Ken Vandermark & Paal Nilssen-Love: Screen Off

Rating: ★★★

Record and Artist Details

Musicians:

Paal Nilssen-Love (d, perc)
Ken Vandermark (ts, bar s, cl)

Label:

PNL

June/2019

Media Format:

CD

Catalogue Number:

PNL041

RecordDate:

2008-2018

This 10th album from the longstanding, high-energy, improvising sax/drums duo is a retrospective compilation of extracts from live shows recorded between 2008 and 2018 – but with a difference. All the music contained here has been culled from clips of gigs unofficially uploaded to YouTube by enthusiastic punters. Working closely with producer Lasse Marhaug, Vandermark and Nilssen-Love have spliced together 21 short bursts of sound – all around two minutes long – to create a 42-minute action-jazz collage of crunchy riffage and freeform thunder. With most of the clips, presumably, recorded on mobile phones, there's a gritty, lo-fi quality to much of the sound, calling to mind an old-fashioned bootleg tape. As the duo generally tend to play long, continuous sets in live gigs, these clips are all, by necessity, highlights from much longer shows, here linked by sudden jump cuts and abrupt backwards whooshes. The result is an exhilarating jolt that bristles with genuine punk energy.

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