PURPLE TRAP - The Stone

If you know you know, I guess.

PURPLE TRAP - The Stone (LP) (2023/2025)

I at least knew the label Karlrecords. I also knew Japanese Noise improvisation legend Keiji Haino. And of course i also knew bass player Bill Laswell, who I recently reviewed several times with the return of his trio with John Zorn and Mick Harris, PainKiller.

Rashied Ali, who had played drums with Jazz greats like Sonny Rollins, Pharoah Sanders and both Alice and John Coltrane only seemed familiar via name recognition to me, and if he had already been present somewhere in my music collection, I'm not actively aware of that.

However this was still enough to imagine how this live recording of their trio Purple Trap from December 2005, which Bill Laswell first released digitally for his Bandcamp channel subscribers in 2023, would roughly sound like: Intricate Free Jazz, brute Noise, a masterful balance of chaos which finds and dissolves structure - and musicality too seasoned to bother with seeking validation.

Ali as one of the originators stays closest to the traditional image of Free Jazz, while Laswell fluidly moves between smooth stabilizing lines and more experimental or sick distorted sounds.
Haino, who also delivers some manic vocals, is all over the place between surprisingly sweet and listenable and - much more frequent - parallel dimension rock star mannerism and other delightful Avantgarde dada.

Or in other words: legends at work. It's good. Friends of Free Noise Jazz can't do wrong with this record.

If you purchase the vinyl release don't throw away your download code, because one of the seven tracks is only available digitally!

PAINKILLER - The Great God Pan

Rejoice! We have a trilogy!

Oh wait, that's already how I started the review of the second comeback album from John Zorn, Bill Laswell and Mick Harris as PainKiller!

PAINKILLER - The Great God Pan (CD) (2025)

After two albums of moving their Grindjazz legend legacy into the realm of half-Electronic Future Jazz - "Samsara" rather straight forward, "The Equinox" more complex and refined - the trio stepped on the brake to deliver a much more textural and Ambient work with "The Great God Pan".

Laswell and Harris mostly bring flowing and droning atmosphere to the two over twenty minutes long tracks. While the Electronic artist of ex-Napalm Death drumming fame actually plays percussion again in "Ercildoune", you shouldn't expect wild blastbeat explosions. No, even when he plays some wilder stuff, it appears so subtly in the mix that you probably won't even notice it as what is it on first listening.

The base of the music stays slow and minimalist almost all the time, meandering in a mood that can sometimes be eerily beautiful, but most of the time feels hauntingly nocturnal.
Zorn is the only player who repeatedly goes for the berserk PainKiller trademark with sudden shrill saxophone crescendos. But even those are placed in a restrained effectful manner between long passages of a more calm, soulful and spiritual performance.

"Secret Sins" is the wilder piece of the two, with more dirty noises and a more adventurous yet also denser mood. And it starts with thirty seconds of actual old-school "Guts Of A Virgin" grindfuckery!

All in all "The Great God Pan" remains a very different beast than the other two CDs - and that's brilliant, because it completes the wide picture of what PainKiller stands for over three decades after the group's inception.

Alongside Zorn's sister group Naked City, which started with the idea of Jazz musicians playing Grindcore, the pivotal role of PainKiller in connecting the extreme and Avant-Garde edges of Jazz and Rock music cannot be overstated. One could have easily let the name  rest comfortably on its luxurous couch in music history, but I applaud the group to not only reactivating but also redefining it with this strong trilogy! 

PAINKILLER - The Equinox

Rejoice! We have a trilogy!

PAINKILLER - The Equinox (CD) (2025)

Last year's return and reimagination of the John Zorn / Bill Laswell / Mick Harris cult trio PainKiller wasn't a one-off, but only the first of three releases with the new less improvisational approach of ex-drummer Harris laying down a foundation of Electronic beats and sounds and the other players adding bass and saxophone on top. "The Equinox" totally follows this blueprint introduced on "Samsara", but!

Well, to be completely honest writing this review is one of those rather futile excercises, where you cannot really add anything not already covered by the album's own hype text on the OBI strip. And I even accidentily got two of those in my copy, as if Tzadik thought they weren't mocking my attempt enough already.

