Talibam! - Boogie in the Breeze Blocks and The New Nixon Tapes
You'd be forgiven for interpreting Brooklyn, New York's Talibam! as another art project gone wrong from a look at the photos adorning their latest full-length disc, Boogie in the Breeze Blocks (ESP-Disk). Striking poses in a fuchsia t-shirt and white Eurotrash glasses, keyboardist Matt Mottel and drummer Kevin Shea appear to be pulled from an art opening crowd. But true to form, that image is quite far from their reality. Shea studied percussion at Berklee College of Music, and held the drum chair in bands like Storm & Stress, Coptic Light and People in addition to free-jazz outfits Mostly Other People do the Killing and the Peter Evans Quartet. Mottel has long been a fixture on the New York improvising scene, working across generations with figures like saxophonist Ras Moshe and multi-instrumentalist Cooper-Moore. Talibam! was formed in 2003, its moniker referring to a New York Post headline on the war in Afghanistan; since that time they've released a slew of EPs, CD-Rs, cassettes and singles, though only four proper full-lengths have surfaced with the latest on venerated avant-garde label ESP-Disk and Minneapolis' Roaratorio.
Though essentially a duo, Talibam! are joined on Boogie in the Breeze Blocks by a host of guests including the rest of MOPDTK (Moppa Elliott, bass; Peter Evans, trumpet; Jon Irabagon, saxophones), guitarist Anders Nilsson, and symphony horn player Danielle Kuhlmann and drummer Mike Pride (both on vocals). The opening salvo of thrashing percussion and seasick keyboard fantasias recalls John French jamming with Sun Ra, utterly disjointed but maintaining a furious sense of forward motion. Kuhlmann takes on the June Tyson role in a sort of Rock in Opposition-Nu Soul collision midway through. "Ghost Cloud" breaks into an Arkestra-like chorus as Irabagon's tenor saxophone and Peter Evans' brittle trumpet lilt and dart through a lunk-headed chant. "Slap Yr Boots On! Oysters Await" begins with nonsense syllables and erupts into Neu!-like motorik, Kuhlmann's strut gleaming atop a relentless drumbox and keyboard jam. It's over almost as quickly as it begins, with Pride reciting one of Shea's convoluted texts over glitch and unintelligible yelling.
The core of Talibam! vacillates between seeming chaos and extraordinarily tight grooves, spastic "free" explosions rutting with progressive post-punk and betraying influences as deep as Pere Ubu, Beefheart, Klaus Schulze and Can, all with a nearly operatic sensibility (indeed, there's talk of a long form, theatrical exposition on the multipart piece "Schroeder meets Jagger"). Talibam! aren't without a bizarre sense of humor - inane banter with a police scanner and a dubious pickup conversation introduce and occasionally overtake chops and composition. Nevertheless, Boogie in the Breeze Blocks is easily one of the most uniquely compelling records you'll hear this year.
The New Nixon Tapes is probably the closest Talibam! have come to a purely "avant-jazz" record. Joined by reedmen Daniel Carter and Ed Bear (himself a previous regular member), this vinyl-only release explores the outfit's improvisational tack across two sidelong pieces, recorded in 2005. Carter has been a mainstay of the New York free music environment since the 1970s, playing with Bob Moses, Earl Freeman, Tom Bruno's Test, William Parker, and Other Dimensions in Music. "The Man from Plato 3000, whose Resource Efficiency Ear-a-Rounded the Antiquity Pixel" applies a delicate sensibility to free improvisation, flute, feedback and keyboard blurt alternately pirouetting in flight and plumbing grungy bowels.
Whereas on Boogie in the Beeze Blocks Shea's drumming is frantic, fast and thick, that athleticism is clearly balletic in its lightness. That's quite evident here, where he appropriates the sparse detail of John Stevens and distracted antics of a young Han Bennink in a churning, ornate approach to free time. The ensemble is quite well-integrated; Carter's language, while hard-bitten, is equally that of a slightly deferential colorist, so his keening exhortations are textural flits rather than blustery overblowing. To a degree, Mottel and Shea appear to soften their playing, foregoing a penchant for raucousness and knitting together an intensely active instrumental landscape. "Organist Dick Hyman, whose Art Tatum Studies Crowdsorcerers Swallow the Cornucopian Logic of..." flirts with more typical pummeling drive, Mottel worrying a dirty chord as Carter's alto weaves in a pinched wail akin to Terry Riley played through a blown speaker. Though just over a half-hour in length, The New Nixon Tapes offers another equally curious side to Talibam's art, all of which confounds image and expectation to a truly musical point.
