Each player created a recording that melded with band members in ways that show how telepathically they had come to recognise the moods, styles and habits of their band mates.
Losen: LOS274-2
Per Mathisen: acoustic bass, upright bass, sound effects; Ngyuên Lê: guitar, sound effects; Audun Kleive: drums
Recorded February 2023 by Sven Andréen at Klokkereint Studio, Gjøvik, Norway
Following from ‘Sounds of 3’ (2106) and ‘Sound of 3 edition 2’ (2019), the ‘bass Viking’ returns with a new trio to put his unique stamp on contemporary jazz-funk.
The titles on this set share a a lineage to Viking sea-faring traditions. For example, ‘Navigating stars’, ‘Silenced sails’, ‘On the horizon’, ‘Calming sea’, ‘Weather ahead’. Even the opening track ‘Birds unrest’ speaks to the ways in which the distress of birds can indicate a change in the weather.
Of course, calling himself ‘bass viking’ you’d expect these titles and, perhaps, the knowledge of a great sailing nation provides inspiration for the compositions themselves.
What you get as a listener, however, is tremendous power trio playing the skirts the edges of jazz-rock / funk / fusion and prog-rock in ways that blend a variety of musical styles.
Nowhere is this better expressed than the free improvisation of the final track, ‘Free at Last’. What is most exciting about this is that the three musicians recorded their parts separately (without hearing what each other had produced) and this was mixed seamlessly, “without edits or cut” (as the liner notes point out).
Each player created a recording that melded with band members in ways that show how telepathically they had come to recognise the moods, styles and habits of their band mates.