So the short and probably sufficient version is that the album does everything its predecessor does, but more refined, more dynamic and with more variety. Harris' groundwork is significantly more complex, Laswell's Dub and Fusion bass lines sit tighter on his even wilder breakbeats and even deeper and more atmospheric Ambient textures. And Zorn is just... really everything he can be on the saxophone, delivering a plethora of both shrill outbursts and achingly beautiful warm melodies.

But where's the news here? You know these guys are masters, legends even in their fields. "Samsara" was the already amazing warm-up in their new Ambient Electronic Jazzcore Techno Noise constellation. "The Equinox" shows their further adaption and improvement of the workflow. The result is Future Jazz PainKiller, part 2: The Masterpiece?

I'm very curious to hear how in hell and on Earth they will follow this up with "The Great God Pan" next month!

PAINKILLER - Samsara

PAIN FUCKER MOTHER KILLER!

PAINKILLER - Samsara (CD) (2024)

PainKiller are back in their original line-up of John Zorn, Bill Laswell and ex Napalm Death drummer Mick Harris. "Talisman", a live recording from 1994, released in 2002, was the last album in that constellation. Meanwhile however blast beat originator Harris has stopped drumming altogether. So how does this work?

Before giving you the answer let me briefly bring you up to speed in case you're unfamiliar with this legendary trio, which I have used as a reference point in this blog countless times!

It all began with Zorn's love for Napalm Death and the idea to let Jazz musicians play Grindcore, which birthed the album and band Naked City. You'll hardly find an album which matches the craziness of the forty-two tracks (with between eight and seventy-two seconds length) of "Torture Garden"!
PainKiller was not exactly the reversal, but at least a variation of that idea: the Jazzers Zorn on saxophone and Laswell on bass plus the Grindcore drummer, who had as good as zero experience in improvising or even playing slow playing what today is commonly called Jazzcore.

From 1991 to 1994 they released three studio albums: the brutally chaotic "Guts of a Virgin", my personal favorite "Buried Secrets" with guest apperances of Godflesh on two tracks ("The Toll" might be Justin Broadrick's most extreme vocal performance ever), which also introduced Dub influences, and "Execution Ground", which broadened the range to Ambient and saw the band indulding in longtracks up to twenty minutes length.

Since then there have been a couple of live performances (and respective releases) both with Harris and other drummers. But who would have even thought of the possibility of this new album?

In some ways "Samsara" goes back to the early days of PainKiller: Jon Zorn's alto saxophone improvisations go through all the extremes from warm smoothness to shrill screeches and wild noisy bubbling sounds. Laswell reprises his rumbling and roaring bass sound and the signature flanger effects in slow passages.
Beyond that however the premise is very different now. No live drums and no extreme vocals either. Instead "Samsara" presents the Power Electronics version of PainKiller.

So instead of mostly the bass leading the flow and evolution of the music, the foundation of these eight new pieces had been recorded by Mick Harris alone. Dynamic, completely Electronic tracks made of synth sounds, effects, noises and pumping beats, which would probably all already work on their own. The other players however elevate the material with the bass stying close to the rhythmic guideline while infusing his special tone, and Zorn finalizing them with a rich performance of in your face Avantgarde and floating Spiritual Jazz.

So there you have it: PainKiller goes Future Jazz - still regocnizable, with a similar vibe and rawness, yet recontextualized for a new age. I dig it.

 

MIDYEAR TOP 12 : my favorite albums of 2020 (so far)

I've shared this on my profile and several groups on facebook yesterday, so why not also here?

Half of 2020 is almost over, so as one does these days here are my TOP 12 favorite albums so far, short and sweet, without further ramblings and not seperated by sub-categories like studio / live albums, boxes or whatever yet.

1. LAIBACH
   Laibach Revisited
   
   
   
2. TRIPTYKON with METROPOLE ORKEST
   Requiem (Live At Roadburn 2019)
   
   
   
3. DOOL
   Summerland
   
   
   
4. BILL LASWELL
   Against Empire
   
   
   
5. BOHREN & DER CLUB OF GORE
   Patchouli Blue
   
   
   
6. THE NECKS
   Three
   
   
   
7. ORANSSI PAZUZU
   Mestarin Kynsi
   
   
   
8. BADA
   Bada
   
   
   
9. INSECT ARK
   The Vanishing
   
   
   
10. CAMEL DRIVER
    \ /
    
    
    
11. RADAR MEN FROM THE MOON
    The Bestial Light
    
    
    
12. CIRITH UNGOL
    Forever Black

BILL LASWELL - Against Empire

Ich hatte da doch im letzten Review noch etwas offen im Raum stehen gelassen.

