If you look around enough, you'll find there is no shortage of musicians looking to create music with a sense of daring, a spontaneity and a refusal to merely ape what has gone before. The Michal Osowski Collective is a good example. They are based in Europe and recorded a live CD in Rotterdam a couple of years ago. It is out now, titled Live at the White Elephant, and it's part of Ayler Records' download-only series. (For $10 you get a high-quality MP3 download of the session and all the album art to print out.)
The Osowski group's makeup is not typical. Osowski mans a battery of electronics, there is a bass player and a drummmer, and two artists that vocalize or play theremin, flute, and small instruments. This is an evocative soundscape of live improvisation. It does not follow a free jazz route exactly, nor is it especially beholden to concert "new music." It just flows along with lankingly executed sound events, like a kind of soundtrack to your dreams.
There are seemingly good-humored episodes and some with a bit of intensity. Nothing quite sounds beholden to previous artists or styles, not at least in this combination. Does that mean you will like it? It's certainly not for everybody. If you like out music, this is indeed in that bag. It's not music of an "instrumentalists show their stuff" kind, though. All players contribute to a sort of euphonic wash of sound that slowly evolves and evokes some nameless connotations along the way. You probably aren't going to exclaim while listening, "Wow, that's some slide whistle playing!"
With all the above in mind I would say that this might not be the first Ayler download to grab. It takes its time imparting musical content and you might not have the patience. Or you might and then perhaps you'll be bemused and possibly enthused over the events captured that day. It is quite different in a human sort of a way. That's something.
Go to http://www.ayler.com/ for more information.
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