Elephant9 with Terje Rypdal: Catching Fire

Record and Artist Details

Musicians:

Terje Rypdal (g)
Torstein Lofthus (d)
Ståle Storløkken (Hammond org, ky, mello)
Nikolai Hængsle (b)

Label:

Rune Grammofon

November/2024

Media Format:

CD, LP, DL

Catalogue Number:

RCD2236/RLP3236

RecordDate:

Rec. 2017

Health and safety alert: when first activating this firebrand release you may wish to stand several yards back from your speakers and remove all pets, rellies of sensitive disposition and request neighbours take the cat for a walk over its 70-minute duration.

There’s no point playing this album unless your amp’s set to 11. Storløkken and Elephant9 have subtleties but on this live recording and with the extra noise provocation of Rypdal, the quartet rip, roar and rock with splendid abandon. The opening 22 minutes of ‘I Cover the Mountain’ starts in classic Storløkken style, all ominous keys and synth swirlings that presage the coming storm. In time Rypdal joins the mayhem, sitting atop mounting crescendos of feedback like some horseman of a rock apocalypse. But then suddenly we deep-dive into the funkier ‘Dodovoodoo’, all crunching analogue keys, like early Weather Report and Zawinul riffing again.

It’s all rattling good fun, with its echoes of electric Miles, or Pink Floyd live extravangas, but there’s a deep musicality behind the big hair. It’s also intriguing to compare this to Storløkken’s recent work with Hedvig Mollestad in The Weejuns, a more-loose limbed, improvisatory project (which it would be intriguing to hear more of at the earliest opportunity).

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