Chelsea Hotel which was quite an experience. Some strange folk and great artwork but I still sensed an element of dated artificiality to it's rather forced bohemia.

No Static at All

I'm far too late getting the word out that I'm co-presenting a radio show with Sam Andreae from the RNCM starting tomorrow Monday 25th February on south Manchester's ALL FM 96.9. It's a late one running from 11pm to 1am so I'm not sure how many people will be listening but it should be good fun. It's part of a series of EXR Unsigned shows on ALL FM covering all styles of music. The shows will hopefully be available from the website as a 'listen again' but there's one or two things to sort out before this can happen I believe. Initially it's only going to be every other month so we'll see how it goes.

We'll mainly be playing tracks by unsigned local artists and we'll be getting in some of our local jazz talent for interviews and live sessions. On the first show we'll be interviewing sax player Andy Schofield and pianist Les Chisnall about their fab new CD 'Another Place' just out on the Cinnamon Club's new record label. We'll also be interviewing Anton Hunter about his free improvisation night at Fuel Cafe in Withington, The Noise Upstairs (reviewed below).

So give us a shout if you're doing the jazz thing and have tracks you'd like us to play and/or gigs to mention in our listings section. My EXR email address is ades@exr.org.uk.

Cor Baby That's Really Free

Having promised I would many times, I finally made it down to Anton's free improvisation soirée at Fuel Cafe in Withington last night, The Noise Upstairs - "An evening of uncomposed sounds... combining our backgrounds of jazz, contemporary classical and electro-acoustic music". Good fun it was too with the democratic principle of drawing three names out of a hat to form each improv trio being adhered to.

It was interesting to hear the different 'free' styles. The first trio consisting of a drummer and two saxes was clearly reminscent of classic 1960's free jazz, reminding me a little of the Art Ensemble of Chicago. It was especially effective when the two sax players came together for a long unison note and then drifted microtonally apart giving a bitter tasting atonal whining clash.

The second trio was a cello, violin and a mic'd muted trumpet through a series of multifarious effects units. I'm not at all familiar with classical free improv (any good suggestions?) but this trio again reminded me of stuff I've heard and seen in TV documentaries on people like Stockhausen. Anton joined in for the final ensemble of the evening on mandolin (ok it was a quartet to give everyone a bash). With the addition of violin, french horn (I think!) and electric guitar, much staccato stabs and scratching of bows on the back of violins made for a wholesome aural brew.


I joined in myself (see pic above) for one trio session and had scratch about on a few guitar strings running through buckets of delay and wah wah to create a back wash for my trombone and violin ensemble partners. This went into a heavily delayed Terry Riley'ish arpeggio thing that seemed to go down well with a few folk. Nice evening and highly recommended.

We Wuz Robsoned

Tedious, academic, disconnected and flat would have been the sum total of my review of the Phil Robson Quartet with legend Dave Liebman at the RNCM on Thursday the 31st of January 2008. So bad was it that I was planning my escape from my mid row seat, as I doubted I could take much more than about 10 minutes.


However I stuck it out, and the fourth slightly bluesy track was executed with a smidgeon of desperately needed feeling, albeit still barely registering on the Richter scale. The tracks largely consisted of harmonically complex but structurally basic repetitive forms. Liebman's playing felt unconvincing and uncommitted. The obligatory fast runs, outside lines, squeals and grunts were all dutifully in attendance but were delivered with such disconnectedness they registered no impact other than irritation. Some respite came from a pipe solo introduction to a version of Coltane’s ‘India’, this being the best part of the set by miles along with a decent bass solo from Aiden O'Donnell. Once the band joined in after the intro however, the energy once again died. Jeff William’s drumming was overly busy and lacked any sense of dynamic intensity. Phil Robson’s terse and unenthusiastic introductions were at least consistent with the music.

You're Never Gonna Do It Without Your Fez On

Word had clearly got around that this visit to Matt and Phreds on Wednesday 30th January 2008 by Bristol based quirksters 'The Blessing' was worth checking out. Being favoured by luminaries including Portishead and Robert Plant no doubt assured a degree of interest from outside the usual jazz rank and file. I caught The Blessing down in Bath a few weeks ago and was very impressed but uncertain whether they could whip up a similar storm on an away match. My fears were unfounded as they put on another great, if ever so slightly less intense show. The general vibe and a few specific motifs referenced the Polar Bear sound but there's a distinctly grittier funkier groove than the Londoners go for. The drummer Clive Deamer's drive and feel was quite delicious, pushing the whole thing along with an uplifting and smiley vibrancy.


The Blessing have no overtly chordal instrument in the line-up. This gives the sound a sense of openness and provides plenty of harmonic freedom for the mash and interplay of the lines from sax player Jake McMurchie and trumpeter Pete Judge. I loved the shamelessly bright and aggressive tone of bassist Jim Barr. It's refreshing to hear such unabashed plectrum riffing in the context of a jazz set. Much of the material had Caravanesque 'fez' minor movements reminiscent of Parker's 'Night in Tunisia' and tunes of that ilk. One or two rockabilly shuffles sneaked in occasionally and there was some prodigious use of noise terror delay effects to keep the tonalities suitably off balance. Pizza referencing track titles delivered with suitably laconic dryness from Mr Barr completed the left field nudge of this cool little combo.