Alm: Alm EP
Alfred Vogel’s Boomslang Records is nothing if not eclectic, the Austrian label championing everything from free improvisation to contemporary jazz, grooves and singer-songwriters. This debut EP from Berlin-based trio Alm, rooted in contemporary jazz and improvised music but coloured by ambient music, post-rock and minimalism, perfectly embodies the label’s catholic spirit. While starting from a broadly similar place to GoGo Penguin, their music favours drift and abstraction over the Manchester trio’s dance-floor ready grooves, and despite being relative newcomers they play with the kind of close-knit rapport that usually takes decades to develop.
While instrumental roles are not always sharply delineated, Danish-born guitarist Carlo Dayyani (Guldborg), a graduate of Jazz-Institut Berlin who previously impressed with his dreamy Melankoli Eufori (2024) and equally atmospheric Langmod (2025), tends to focus on melody and texture. Swedish electric bassist Seth Sjöström, recently heard on a stripped-back collection of standards with vocalist Irma Neumüller, is the trio’s main arterial pulse, while Austrian drummer and composer Steven Moser, a regular with guitarist Jascha Briand and cellist Gal Golub, is catalyst in chief, frequently shifting the music’s direction as the pieces unfold.
Despite the short playing time there’s lots to enjoy here, the five tracks each offering something distinct. Opening with Drumsolo, a misnomer if ever there was one, a carefully calibrated group improvisation transforms a static Eno-esque soundscape into a shimmering wall of sound. Moser’s Preach has significantly more forward motion, its tight rhythmic cells and propulsive bass-line reminding me of Nik Bärtsch until Dayyani and Moser let loose and stretch the form beyond its limits. The organ-like drone of the improvised Motvind pivots on a series of small harmonic and rhythmic shifts, and subtlety is also the watchword of Moser’s slow-burning Trauma, Dayyani’s pellucid tones reminding me of his compatriot Jakob Bro. In the closing cover of Björk’s Cocoon from her 2001 album Vespertine, the sexual tension of the lyrics is mirrored in the trio’s taut but superbly judged improvisation. Well worth seeking out, and I hope that there’s more to come.
Discography
Drumsolo; Preach; Motvind; Trauma; Cocoon (27.11)
Carlo Dayyani (elg); Seth Sjöström (elb); Steven Moser (d). March 2025, Rødhus, Denmark.
Boomslang Records Boom2204
Trigg & Gusset: Event Horizon
To describe Event Horizon as mood music may seem a little pejorative, but in the twilight world of Dark Jazz mood is everything. A niche sub-genre influenced by the classic film-noir soundtracks of the 50s, Doom Metal and Dark Ambient electronica, it often sounds like a quest for the perfect David Lynch soundtrack. Elements of the style can be heard in the music of Colin Stetson, though the leading exponents of this largely European movement include the Kilimanjaro Darkjazz Ensemble (Netherlands), Bohren & Der Club of Gore (Germany), Dale Cooper Quartet & The Dictaphones (France) and the Dutch duo of Bart Knol (Trigg) and saxophonist Erik van Geer (Gusset).
Drawing on a network of regular collaborators, the duo tend to choose the best combination for the project at hand. For this, their sixth album in a little over a decade, they opt for a classic horn-led quintet, with trumpeter Coen Hamelink joining van Geer in the front-line. The eight tracks were crisply recorded at the Graveland studio of drummer Mischa Porte, and despite the dynamics being relatively narrow – tempos range from processional to funereal – there’s more than enough melodic and textural variety in the programme to sustain interest.
The airy theme of opening Faded Corners has a disarming lightness of touch, ultimately balanced by the heavy emotional counterweight of Knol’s chill keyboard wash. The almost naïve melodic directness of Holding Pattern conceals a similarly dark undertow, while Glass Memory dances to a lethargic groove that reminds me of Belgo-German group Dictaphone. Major Cisco and Kuroi suggest the sophisticated minimalism of Rainer Brüninghaus and Markus Stockhausen’s 80s recordings for ECM, while guitarist Jurren Mekking, heard on last year’s video game soundtrack Blue Prince, takes a doom-laden cameo on Aether. Moving to a suitably downtempo climax with Night Transit and Perfect Fifth, the latter replete with van Geer’s woody bass clarinet, Event Horizon may be more charcoal grey than the maximum black of Bohren but it’s nevertheless a masterclass in controlled atmospherics.
Discography
Faded Corners; Holding Pattern; The Story Of Major Cisco; Kuroi; Glass Memory; Aether; Night Transit; Perfect Fifth (42.36)
Erik van Geer (ts, ss, bcl, cl); Coen Hamelink (t); Bart Knol (kyb, b, pc, elec); Mischa Porte (d); with Jurren Mekking (elg) on 6. Studio Ritmisch, Graveland. No date.
Independent
Julius Windisch Immerweiter: Live At Morphine Raum
I’ve been an admirer of the young German pianist Julius Windisch ever since I reviewed Pros & Cons back in 2021. His connections to Copenhagen’s Rhythmic Music Conservatory (RMC) were evident in the album’s mathematically improbable time signatures and surprisingly accessible hooks. A fearless composer and improviser who is completely unafraid to embrace musical contradictions, he’s now very much at home in Berlin’s creative music scene. This searching EP-length collection is the second outing by his new quartet Immerweiter (“more and more”).
Recording live at Berlin’s Morphine Raum, a hybrid recording studio and performance space, Windisch set out to capture something of both the polyrhythmic complexity and vibrant presence of British ambient and techno pioneer Richard David James (Aphex Twin) and the ambiguous harmonies of composer Wolfgang Rihm. This project is described as an attempt to refresh the language of the conventional post-bop jazz quartet; what emerges is a series of dense, multi-layered structures, laced with brittle melodicism and steeped in intrigue.
It opens with the explosive 45-second volley of Instagram, a bouncy Ornettish theme assailed by staccato rhythms. Aphex Twin offers an extended glimpse of Windisch’s methods at work, Klewer’s lonely atonal horn setting a frenetic pace before it is gradually subsumed within an interlocking grid of rhythms and sounds. Lichtblick (“ray of hope”) has an intense melancholia redolent of Avishai E. Cohen’s ECM quartet, Klewer once again in complete command as he glides across Wankel’s precarious beats. Windisch’s pastel keyboard tones add a soothing balm to Calm & Kind, and on Striving he uses the instrument to underpin the melody with bold slabs of fluro-neon sound, a stark contrast to the monochrome gravity of the piano coda. Boundaries between acoustic and electronic melt away on the closing Schweben (“floating”), part Satie-esque étude and part proggy fantasia, and as Klewer tangles with Eftychidou’s sonorous bass the quartet sounds at once classic and futuristic. On an album with surprises around every corner and no shortage of originality, Windisch more than meets his own challenging brief.
Discography
Instagram; Aphex Twin; Lichtblick; Calm & Kind; Verteilen; Striving; Schweben (31.47)
Windisch (p, kyb, elec) with Pascal Klewer (t); Sofia Eftychidou (b); Marius Wankel (d). Morphine Raum, Berlin, 21 November 2024.
Unit Records 5260
