Max Eastley/Terry Day/John Butcher
Angles of Enquiry
(Confront Recordings)
★★★★

MAX EASTLEY is a 79-year-old Devonian who plays the rare electro-acoustic monochord, a 10-foot-long wooden, single-stringed instrument played with fingers, bow or glass rods.

In a trio with percussionist Terry Day and saxophonist John Butcher, all through their album Angles of Enquiry his string whines, bounces, delves, clucks and menaces with low, bowed groans, harmonising with bird calls as his confreres combine with him, creating a soundscape of permanent surprise.

Eastley researches ”Aeolian Phenomena,” and it is a strange god of improvising winds that blows through the heart of this record, with a restless spirit of musical unity testifying in every assertive phrase.

Here are three troubadours of innovation dedicated to a co-operative artistry, always soundmaking on the cusp of creation. As a listener you marvel at their explorations as each note signals the contours of a new world of ears and imagination.

Trevor Tomkins’ Sextant
For Future Reference
(jazzinbritain records)
★★★★

THIS double CD set, made from recordings of 1980 and 1983 and never previously released, is a compelling memoriam to the brilliant but modest south London drummer and Guildhall School of Music teacher, Trevor Tomkins.

Featuring other underexposed dynamic British musicians like guitarist Phil Lee (hear him on the track GRS), saxophonist Jimmy Hastings, trombonist Chris Pyne, bassist Paul Bridge and pianist John Horler, the record seethes with life and true musicianship.

On Celeste, Hastings and Lee play with an uplifting lyricism and throughout Tomkins never overplays, finding empathetic rhythmic undertows for each bandmate and is a thoroughly listening drummer.

There are six tunes by the ever-creative Lee and three by Horler. But the sextet also gives stirring versions of Cedar Walton’s Ugetsu and Kenny Wheeler’s Smatter where Tomkins’s drive and rare solo artistry is full of fire and energy. Such verve and immediacy throughout: as if it were made yesterday!

Caroline Kraabel and Pat Thomas
whats wrong
(crossmatch records)
★★★★★

THIS is an album of two loving sleeves: one of cardboard, one of patterned cloth. Inside them is a musical story by two revolutionary musicians from two continents: US-born saxophonist Caroline Kraabel and British pianist of Antiguan roots, Pat Thomas.

To describe their album as audacious is sheer understatement. Powerful sounds from the innards of percussive piano and multi-voiced horn peal out from its grooves as if both musicians are in a birthing room of sound, which is in fact Dalston’s Vortex, where it was recorded.

whats wrong takes very careful, internalised listening. Its sounds speak critically of our world and its crimes and suffering, while showing in its compelling artistry the creativity and freedom urge needed to heal them. Not easy, but nonetheless beautiful, it cries out for hearing.

It is an album for all senses and seasons, and a vital prod for imagination and consciousness too.