The Field/Vidic duo of Slovenian saxophonist based in Switzerland Gregor Vidic and London born drummer Niclas Field is expanded with Japanese free improvising guitarist Tetuzi Akiyama, recording at Gok Sound in Tokyo in 2017 for three exceptional and suspenseful and electroacoustic improvisations, merging melodic and abstract approaches in uniquely detailed ways.

Swedish bass player Egil Kalman, here on modular syntheizer, joins Norwegian guitarist Fredrik Rasten for a lovely album of drifting electronics and beautifully entwining acoustic guitar, unhurriedly developing environments of warm, slowly evolving chord structures that show influences from players like Catherine Lamb or the Wandelweiser collective.

Three active Norwegians musicians based in Oslo-- guitarist Karl Bjora (Yes Deer, Megalodon Collective), drummer Dag Erik Knedal (Saka, Akode) and saxophonist Karl-Hjalmar Nyberg (Left Exit, Megalodon Collective)--in their debut album as a performing trio, showing both assertive collective playing in a free jazz mode and deeply introspective exploration.

The collective free jazz Nau Quartet led by alto saxophonist Jose Lencastre with Red Trio pianist and bassist Rodrigo Pinheiro and Hernani Faustino and drummer Joao Lencastre are caught live at Moscow's DOM Cultural Center for this album of thoughtfully informed improvisation, using open and spontaneous structures as they evolve each conversation in organic ways.

The ever-shifting lineup of jazz/no-wave/avant/aberrant improvisers The Flying Luttenbachers, anchored by drummer Weasel Walters, brings multi-reedist Matt Nelson, two guitarists (Brandon Seabrook & Henry Kaiser), bassist Tim Dahl and Brad Laner on synth for an aggressively informed and excitingly unpredictable album of superb playing and possibly bad intention; recommended!

Satoko Fujii leads her 13-piece big band through 5 thrilling and insightful compositions with a who's-who of NY improvisation: Nels Cline (guitar), Ches Smith (drums), Joe Fiedler & Curt Hasselbring (drums), Oscar Noriega, Ellery Eskelin, Briggan Krauss, Andy Laster & Tony Malaby (sax), Herb Robertson, Natsuki Tamura & Dave Ballou (trumpet) & bassist Stomu Takeishi; wow!

Dedicated to the late Mike Panico, who requested that viola player Ig Henneman develop a concept for the Relative Pitch label, this trio brings together the Amsterdam-based Henneman and flutist Anne La Berge with US trumpeter Jaimie Branch, three women in an eccentric and fearless trio of energetic interaction marked by masterful technique and exuberant delivery.

Performing on saxophones and cymbal, the debut album from NY-based Canadian-American composer, saxophonist, and performance artist Erin Rogers uses multiphonics, vocalization, circular breathing, and inciting of outer resonance to add layers of complexity to her gripping improvisations, which she describes as "No electronics, no bandmates, no composers... just me + dark room + 2 saxophones".

An absolutely idiosyncratic style in performance, Japanese alto saxophonist Masayoshi Urabe, also on harmonica and voice, is heard in a single extended performance at Sakedelic Space Shuyukan in Shiga, Japan, as the listener experiences the performance through his playing, physical motion, aberrant racket, arduous utterance, and inexplicable moments of silence and sound.

The 3rd volume of saxophonist Mars Williams' Albert Ayler-infused holiday records, bring free jazz to the holidays in a unique holiday mash-up of songs with titles like "Noel Omega - Twas The Night Before The Frosty Island Harvest Xmas", in a quintet with Jaimie Branch (trumpet), Knox Chandler (electric guitar), Mark Tokar (bass) and Klaus Kugel (drums).

Their first release in 2000 performing Cornelius Cardew's "Treatise", for 20 years the Formanex quartet of sound artists, conceptualists and experimenters Anthony Taillard, Christophe Havard, Emmanuel Leduc, and Julien Ottavi are heard here in collaborations with Keith Rowe, Kasper T. Toeplitz, Ralf Wehowsky, Seth Cluett, Michael Pisaro, Radu Malfatti, &c.

Recorded during Ken Vandermark's residency titled "The Unexpectable", in Krakow in 2017 at Klub Alchemia, plus concerts at Hevre and Black Box in Germany, with duos, trios and quartets in a variety of configurations with artists including Ken Vandermark, Nate Wooley, Ikue Mori, John Butcher, Kent Kessler, Steve Noble, Mette Rasmussen, Eddie Prevost, Joe McPhee &c.