Also, das für mich neben den neuen Scheiben von Oranssi Pazuzu und Dool (naaa gut, eigentlich auch Bada) wirklich große Album des Aprils 2020 hat für mich Jazz/Dub/Funk/Advantgarde/usw.-Bass-Riese Bill Laswell veröffentlicht.

BILL LASWELL - Against Empire (CD) (2020)

Ob Klassiker oder Zeitgenössisches, die vier durchschnittlich viertelstündigen Stücke von "Against Empire" zwingen einen allesamt dazu, die ganz großen Namen als Vergleich heranzuziehen.

So beginnt der Opener sogleich mit einem Saxophon, welches ganz tief den Geist von John Coltranes "A Love Supreme" atmet, um kurz darauf in eine Bläserharmonie zu wechseln, welche sich so auch als typisches Element auf einem Album von Kamasi Washington wiederfinden könnte. Der Urheber ist jedoch noch eine ganze Spur legendärer, ist doch Spiritual-Jazz-Gigant Pharoah Sanders selbst hier an der Seelentröte zu hören.

Die weltmusikalische und funkige Note des Stücks lässt mich schnell an Herbie Hancocks "Sextant" denken, und wessen Name ist hier als weiterer Kollaborateur aufgeführt? Genau!



Namen sind überhaupt das einzige, was das CD-Digipack in Bezug auf die Musiker hergibt. Welches Instrument auf welchem Track? Das zählt wohl als Information, die bereits von der Musik an sich ablenkt. Dabei hätte man es durchaus zum Konzept erheben können, dass Laswell die rhythmische Basis jedes Songs mit jeweils einem anderen Rockdrummer eingespielt hat.
Der populärste - und doch in diesem Zusammenhang etwas überraschende - Name darunter ist sicherlich Red Hot Chili Pepper Chad Smith, der - so nehme ich es doch jedenfalls stark an - den zweiten Track "Tabu" markant bestimmt.



Komplettiert wird die insgesamt neunköpfige Besetzung des Album durch Multiinstrumentalist Peter Apfelbaum an Saxofon, Flöte und Keyboards, sowie Perkussionist Adam Rudolph, der sich vor allem im langen Ambient-Mittelteil von "Tabu" als großer Freund der Triangel herausstellt. So auffällig hört man das Instrument nicht alle Tage.

Eingeleitet mit minutenlanger Schlagzeugeskalation durch Hideo Yamaki und ständig in neue rhythmische Richtungen umschwenkend ist "Shadowline" der am offensivsten freejazzende Titel  von "Against Empire". Laswell bleibt hier am Bass sozusagen als Kontrapunkt mit seinem typisch blubbernden Dub-Sound betont entspannt.

Ach ja - und das Ding hat ein Zwischenspiel und einen Epilog, die für sich in ganz anderem Zusammenhang glatt als - haha, festhalten! - Dungeon Synth durchgehen könnten.

"The Seven Holy Mountains" schließlich ist ein weiterer Jazz-Fusion-Wirbelwind, der den Geist von sowohl John als auch Alice Coltrane mit jeder Menge Percussiongewusel durch unterschiedliche Spielarten inklusive in später elektrischer Phase orgelndem Miles Davis bläst.

Überhaupt hat Bill Laswell hier ein Album abgeliefert, welches in seinem Mix aus Studiokomposition und Improvisation in ganz direkter Tradition von Davis-Klassikern wie "Bitches Brew" steht.
Wer Weather Report und Konsorten mag, aber auch für neuere Einflüsse aus weiteren Genres die Ohren offen hat, für den gibt es auf "Against Empire" unendlich viel zu entdecken.

Dies gilt natürlich auch für alle Fans der hier beteiligten Protagonisten, deren Namen "Against Empire" vollends gerecht wird. Die alten Meister beweisen hier, dass sie nichts von ihrer Strahlkraft eingebüßt haben.

Ein wahrhaft reiches, viel Liebe zur Musik an sich verströmendes Werk.