(Arve Henriksen – trumpet, vocals, electronics; Benoît Delbecq – piano, bass station; Lars Juul – drums, electronics; Steve Argüelles – Usine, delays, Sherman Filter)
Another maverick trumpeter, Jon Hassell, made music something like this almost a decade ago with his brilliant Water Lily Acoustics SACD release, Fascinoma, featuring the piano of Jacky Terrasson, the bamboo flute of Ronu Majumdar, and the guitar of Ry Cooder. An additional release, headlined by Majumdar and called Hollow Bamboo, recorded at the same time and featuring Hassell and Cooder, evokes a similar sensibility.
Ten years down the road, the music on Below the Surface incorporates a lot more influences (electronica, post-rock, New Music, and avant jazz) and sounds (midi-instruments such as the Usine and Sherman Filter), but the essential vibe remains identifiable: breathy, shakuhachi flute-inspired trumpet from Arve Henriksen, spacey piano by Benoît Delbecq, sprung percussion from Lars Juul, and live sonic manipulation from aural mastermind Steve Argüelles, the genius behind Omar Sosa’s magical sound. Those who were and continue to be fascinated by Fascinoma and Hollow Bamboo should flock to this session.
But they don’t seem to be.
Why not? Probably they don’t know it exists. Unless they’re super-tuned into the obscure European avant-jazz scene or very familiar with the Canadian new jazz SACD label Songlines, they’ve probably never heard of these people or this disc. And that’s a shame, because this music—though edgy, atmospheric, slowly developing, and totally unswinging—nevertheless is entirely approachable, enchanting, and even mesmerizing. It’s as if a 21st-century Brian Eno met ECM—but with much more spine and bursting with ideas: Eno for ambience; ECM for stunning sound, lots of space (especially in the hi-res surround sound option), and their famous down-tempo jazz approach.
Certainly not for everyone, but anyone at all inclined to world/ambient/electronic/post-rock jazz should not miss this wonderful music. (It’s a hybrid SACD/CD if you lack the hi-res playback capability.)
TrackList: Beneath the Undercurrent, A Rumoured Version of Ourselves, Two Fold, Bob Whites, Time Makes the Tune, A Triple of Keys, Polylectic, Noded Disnoded, Luz
– Jan P. Dennis