FEN (Far East Network) is comprised of improvisers from Singapore (Yuen Chee Wai), Japan (Otomo Yoshihide), China (Yan Jun), and Korea (Ryu Hankil), using electroacoustic instrumentation to create a unique merging of cultural and personal aesthetic, in their 1st album recorded in NYC using electronic feedback, computer noises and guitar; intriguing and unconventional.

Winter 2019 issue of Canada's premiere new music magazine and CD, with articles on Buffy Sainte-Marie, Pierre-Yves Martel, Jennifer Thiessen, Wesley Shen, Julia Kent, Tim Olive, Kimia Koochakzadeh-Yazdi, the CD including works by each, plus reviews of recent Canadian and international recordings as well as the fourth annual Calgary New Music Festival.

Lapsteel guitarist and electronic artist Mike Cooper and percussionist Mark Wastell, employing a paiste 32" tam tam and a shruti box, pay homage to the large acoustic sound mirrors used in Britain from 1916 to 1930 as an early form or radar, each of their detailed improvisation referencing one of the locations on the British south and northeast coasts.

Three British free jazz giants, having worked in a number of configurations and as a trio over many decades, are caught live in the Russian Drama Theater during the 2017 Vilnius Jazz Festival--Evan Parker on soprano & tenor saxophones, Barry Guy on bass, and Paul Lytton on drums, for four improvisations of nuance and surprise, incredible mastery, and profound conversation.

A unique album blurring acoustic recordings from saxophonist Mats Gustafsson with the electronic machinations and rhythms of Wendy Gondeln, aka Albert Oehlen, a German experimental electronic artist, the two inviting Martin Siewert for additional guitar on two tracks, and Wolfgang Voight to remix two tracks; funky, unpredictable, amusing, and seductively tantalizing.

2nd Offering: Electroacoustic composer Michel Banabila compiles his dynamic works for dance & movement in this beautifully pressed limited double LP, presenting two 2019 works--'Dragonfly II' for "A Trace of Inevitability" (Yin Yue - Pennsylvania Ballet), and "Illicit Acquirement" for "Enough" (Patrick O"Brien - CUNY Dance Initiative)--and six prior pieces featuring his work with Conny Janssen Danst & Annabelle Lopez Ochoa.

The 4th album from German saxophonist Peter Van Huffel's Gorilla Mask, the 3rd on Clean Feed, is another powerful blending of jazz and rock forms in restless and profoundly determined music, energetic but intelligently structured, with great riffs and melodic grooves from Roland Fidezius (electric bass) and Rudi Fischerlehner (drums and percussion).

Swedish bass player Egil Kalman, here on modular syntheizer, joins Norwegian guitarist Fredrik Rasten, for a lovely album of drifting electronics and beautifully entwining acoustic guitar, unhurriedly developing environments of warm, slowly evolving chord structures that show influences from players like Catherine Lamb or the Wandelweiser collective.

Investigating the possibilities of instability with synthesizers and electronic instruments, sound artists Eryck Abecassis (France) and Lars Akerlund (Sweden) present 7 impressive tracks of "Dark Energy" in two parts, combining electronics and modular synth, with credits to VICC (Visby International Centre for Composers) and EMS (Electronic Music Studio, Stockholm).

A split cassette between Wilmington sound artists Joshua Marquez, a Filipino-American composer, guitarist, and activist who explores the liminal space between tone and noise; and Mr. Stonecipher, aka Ryan L Lewis IV, a sound artist and filmmaker who works with dramatic sound and feedback of a cinematic quality, often employing unusual objects as source.

A diverse, unique and sometimes explosive saxophone quartet from Lithuania founded by Arminas Bizys, Kazimieras Jusinskas, Algirdas Janonis, and Danielius Pancerovas, using extended techniques, the saxophones themselves, and found objects as they articulately merge structurally free improvisation, academic approaches and motives from Lithuanian folk music.

The improvising string duo of stalwart London improvisers, Daniel Thompson on acoustic guitar and Phil Durrant on the octave mandola, are heard in two settings of texturally rich, intricate interactions, first at Cafe OTO in 2022 for an extended improvisation, then at Cable Street Studios two months later for six succint, impressively diverse dialogs.