Borbetomagus - Trente Belles Années [Agaric Records - 2012]“Trente Belles Années” offers up a live set from 2009 of these legendary American noise/jazz masters. This cd presents the listener with just over forty six minutes worth of gloriously searing yet rewarding noise/ jazz craft. The disc features a recording taken in Montreuil France at the legendary experimental venue Instants Chavirés in December 2009. And offered up here is a single track that comes in at the 46.16 mark. The tracks recording is loud yet clear, and you make out every detail of this three pieces twisting, searing & roasting attack. This recording features the following line-up: Jim Sauter on Tenor Sax, Dom Dietrich on Tenor Sax, and Donald Miller on guitar. The set starts up with a dense weave of revved up ‘n’ manic blues tinged guitar runs & scorching/complex double tenor sax attack. As the track goes on you first make out one elements trail & then another’s as they snake in & out of the searing & dense mass of the track. As you’d expect with such seasoned pros the tracks thick ’n’ noisy momentum never really lets up as they attack ones sonic sensors with white-hot vigour. Also through-out the set the three manage to keep throwing in new details and twists into the maelstrom of sound- this is far from just meaning-less noise there is a hell of a lot of sonic detail & skill at play here. It would be pointless to try & detail every twist & turn here, as the three piece certainly do keep the whole thing very fluid & fresh though-out. I guess structure wise the first half or so of the track is quite detailed yet manic with the blues & R’n’R tinged noise guitar backing & the flaming double Sax attack. Around the mid-way point the guitar becomes more of a buzzing & intense drone presence, with Saunter & Dietrich weaving fiery & seared solo patterns around it’s axis. But in it’s last ten or so minute minutes we go back to the loser ‘n’ squealing guitar runs that maniacal scuttle & race against the double tenor sax inferno, through there are a few dips back into guitar drone brutal simmer & wails too. It’s two or so years since we’ve heard anything from Borbetomagus release wise so it’s great to have “Trente Belles Années", and it really is as searing & rewarding as anything else they've put out over their long career. So if you enjoy the place where noise & jazz meet this is a must have item!. Roger Batty
|