Tag: ChrisCorsano

Low Cost Space Flights

Low Cost Space Flights by Chris Corsano / Paul Flaherty.
Bandcamp Link: Low Cost Space Flights

It has been a week of energy jazz. On Monday I saw two groups with local saxophone flamethrowers Tom Weeks and Josh Allen, listened to this album from Corsano and Flaherty this morning, tonight going to see Peter Brötzmann / Keiji Haino Duo.

The name of this album is completely descriptive of both Corsano and Flaherty’s take no prisoners approach to playing. From the first note to the last, this is playing as if your life depended on it.

Flaherty spends so much time in the upper register of his sax, smearing squeals across the milky way, that you might follow him into the stars. Corsano’s playing is so fast and furious, if you vibrate along, you might just reach launch velocity.

This is a great album. Energetic, abrasive, harsh, and beautiful, all at the same time. A new moment of insight with every breath.

#LowCostSpaceFlights #ChrisCorsano #PaulFlaherty #TodaysCommuteSoundtrack #FeedingTubeRecords

Live at Tonic

Live at Tonic by Wally Shoup / Paul Flaherty / Thurston Moore / Chris Corsano.
Label Website: Live at Tonic

Two Saxes, Shoup and Flaherty, Guitar, Moore, and Drums, Corsano.

The school of improvised music that grew out of the New York scene, especially those that continued on from Shepp and Ayler, is a particular type of energy jazz. Distinct from the energy Jazz of Europe, which is more classically influenced, its roots are in smoky noir-esque honkers and marching bands.

Skittering polyrhtyms. Squeaks, Squonks, and honks. And whatever it is that Thurston Moore is doing to his guitar.

This is a pretty awesome, and pretty noisy, expression of that scene. Also, pretty well recorded, for a live album.

Not music to nap to, this is music that gets you to work early.

#TodaysCommuteSoundtrack #WallyShoup #PaulFlaherty #ThurstonMoore #ChrisCorsano #LiveAtTonic #FireMusic

Proton Pump

Proton Pump by Akira Sakata & Chikamorachi with Masahiko Satoh.
Bandcamp Link: Proton Pump

Chikamorachi is the bass and drum combo of Darin Gray and Chris Corsano. They usually include a guest or two on each album. Reed player Akira Sakata is one of their more frequent collaborators. He is a Japanese woodwind player who is probably best known in the West for his appearance as a guest saxophonist on Last Exit’s “The Noise of Trouble” album.

I wasn’t familiar with keyboardist Masahiko Sato, but he brings the Cecil Taylor-esque multi handed polyphonies to keep up with way above the speed limit playing of Corsano, Gray, and Sakata. Interestingly, I also hadn’t remembered that Sakata played clarinet. For someone primarily known as a Sax player, he plays a pretty mean clarinet.

This is Energetic “Free Jazz”, with some Bebop-ish runs and the odd Jazz/Blues lick. It will get you to work faster than you usually drive.

#TodaysCommuteSoundtrack #Chikamorachi #DarinGray #ChrisCorsano #AkiraSakata #MasahikoSatoh

Amaranth

Amaranth by Icepick.

This trio of Chris Corsano, Ingebrigt Håker Flaten, and Nate Wooley has maybe THE best band name ever.

Drums, bass, and trumpet. Well, -ish.

The players here are serious practitioners of extended technique, so I am often not quite sure who is playing what, (my favorite moments in listening to any improv). The track “Rare Rufescent” is particularly gnarly.

Outstanding.

#TodaysCommuteSoundtrack #ChrisCorsano #IngebrigtHåkerFlaten #NateWooley #Icepick #Amaranth #MonofonusPress