This is a live improvised set, recorded in December, 2014 at the famed Glenn Miller Café in Stockholm, Sweden and an enjoyable enough one at that. Listeners who are aware of Küchen's impressive, gut-wrenching solo work in recent years ("Hellstorm" and "The Lie & the Orphanage", for example) should understand that there's none of that conceptual bedrock in place here.
Instead we find Küchen (soprano, alto and tenor saxophones, including various plugs and stoppers for same), Berthling (double bass) and Noble (drums and percussion) engaging in a not atypical round of free improvisation, well-wrought though not noticeably different from any dozens of others one could cite. The music ranges from the muscular—an approach that Küchen's guttural, growling tone well serves and which dominates here—to the subdued and elegiac; indeed, there's a point near the end of the first track where they near "Come Sunday" tonality. Berthling, who this listener had only really heard in very different contexts, with Tape and Oren Ambarchi, for instance, has a nice, dark tone, blending into the mix quite well and pushing matters forward with great strength but also unobtrusively, no mean feat. Noble's drumming is crisp and apt though, one should say, indistinguishable from many a colleague.
Three tracks, two at 22 and 17 minutes, one just over four. The trio negotiates the longer cuts very well, never really allowing interest to flag, skipping along nimbly, though the shorter one has a nice, tough concision that was welcome. Still and all, quite an attractive outing. When Küchen, near the end of the last track, lifts multiple reeds to his lips before transferring to soprano, the effect is exhilarating and moves the music to a higher level, well worth the wait and causing one to hope that the trio might continue to explore that particular avenue in the future.
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