info2.txt
John Zorn and Bobby Previte
EUCLID'S NIGHTMARE
27 untitled tracks
Recorded at Avatar Recording Studios, New York City on March 2, 1997
Produced by Bobby Previte and John Zorn
John Zorn: alto sax
Bobby Previte: drums
1997 - Depth Of Field (USA), DOF 1-2 (CD)
Note: tracks (7) and (18) are identical; it seems that this was done intentionally.
Genre: Avant-Garde, Free Improvisation, Free Jazz
Review
This 1997 duet recording between drumming ace Bobby Previte and
saxophonist John Zorn is indicative -- pretty much -- of what Zorn's
music was like at the time: There are plenty of hard bop linguistics
mixed in with film noir themes and screeching, burning skronk. There
are also short, lucid moments of melodic tranquility that prefigure
much of Zorn's work from 1999 on. But mostly, this series of duets
reveals something else, that two players from similar backgrounds,
who have played in the same bands together and can understand
each other on an almost symbiotic level, can still approach the same
musical problem from two different sides and come up with the same
answer. Nowhere is this clearer than on sections ten through 14 (there
are 27 sections in all), which total about seven of the CD's 41 minutes.
Here, Previte hears Zorn insistently and responds with short, crisp rim
shots, rolling tom-toms, and scattershot cymbal runs that tend to
stretch out the time, turn it loose from its constraints inside the work,
and move forward into whatever frame Zorn chooses next. For his part,
Zorn hears the thrumming of the cymbals and decides to speed up the
piece in order to match Previte's double time. They both arrive in the
pocket at the same time and kick the energy into an overdriven state
of chaotic -- yet jubilant -- free improv, where there are no ties to
gravity at all until Previte introduces a tom-tom and Zorn responds
with a gorgeous angular legato. This is only one of dozens of surprises
on Euclid's Nightmare. Zorn fans will be familiar with the level of
histrionics employed here, while followers of Previte's more refined
work may be put off by the constant atonality of the work.
-Thom Jurek, All Music Guide
|
|