L’eclettico e ineffabile Frith disegna qui una striscia sonora – consigliabile a chi ne segue le gesta da sempre ma anche a chi volesse prendere confidenza con la sua arte – che appare quasi come una sorta di guida all’ascolto dell’ex Henry Cow e di mille altre cose. Emerge in particolare lo spirito degli storici Massacre, dai quali il nuovo trio eredita tensioni ed energia propulsiva. I due partner di Frith si mostrano all’altezza del compito, fornendo adeguato sostegno ritmico, imbastendo trame sottili, o robuste e gagliarde. Ragguardevole è Hoopes, che mostra di aver messo a profitto l’insegnamento di Pastorius con un suono turgido e pastoso al tempo stesso. I tre si trovano a meraviglia e danno luogo a una sequenza sonora che oscilla tra piglio rock, atmosfere astratte, grande coralità, solitarie fughe chitarristiche, senza soluzione di continuità, da viaggi astrali a indagini sulla materia elettroacustica per giungere alla free form integrale. Una nota di merito per il titolo dell’album, che brilla di luce propria con un’espressione mirabilmente in equilibrio tra imprecazione very cool e bestemmia tout court, forse uno scampolo dei borborigmi cui si lascia andare Frith in Poor Folly.
Fucile

https://www.musicajazz.it/fred-frith-another-day-paradise/

英国のギタリスト、フレッド・ フリス最新作。彼はインタク トから11枚ものアルバムを 出しています。

Ma chi lo ferma Fred Frith? Ha un'età che gli permetterebbe panchina, giornale e giardinaggio, e invece eccolo qui, sempre più presente e divertito in avventure radicali che fanno saltare per aria tutti i dadi stretti del jazz e del rock. Questo ad esempio è un «power trio>> elettrico che agisce sull'improvvisazione in cui la sua chitarra cerca e trova misteriose, spettrali, a volte palpitanti assonanze con la psichedelia d'antan che ascoltava all'Ufo Club quando sul palco c'era Syd Barrett.

Exploratory British guitarist Fred Frith's career is one of constant motion. Forays around the globe and across his fretboard produce a uniquely improvisational music with no loss of aesthetic for the emoting. Collaborations with a peerless cadre including Anthony Braxton, Derek Bailey, John Zorn, Chris Cutler, Bill Laswell, Evan Parker, Han Bennink, Ikue Mori and ensembles Henry Cow, Skeleton Crew, Naked City, Material, the Golden Palominos and Massacre saw his legend flourish over a period encompassing nearly 50 years.

On Another Day in **** Paradise, Frith's trio with Jason Hoopes (basses) and Jordan Glenn (drums/ percussion) brings dark, heavy textures reminiscent of the Downtown scene in which the guitarist thrived. Streams of feedback dance through arching, valley- wide guitar lines at once dissonant and gorgeous. The album opens with "The Origin of Marvels", a brief piece featuring Glenn's orchestral chimes, bells and clay pots against Frith's ECM-esque volume pedal phrases. The album is a study in conflict: near-gentle melodies alternate with raceways of raucousness. Frith spares little when searching for the right sound, including use of vocalized cries and neologisms. Most of the pieces are short with the central work, "Yard With Lunatics", as the standout epic. Throughout, Glenn fleetingly rolls over a drumset that includes brake drums and small percussives, responding to and rephrasing even the subtlest nuances before him while Hoopes' role, thrusting, guttural and deeply effective, often recalls Jah Wobble more than Jamaaladeen Tacuma. This is a trio fans of Frith will devour soundly.

Evocative and disturbing, the Fred Frith Trio’s Another Day in **** Paradise may just be one of the weirder and most arresting albums of the year. Joining Frith are bassist Jason Hoopes – who alternates between electric and acoustic – and drummer Jordan Glenn, whose kit wonderfully sounds as if half of it is built from toys and found objects. This album is all about sound, mood, texture, ideas, and atmosphere: demented church bells over distant guitar wails; tumbling kit and static guitar crunch punctuated by acoustic bass interjections; arco bass alongside Frith’s piercing Morton Subotnik impersonations; fuzzy slabs; his spoken nonsense syllables; long echoes reverberating across anxious and restless drums; quiet squeals and clacks behind long guitar swells mirroring the shape and direction of whale song. It is a sonic and affective world with the power to raise goosebumps.

To create this surreal soundscape the trio often returns to many of the same devices and vocabulary, but they twists and reconfigure them in new ways to fashion something fresh each time. Several tracks segue together (tracks two through six form a kind of mini-suite) and the group shifts gears quite quickly, which makes for a very quick and engaging listen. When Frith et al decide to change direction there is no hedging or tip-toeing – transitions are made assertively and roles are settled into at once, allowing for immediate discovery and invention.

