Third by Chris Forsyth & Nate Wooley

In recent years, guitarist Chris Forsyth has come on like the redeemer of classic rock. His work with the Solar Motel Band extends the improvisational fire and frankly ecstatic thrust of rock virtuosos like Tom Verlaine and Richard Thompson within sturdy riff structures that Led Zeppelin fans could appreciate without putting on their thinking caps. Trumpeter Nate Wooley’s recent output encompasses bruising free jazz with the trio Icepick, minimalist drones on his solo record The Almond and more elegantly arranged ensemble work with his Sextet. But put the two of them together and you can forget about all of that stuff. Genre references and personal styles fall away, since they’re essentially inadequate answers to the fundamental question at hand — what do we play?

This is a question that both men have faced in different ways, particularly in their work with Peeesseye (Forsyth) and Paul Lytton (Wooley). In those settings, both artists could play with just about anything, which meant that they had to be really clear about what they want to accomplish. There’s a lot of extended technique on display here — guitar as hiss generator or distant garbage disposal, amplified trumpet as knocked door or wind heard through deteriorating telephone wires.

But there are also passages where Forsyth explores a reticent but tonal approach that is close kin to Loren Connors c. Airs, and Wooley sings haunted, wordless syllables into his horn. What holds it all together is a finely tuned sense of complementarity, so that a sad string bend and a metallically distorted moan not only sound proximate, but inevitable, and when they both wail, it’s momentarily hard to tell guitar and horn apart. This isn’t really Wooley’s music, or Forsyth’s, but the creation of some hybrid organism that only exists when they play together and only honors its own laws.

Bill Meyer, Dusted

Tracklist

1.	Evening Rage Part 1	20:57

2.	Evening Rage Part 2	20:56

Credits

released November 3, 2014

Chris Forsyth: guitar
Nate Wooley: trumpet

Mastered By – Bhob Rainey
Recorded By – Kinan Faham

Design, Photography – Thalia Raftopoulou
Released by Rekkim Records
rekemrecords.tumblr.com

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