Loja

This was the period when the art world was fixated on graffiti artists such as Jean-Michel Basquiat, Kenny Scharf, Keith Haring etc. But street graffiti was everywhere back then and much was written about the quality, form and the act of “tagging”. To me, graffiti contained a similar spirit of subversive messaging to that of the music I was making with Lowell and elsewhere.

In the spring of 2012, during a tour of Europe, Plimley, Guy and Niggli recorded this album at a studio session in the "Loft" in Cologne, Germany. Barry Guy and Lucas Niggli had worked together a lot in the past few years. Pianist Paul Plimley, a Canadian with Irish roots, had made himself a name as one of the founders of the New Orchestra Workshop (NOW).

There is a visceral energy that drives the music on Daylight and all of this has to do with the wonderful musicality of saxophonist John Butcher and drummer Mark Sanders.

Scandinavian quintet Atomic hurl together Ornette Coleman's free-jazz legacy, Carla Bley's ironic solemnities, Latin, postbop, circus-band cavortings and much more. Pianist Håvard Wiik and saxophonist Fredrik Ljungkvist share the composing here.

In some previous reviews I questioned the compositional complexity that saxophonist Steve Lehman put into his music, because in my opinion it created a kind of barrier to bring across real emotional rapport with the listener, who may be in awe for the skills and intellectual effort, yet is a little bit too baffled to still be part of it.

One thing you can always count on with any recording from The Resonance Ensemble, is a full meal. All of the food groups are represented as well as a few snacks that may not necessarily be all that good for you but are so tasty you can't help but smile and enjoy the sugar rush.