#painter's winter

I have to say, this album is so coherently wonderful and unforced-sounding, and well-recorded, and definitely "free" while still being pretty damn pleasant to listen to, that I would readily offer this disc up to the proverbial non-believer, as a potential entry point into a musical world that is often much more daunting than this one, and also a lot less good. All three are constantly servicing the forward momentum of the music, all the while traipsing, stream of consciousness-like, down their own probing paths, and - at the risk of sounding like someone a lot less familiar with this type of music than I am - it's simply crazy to think how the pieces, with the aforementioned cohesiveness, are plucked right out of thin air. The legions of lesser combos out there would give their asses to sound this good; a predictably great outing from these three.

Finally got around to nabbing a copy of this disc, which I'd been eagerly anticipating, since its predecessor, another trio with WP, Daniel Carter, and Hamid Drake (that one was called 'Painter's Spring'), was one of the many highlights of the amazing Blue Series on Thirsty Ear Records, which featured amazing and thorough documentation of WP but also the likes of Matthew Shipp, David S. Ware, Roy Campbell, and Spring Heel Jack. It does not disappoint in the least, in no small part due to the fact that there is much more multi-instrumentalism on display here than on its predecessor, providing not only a wide variety of sonic zones from track to (extremely well-recorded) track, but also an clear, direct overview of these guys' deeply impressive range on a selection of disparate instruments. And, this probably doesn't need to be reiterated here, but listening to the way HD and WP navigate time and "free" playing on the drums and bass, respectively, is an utter joy and is something that should be cherished, because a pair of humans this in tune with one another is a rare thing indeed; great disc!