Thomas Lehn & Paul Lovens - Achtung

Thomas Lehn: analogue synthesizer
Paul Lovens: selected & unselected drums and cymbals, singing saw

This special duo constellation rests in this freedom of cliches. Although the music is occasionally incredibly dense and present, it can hardly be fixed. Is it energy powerplay? Finely linked sound research? Post Free Jazz? English School? Is that a kind of duet for percussion instruments? Or electro-acoustic music par excellence? Is it what one expects? Or something completely different?
Lehn and Lovens know, in any case, how to surprise us-in the logical sense of the word! Because, when someone suddenly calls out "Achtung!" [Look out!] that doesn't mean by a long shot that we are prepared for what will come.

2000 ACHTUNG (GROB) mediafire/rapidshare

Alexander von Schlippenbach Trio - Physics

Evan Parker: tenor & soprano saxophones
Alexander von Schlippenbach: piano
Paul Lovens: selected drums & cymbals

Review

by Eugene Chadbourne

Physics? This is more like a plate of steaming clams, or better yet a big pot of hot fish soup. It is 74 minutes of thick, steaming music played by the group that never dies, served up in two lengthy courses. This was recorded early into their second decade of existence. By then the trio had clearly proved the inaccuracy of certain notions that fixed groups do not work in the free improvised genre. Then again, the Schlippenbach trio has a clear connection with the jazz tradition, something that some of the other groups from the European free improvisation scene don't. One can sense a link between the final period of Coltrane, for example, and the playing of Evan Parker, Alexander Schlippenbach, and Paul Lovens, although eliminated is the need for grandiose theme statements to kick the jams into gear. Since modern jazz in the early '90s had been largely running away frightened from the late Coltrane model and retreating into more conservative, commercial realms, one could say this is the trio that is physically carrying the history of jazz forward. Whatever they are doing, it's top notch.(from AMG)

1991 PHYSICS

Alexander von Schlippenbach Trio - Pakistani Pomade

Alexander von Schlippenbach: piano
Evan Parker: soprano & tenor saxophones
Paul Lovens: drums

British saxophonist John Butcher recently asked me why his music is considered jazz. Sure, it's based on improvisation. Is that enough of a qualification? There are some connections with the American avant-garde from the '60s, including atonal experiments by Cecil Taylor and expansions of the saxophone's sound by Coltrane and Ayler. But in the end, as much as we all like categories, Butcher's music does not fall into any neat bin. "European free improv" is about as close as you can get, and even that is a murky moniker at best.

The genesis of this so-called school has its roots in '70s experiments in England (and specifically London) by rotating collectives. The Continental variety drew from the tricky dadaism of the Dutch school and the more seriously expressionistic variety from Germany. (The French, for the most part, were too busy eating Brie.)

In the case of 1972's Pakistani Pomade, originally released on the FMP label, the group includes pianist Alexander Von Schlippenbach, saxophonist Evan Parker, and drummer Paul Lovens. (German, English, and German, respectively. They still perform today.) The group carries a stalwart emphasis on color, texture, and density—of both the timbral and harmonic kind.

That manifests itself through the wide-ranging play of Parker, who in this case stays toward the brighter end of the spectrum, ranging from light thrusting whispers to squeaking, squawking cries. Lytton has his rare moments of linear timekeeping and outright melodicism, but for the most part he emphasizes rise and fall, twist and turn, crest and boundary.

Schlippenbach, for his part, takes a particularly oblique approach to harmony, with dense clusters and irregular intervals tending to crowd out the more open and resonant moments. As both a player and a composer, he adopts an architectural approach to sound. Three improvisers, playing as intensely and interactively as they possibly can, are barely enough to assemble the craggy structures that emerge here. So in some sense Pakistani Pomade is both a reflection of open possibilities and concerted effort.

Atavistic's Unheard Music Series has brought this recording back to print in an edition with four additional tracks (the 11 minute plus "Pakistani alternate #1" being a particularly dramatic example), original art, and newly unearthed photos of the group. (Man, what hair. What sweat. What serious concentration.) Nearly 20 years later the trio would record the similarly crisp Elf Bagatellen, another essential FMP classic.