Frith, Hoopes, and Glenn’s take on paradise is dark, and sounds akin to a seedy underworld out of a China Miéville novel, or perhaps the soundtrack to deleted Blade Runner scenes that were too twisted to use. Regardless of the inspiration, it’s nowhere I’d like to visit in person. But I will gladly take my ears there any time.

https://www.pointofdeparture.org/PoD56/PoD56MoreMoments3.html

Le rock manque-t-il à Fred Frith? A lire le titre bien bien punk de son nouveau disque, on se demande... Rappel rapide de la biographie du (essentiellement) guitariste : membre fondateur du groupe de rock-prog anglais Henry Cow qui hissa la chaussette au rang d'oeuvre totale Sur ses couvertures d'album, Fred Frith dérive après les années 70 et la rupture du band vers des scènes encore plus improvisées, encore plus underground, encore plus radicales. D'où sa présence continue depuis un tas de berges sur Intakt, label qui sait héberger tous ces itinéraires mal dégrossis pour l'industrie, sachant faire du bien pour le reste : d'ailleurs, Barry Guy viendrait lui plutôt de lamusique baroque, c'est dire.
Mais en fait, le rock manque sans doute à Fred Frith. Son power trio bien à lui (Jason Hoopes aux basses, Jordan Glenn aux percussions et batterie) s'empare d'unemusique qui emprunte beaucoup à un vocabulaire croisant quelque part entre Pink Floyd (avec qui a joué Fred Frith, avant qu'ils ne le deviennent) et Sonny Sharrock, un travail sur les textures et le son qui donne envie de passer un coup de bigot à Jim Jarmusch pour qu'il tourne Dead Man 2, Frith remplace Neil Young. Tout cela mélangé avec l'intérêt radical et toujours aussi intransigeant du guitariste anglais pour lesmusiques non-idiomatiques, par le biais desquels il insère des déséquilibres aux potentialités lyriques (''Yard with Lunatics''), énergiques (''The Deserted Garden') '', presque électro dans l'usage du schred), spectrales, infinies quoi !
Une impression de boucle bouclée se dégage de cet album lorsqu'on s'est un brin penché sur la carrière de Frith, mais une boucle ouverte sur quelque chose comme de lamusique. Une spirale, si vous voulez. Comme souvent avec les albums de Fred Frith, la vie intérieure de l'album est parfois trop laissée à sa propre économie (je me comprends) et lasse par endroits, retenant essentiellement les manies et le figement dans l'ensemble de ce que cesmusiques ''improvisées'' peuvent offrir. Pour le reste, des vrais bijoux bijoux, de vrais morceaux d'absolu kiff, et l'intransigeance d'unemusique qui en toute simplicité reste fidèle à son salutaire mouvement.

http://www.djamlarevue.com/blog/2016/9/20/fred-frith-trio-another-day-in-****-paradise?rq=intakt

Pilier du label Intakt, et Suisse d’adoption depuis des années, le guitariste anglais Fred Frith est, et reste, un musicien inclassable qui fréquente des musiciens de tous styles, se déplaçant sur l’échiquier musical à la manière d’un fou, atterrissant toujours dans la case où on ne l’attend pas. Avec le bassiste Jason Hoopes et le batteur Jordan Glenn, il renoue avec le rock de ses débuts, mais sans répétition, sinon peut-être un peu de nostalgie. Non seulement la musique, forte et dure, de Frith n’a rien à craindre des jeunes musiciens noise qui travaillent dans des domaines post jazz-rock, mais on a toujours l’impression qu’il leur montre la voie. Plein de rebondissements même si parfois assourdissant à mon goût

https://www.culturejazz.fr/spip.php?article3004

Frith remains the most splendidly bloody-minded of innovators. Another Day..., perhaps thankfully, has little to do with Phil Collins, but it does summon some of Frith's rock roots: essentially this is a power trio set loose in a free, irreverent, go-for-it context. There's the edge of Lifetime and the madness of Syd Barrett: indeed, there's more Pink Floyd here than in the Salvodelli/ Casarano/Bardoscia release reviewed elsewhere in these august pages. Yeah, there are longeurs: even the best artists disappear up their own musical arch sometimes. But at barely 50 minutes for 13 songs, Frith is a wise enough cove not to overstay his welcome. That said, 'Yard with Lunatics' is 11 minutes plus of paint-stripping intensity. As this is also Frith's touring band, many of these themes were already road tested so even at their most in-the-moment creative, this trio remain ski-pant tight. Or just pants if yawing guitar sonics ain't your thang. In which case you're missing out.

In seinem kalifornischen Gitarre- Bass-Schlagzeug- Trio ist alles möglich, der englische Aussenseiter zwischen Jazz und Rock überrascht hier endlich mal wieder mit einer absolut wilden Gitarre und seiner genialen Verspieltheit. Das weckt beste Erinnerungen an Frith Musik der frühen Achtziger auf S Ralph Records. Die zehn neuen Stücke sind als durchgehender Wall of Sound angelegt und bieten dabei dem Trio viel Raum für abenteuerliche, vibrierende Improvisationen. Fred Frith selbst sagt dazu: „It's a bloody great feeling". Stimmt definitiv!

Improviser and multi-instrumentalist Fred Frith has released music nearly every year since the early '70s. Through countless collaborations, solo albums, soundtracks and more, he has continually kept his listeners, and fellow musicians, at the edges of their seats. His new album, Another Day In **** Paradise, is no exception.

Each member of this trio-Frith on guitar, Jason Hoopes on bass and Jordan Glenn on drums-adds sounds, layers and textures to the often- dense improvisational soundscapes. But the sound design is so clear and vivid that listeners will be able to easily distinguish individual voices. Though complex and multifaceted, the music never veers toward excess.

Listeners will have no trouble staying grounded in the sonic mix. But this album is no easy listening. Musically, there's a lot going on. The way it pushes the listener toward the brink of sensory overload is exciting-the ears learn to adapt and function in an uncommon way. Not for the faint of heart, Another Day In **** Paradise will leave its listeners tripped out and travel-weary, but ultimately in a better place.