Some stuff is just super awesome, but I don't really have any good idea what the heck to write about it. In this spirit let's just quickly put a checkmark behind this super awesome double LP, be done with it and just enjoy the freaking music!
IVAN THE TOLERABLE TRIO - Infinite Peace (eco colour vinyl 2LP) (2024)
I know that it's a laughable amount of his busy body of work, but so far I own four albums by multi-instrumentalist Oli Heffernan aka Ivan The Tolerable: "Black Water/Brown Earth", "Ritual In Transfigured Time", "Toft House Session" by the Ivan The Tolerable Quartet and (bought together with the that one) this latest record of the Trio. But even though those are all great - as far as I'm concerned "Infinite Peace" easily is the best.
At its core ninety percent of "Infinite Peace" just consists of wonderful dreamy Spiritual Jazz with a little touch of Psych (which might even be rather by association, because that's the main playground of the label Stolen Body Records) and Ambient sounds.
It's not a strict trio recording in the sense that you'll only hear three instruments at a time, but on the contrary rather maximalist. While Heffernan's bass and Neil Turpin's drums are their most indispensable contributions, Oli also integrates mostly subtle guitars and the special sauce of field recordings and synths which create a lot of the special Ivaness of the album, while Ben Hopkinson, who plays saxophone, (electric) piano, mellotron and shruti box always seems to be present with at least two equally important elements.
Everything comes together wonderfully fluent and relaxing. This is an album which confidently claims its stake of the Spiritual Jazz cake, with the flan case made of tradition and a modern individual topping. With thirteen compositions on four record sides it certainly is quite a huge portion - but it's also a flavour which won't overgorge me anytime soon. The taste is just too excellent!
There are a couple of instances when the mood shifts. A bit of Bop here, a hint of what Bohren & der Club of Gore would call "Detective Jazz" there. And sometimes the music moves away from the relatively Easy Listening experience to something darker, especially during the layered Indian drones of "Autodidact IV" and the eery experimental johnzornish soundtrack atmosphere of the final track "Mother Shipton".
And before that we get the longest of all tracks, being a respectable interpretation of Archie Shepp's "Hipnosis", which successfully puts the sometimes quite heavy Tolerable stamp on the 1975 composition.
In short: "Infinite Peace" is super awesome. And of course this review grew larger than I expected to actual regular size. But I won't go back to the beginning and change it now. Duh!
At its core ninety percent of "Infinite Peace" just consists of wonderful dreamy Spiritual Jazz with a little touch of Psych (which might even be rather by association, because that's the main playground of the label Stolen Body Records) and Ambient sounds.
It's not a strict trio recording in the sense that you'll only hear three instruments at a time, but on the contrary rather maximalist. While Heffernan's bass and Neil Turpin's drums are their most indispensable contributions, Oli also integrates mostly subtle guitars and the special sauce of field recordings and synths which create a lot of the special Ivaness of the album, while Ben Hopkinson, who plays saxophone, (electric) piano, mellotron and shruti box always seems to be present with at least two equally important elements.
Everything comes together wonderfully fluent and relaxing. This is an album which confidently claims its stake of the Spiritual Jazz cake, with the flan case made of tradition and a modern individual topping. With thirteen compositions on four record sides it certainly is quite a huge portion - but it's also a flavour which won't overgorge me anytime soon. The taste is just too excellent!
There are a couple of instances when the mood shifts. A bit of Bop here, a hint of what Bohren & der Club of Gore would call "Detective Jazz" there. And sometimes the music moves away from the relatively Easy Listening experience to something darker, especially during the layered Indian drones of "Autodidact IV" and the eery experimental johnzornish soundtrack atmosphere of the final track "Mother Shipton".
And before that we get the longest of all tracks, being a respectable interpretation of Archie Shepp's "Hipnosis", which successfully puts the sometimes quite heavy Tolerable stamp on the 1975 composition.
In short: "Infinite Peace" is super awesome. And of course this review grew larger than I expected to actual regular size. But I won't go back to the beginning and change it now. Duh!
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