European improv never sounded better.(from ALLABOUTJAZZ)

1972 PAKISTANI POMADE

Günter Christmann, Mats Gustafsson, Paul Lovens - Tr!o

Günter Christmann: cello, trombone
Mats Gustafsson: soprano & baritone saxophones, fluteophone
Paul Lovens: percussion

In 1994 cellist and trombonist Günter Christmann, drummer Paul Lovens and saxophonist Mats Gustafsson performed together for the first time as a trio. Now, in 2010, their performance is released on CD.

Musically, it shows that what was avant-garde then still is avant-garde today, sixteen years later, and very much so. The music also demonstrates that even within avant-garde, this trio was thinking quite ahead. What you hear is an incredibly intense interaction between three masters, barely using their instruments other than to produce sounds - not phrases, not melodies, just timbral explorations of coloring, restrained power, blocked flux, sudden release, shades, changes in intensity, and all this against a broad canvas of silence.

Critics who claim that all modern and avant-garde jazz is just noise will find both denial and confirmation here.
It is not noise in the traditional sense : the volume is kept down, allowing for even the most subtle of movements to be picked up by the mikes. No other music, not even classical chamber music, allows for such nuance of sound perception.
Yet it is noise in its most traditional sense, in its most primitive and basic meaning : what you hear are scraping, screeching,clattering, gurgling, hammering, hissing, shouting, rumbling, ticking, weeping, thundering, chattering, ... all coming out of instruments, not in a structure, but raw and in immediate reaction or as propulsion for other sounds.

Ten years ago, I would have run away from this as fast as I could, arms in the air screaming bloody horror.

Today, and don't ask me why, I can listen to this intently, as I have done several times back-to-back and in bits and pieces, enjoying the incredible power contained, almost locked-up, in this music, full of tension despite its minimalism, with sometimes no sound, then all three simultaneously letting out a shout from their instrument, as if read from some sheet music. The greatest quality of the music is the total effect, including what is not being played, not only in the silence, but in what is being suppressed. That is by itself a rare achievement. (from FREEJAZZ)

2010 TR!O

Alexander von Schlippenbach Trio - Bauhaus Dessau

Alexander von Schlippenbach: piano
Evan Parker: tenor saxophone
Paul Lovens: drums

There are times when you (me) curse musicians like Evan Parker for being so damn hermetic in their playing, or like Von Schlippenbach for being far too abstract or too concrete yet hard to pigeonhole, or someone like Paul Lovens for seeming to be unconcerned about rhythm despite being a drummer, or all of them being so totally out there in their own solipsistic adventurous journey that they completely forgot they still need someone (you, me) to listen to their music and enjoy it.

Then there are times when these three icons of European avant-garde music play together and the result is magic. This is such a moment. Yes, it is abstract, it is hermetic at times, it is an adventurous journey, but one that is strangely accessible, with an openness and a kind of creamy texture (am I influenced by the cover art here? but no the music is creamy too) that is pleasing throughout.

The biggest strength of the album is its forward-moving dynamics, as opposed to the in-the-moment creation of sounds of so much free improv, that take you along, like a boat on a musical river, you're part of it, rather than watching it from the shore how things arrive and disappear, no, here you're floating along, which gives you the great pleasure of being able to follow the flux, evolve with its developments, whether through thundering rapids or ballad-like slower movements.

The biggest strength of the album is its warmth, its gentle and welcoming sound, despite its abstract nature, with Evans' tenor being quite expressive in his short staccato bursts full of multiphonic inflections and subtle nuance, or maddening hypnotic in his long circular breathing bouts, all accentuated by Lovens' storytelling on percussion, unusual, elegant and or disorienting, and Von Schlippenbach is the power that holds it all together, gives context, backbone and direction, although all three are quite volatile concepts in an environment like this one.

The biggest strength of the album is its fantastic interplay by three musicians who've seen it all, done it all, without any need to confirm themselves other than the ambition to exceed the quality of their art: to make it more eloquent, more expressive, offering new vistas into music, sound, texture, timbre ...

And now that we're at it : the biggest strength of this live album, is the enthusiastic audience that gives the three musicians the level of applause they rightly deserve.

This is music made for listeners. (from FREEJAZZ)

2010 BAUHAUS DESSAU