Tuesday, September 23, 2014

Flametet, A General History of Flame

Flametet is a quintet (plus drummer) led by bassist and composer Kit Demos. We take a look today at their album A General History of Flame (Glitch Records 002). They seem to be Boston based.

The album delivers up 12 bracing slices of avant modern jazz composition-performance, freely realized with looseness and improvisatory eloquence by the quintet, an interesting combination of players and sound coloring. Kit Demos appears on both double bass and electric bass guitar as well as synthesizer, Jeff Platz plays electric guitar, sometimes modified by ring modulator, Charlie Kohlhase gets with the tenor and baritone, Tod Brunel is on bass clarinet and clarinet, and Pandelis Karayorgis plays the Wurlitzer electric piano, sometimes with wah-wah. There is a drummer present on the date and he sounds good. For some reason he is not named.

The combined electric and acoustic sounds of the band give us a vivid soundstage. Every player comes through with distinctive sounds, collective and individual soloing of note, and an ensemble sound of their very own.

The album toggles between composition, collective improv and soloing with ease. It is a relaxed date that puts everything in a worthy light. Though perhaps deceptively casual, it is free music of importance, with bass playing that comes through along with the other instruments as altogether contributive to what's new out there in avant jazz.

You should hear this!

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