Free Jazz review by Stef

Albatre – A Descent Into The Maelstrom (Shh 005)
****
Today the new Clean Feed batch has arrived, and we’re still struggling to get some of the previous releases reviewed. This album comes from Shhhpuma, the Portuguese label’s side project, now featuring Albatre, a sax trio that brings us a refreshing and modern new sound.

The trio is Hugo Costa on alto sax, Gonçalo Almeida on electric bass and German drummer Philipp Ernsting, but their take on jazz is anything but what you can expected. It sounds like the grunge version of jazz, with heavy moments of raw violence alternated with quieter melodic moments, like a mixture of Zu with Jim Black’s Alasnoaxis.

Bass and drums come with all the anger and energy of a rock or punk band, while the alto screams and wails full of distress and agony like only a sax can in the best of free jazz modes. The music is raw, direct, without embellishments and needless decoration. This is straight-in-your-ears power jazz, but then of the clever kind and with depth.

A Descent Into The Maelstrom … indeed!
http://www.freejazzblog.org/2013/08/albatre-descent-into-maelstrom-shhhpuma.html

Music and More review by Tim Niland

Albatre – A Descent Into the Maelstrom (Shh 005)
Albatre is an improvising trio from The Netherlands consisting of Hugo Costa on alto saxophone and electronics, Gonzo Almeida on bass and electronic effects and Philipp Ernsting on drums and electronics. Their music is frenetic and exciting free jazz with splashes of electronics that gives the music a wide palette of sound. Electric bass guitar and pulsating drums combine with snarls of electronics making a dark and ominous sound that is really in your face with blasts or drums between wails of saxophone. The start-stop dynamic they use is particularly effective as a tension building device on “Malestrom.” A spare and haunting theme opens “Aphotic Zone” with the reverberations of the electronics making for a lonely feel to the music. The full band comes through and really ramps things up into overdrive, moving into the following track, “Deep Trench” which is shorn of any ornamental nature and evolves into a pure trio stomp. “Vampyroteuthis Infernalis” has a strong bass and drum foundation that drives the music ever forward and makes for a great launching pad for an absolutely scalding sound. The closing “Albatrossia” breaks with the formula a bit, with Almeida and Ernsting developing a fractured funk groove before Costa enters and leads the group into an overpowering collective improvisation. I found this album to be quite enjoyable and exciting. The group holds nothing back, and fans of The Thing and similar groups should find a lot to enjoy here.
http://jazzandblues.blogspot.pt/