Piggybacking on 1992’s Invisible Storm, ECM maverick Edward Vesala returned with his organic collective, Sound & Fury, as our guide for Nordic Gallery. Vesala draws a thinner circle around his ensemble this time around, weaving inside it a dreamcatcher for communal freedom, as exemplified in the 11-minute “Bird In The High Room,” a menagerie of cymbals, muted horns, drums, and birdsong. The latter signals a luxuriant indulgence in the Vesala soundscape as winds and wings fall in line like a panel out of Where the Wild Things Are. Even the electric guitar whistles in its sibilant cage, avian heart unfolded. Field recordings continue to leave breadcrumb trail of “Fulflandia” on its way toward “The Quay of Meditative Future.” Harpist Iro Haarla’s veiled and omnipresent insistence turns arrival into departure as the music’s long-shadowed caravan cuts a line in the sand. The mélange of flavors in “Hadendas”—ranging from roller rink organ and winds to Vesala’s own thumping accompaniment—lifts the tent flap of this night circus to usher in the “Unexpected Guest.” Is it the listener? The critic? The dog who’s been running circles outside this entire time? No, no, and yes. Such is the nature of this narrative turn, which cracks like the vocal egg that opened Storm. Accordion and gravelly tenor trade hands in “Bluego,” a tango deconstructed and put back together in reverse before an arrangement of “Lavander Lass Blossom” wilts, upended and suspended. A series of tunes at once glittering from Haarla’s careful appliqué of intimate crafts (“Streaming Below The Times”) and darkening in twisted whimsy (“One-Two-Three Or Four-Five-Six”) presses on through shimmer and corrosion into “Flavor Lust,” thus closing shop and hanging the day’s labor out to dry. - ecmreviews.com
Tracks
01. Bird In The High Room
02. Fulflandia
03. The Quay Of Meditative Future
04. Hadendas
05. Unexpected Guest
06. Bluego
07. Lavander Lass Blossom
08. Streaming Below The Time
09. One-Two-Three Or Four-Five-Six
10. A Significant Look Of Birch Grove
11. On The Shady Side Of Forty
12. Flavor Lust
PETRI IKKELÄ accordion
PEKKA SARMANTO bass
KARI LINSTED cello
TAPANI RINNE clarinet
JIMI SUMEN guitar
JOUNI KANNISTO tenor saxophone, flute
MATTI RIKONEN trumpet
IRO HAARLA harp, piano, keyboards, accordion, koto
EDWARD VESALA drums, percussion, tambura, angklung,
JORMA TAPIO alto sax, bass clarinet, alto clarinet, flute, bass flute
PEPA PÄIVINEN tenor sax, soprano sax, baritone sax, bass saxophone, alto flute,piccolo
Music composed by Edward Vesala
Recorded 1993, 1994 at Sound and Fury Studio, Korkeakoski, Finland
ECM Records ECM - 1541