6 (2009)
13 tracks, 58 minutes
Bandcamp • Spotify • iTunes
One thing I love about this blog is some of the juxtapositions that are thrown up by the random selection. This album and yesterday’s album are not entirely without their similarities, but their soundworlds are absolutely light-years apart.
Soil & “PIMP” Sessions approach jazz with the vigour of a thrash metal band. There isn’t actually any metal in the sound itself, but they play with such wild abandon in contrast to jazz’s usual restrained, tasteful image. They call it ‘death jazz,’ although I’d say it’s much more life-affirming than that implies. After the introductory sound collage contributed by DJ Kentaro, the album hits straight into that stride with the piece ‘Keizoku,’ which won’t half blow those cobwebs away. It’s a million miles an hour and it barely lets up for the rest of the album, and it’s all just pure jazz (maybe with hints of samba and Afrobeat thrown in).
Considering there are only five musicians in the group – trumpet, sax, piano, double bass and drums – they make so much noise, it sounds like there are about 20 of them. And all-acoustic too! A passing listen would convince you that there’s all matter of electronics going on, but nope. It’s all just air, reeds and strings.
There’s also a sixth, key element of the band. Shacho is the bandleader and ‘agitator’ – that means he’s the Bez of the group. His job isn’t musical as such (although he will bellow into a megaphone or hit a cymbal occasionally), as much as it is to just get the band and the audience as riled up as possible and create the perfect atmosphere: a near-riot. As you might imagine, as good as the album is, it just cannot compare to their live show. I’ve only seen them live once, at WOMAD in 2010, but I’m not sure I’ve stopped sweating since. Enjoy this album now – catch them live as soon as you can!
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