Oliver Arditi

Blog archive

  • Prescott – One Did (avant-rock)

    Prescott – One Did (avant-rock)

    There’s an openness, and a sense of ensemble solidarity, to Prescott, that puts me in mind of jazz as much as it does of the art-rock influences they own up to in their press release; much of the music is clearly arranged in detail, but it feels improvisational, and its musical meanings seem to stem… Read more

  • Monkey Puzzle Trio – The Pattern Familiar (avant-jazz)

    Monkey Puzzle Trio – The Pattern Familiar (avant-jazz)

    The musicians that make up Monkey Puzzle Trio are all confirmed experimentalists, all situated on the peripheries of, or the boundaries between, socially validated zones of practice, where the population is sparse and the musical meanings hard-won. The press release for this album situates the ensemble’s work on ‘a tightrope between song, improvisation and sound-as-sound’;… Read more

  • Various Artists – Album Roundup

    Various Artists – Album Roundup

    I wonder whether this band really wanted to call itself Leveret, but couldn’t recall the word. It’s more likely that they’re named after the 1502 watercolour by Albrecht Dürer, an early masterpiece of observational art; I’m not precisely sure why, but an air of mystery never goes amiss. The music isn’t overtly transgressive, but there’s… Read more

  • Review Of The Year 2014: 20 Albums

    Review Of The Year 2014: 20 Albums

    My views on end-of-year roundups in general are quite aggressive, and can be read at greater length in the introduction to last year’s selection, here. Suffice it to say that I think anyone claiming to know which are the best few albums released in any given year is seriously delusional; my selection is simply some… Read more

  • Bitter Fruit – It Gets Worse (noise rock)

    Bitter Fruit – It Gets Worse (noise rock)

    This bunch of raucous, abrasive noise-mongers from Oakland CA specifically describe their music as ‘queer death rock’. That raises a couple of issues as a genre label. The first is that given that the sound of this record is something that makes sense in an established set of musical practices, what is it about the… Read more

  • Regal Worm – Neither Use Nor Ornament (avant-prog)

    Regal Worm – Neither Use Nor Ornament (avant-prog)

    ‘A small collection of big suites’ is the sub-title applied to this ‘mini-album’; I can’t concur with either characterisation. Taken as a single work in several movements (it’s really two long suites with three short pieces as an entr’acte) this would be, at forty-six minutes, a respectable length for a Classical symphony. In other words,… Read more