4boxs - several albums
4boxs (”Your home for Pimprovisation”) is an exciting music project headed by Mike Hagedorn. From his press release: “Trombonist Mike Hagedorn has been testing his theories of style, genre and technique in Chicago ongoing ten years. His current project, 4boxs, begun in 2001, is a 10-year recording and performance plan where he combines musicians from various backgrounds into unconventional groups to push the evolution of popular and improvised musics.” His website hosts 7 albums of jazz, improvised, and avant-garde music, recorded by Hagedorn and his collaborators.
Ol’ Sparky is a collection of “preconceived and accidental solo, duo, and quartet improvisations digitally reassembled into four unpretentiously titled untitled tracks.” The first and third tracks are almost an ambient landscape with meandering trombone solos laid on top, the second and fourth tracks are more aggressive and speedy.
Beekey is a heavy, deeply-processed, industrial-sounding rock album that still retains some of the jazz techniques - if not the sound - of the 4boxs project. Like nothing you’ve ever heard before, but hey - that’s true of most 4boxs music.
Total Improv! is a continuation of Ol’ Sparky but with the intrusion of Subotnick-esque electronic noise.
Temeritorium is an energetic jazz record. “The challengers: four diverse improvisers swapping roles and ditching preconventions. The match: a one-hour one-time-only recording session yielding bizarrely unique results. Truly, this is a swing-based free-improvisation album like no other.”
The Ridiculous Trio Plays the Stooges is easily explained: “trombone, tuba and drums (no vocals!) covering Stooges classics.”
The Driver is an avant-garde jazz piece by Mike Hagedorn.
anaananaan: Part one is 20 minutes of rockin’, noisy jazz chaos. Part two is definitely Subotnick (to my ears) with a furious rhythm and varied instrumentation. Strangely, the second half suddenly switches to a more Aphex Twin-like sound.
MP3s of varying bitrates for all the albums are available at the page below.
