FRA DET ONDE - feat. the Legendary Emil Nikolaisen

Shortly after (or in my case purchased together with) the Martin Rude & Jakob Skøtt Duo's wild melange of jazz, kraut rock, folk and electro on "The Discipline Of Assent" El Paraiso Records follows up with another session recording, which is absolutely on fire.

It's a rather short affair spinning on 45 rpm, but fuck yeah, what a jam...

FRA DET ONDE - feat. the Legendary Emil Nikolaisen (LP) (2020)

At first it seems almost unbelievable that aforementioned fire was lit surrounded by a truly Norwegian outer temperature of minus sixteen degrees Celsius.
On the other hand thinking about it a little bit longer, the need to shake off the bone-chilling cold could be a critical explanation for the relentless drive of this recording.

But don't let yourself be fooled by the powerful rawness of the drums and the thickly snarling Rickenbacker bass sound into believing that this EP has a rock music ratio even remotely comparable to the Rude / Skøtt release!

No, at it's core ninety percent of this is pure jazz! Or electric free jazz, if you want to be more specific.

And the trio of Olaf Olsen (drums), Rune Nergaard (bass) and trumpeter Erik Kimestad Pedersen plays it hard and fast and passionate, but without stepping over into hard rock territory, even though the musical backgrounds to pull that off are there. Fra Det Onde however stay very much true to the spirit of the later, "harder accessible" works of the John Coltrane Quartet and its music-historical spawn.

The production is extremely hands-on in openly affecting the music through excentric mixing choices and tickling the equipment to resound and moan. It's hard to grasp what exactly is happening here, but it is of such important that producer Emil Nikolaisen's name is in the freaking title of the EP.

The overall result at the same time exudes a traditional familiarity and an adventurous modern excitement. I can easily see myself spinning this gem back to back with the likes of Miles' "Dark Magus" oder Trane's "Meditations" without being let down in the slightest.

Or in other words: This free jazz fusion blizzard is a complete ripper!