Alessandro Bosetti, voice, electronics. Tony Buck, drums. Kenta Nagai, guitar. With guests : Hilary Jeffrey, trombone. Els Vandeweyer, vibes.
“You Wait to Publish” is the third release of the powerful voice and electronics, fretless guitar, drums trio led by Italian (via Berlin) speech musician Alessandro Bosetti with Tony Buck The Necks) from Australia and Japanese, based in the USA, Kenta Nagai (Shelley Hirsch, Tatsuya Nakatani). This album sticks to the band’s original core approach based on obsessively repeated speech-melodies, while it opens up to a wide spectrum of post jazz, post pop, post minimalist solutions and colors, enhanced by Hilary Jeffrey (Zeitkratzer, C.Christer Hennix) on trombone and Els Vandeweyer (Fred Van Hove, Ken Vandermark) on vibes on several tracks. References range from Henry Threadgill’s Zooid to the early Talking Heads, via Scott Walker and Red Crayola, ultimately summing up to an
absolutely unique sound. As in the previous Bosetti’s Monotype releases Royals it features the artwork of the German artist Kati Heck on the cover.
Andy Moor about Trophies : “First time I heard this trio was after 3 days of no sleep at the Konfrontationen Festival in Nickelsdorf… Alessandro gave me a CD and we gave it a spin on hour 7 of our 18 hour drive home to Amsterdam. This is a good state in which to listen to music … tired , happy and ears saturated by three days and nights of music… listened with Terrie Ex and Valentina and we all agreed it was good driving music and also something we’d never heard before… it was very hard to figure out what the hell was going on… I was sure Alessandro’s voice was triggering some kind of midi device that made guitar sounds that would follow the rhythm and melody of his voice… but at other times it sounded like guitarist Kenta Nagai was actually playing along… which seemed almost impossible. In fact it was the latter and I still believe it’s impossible which is why I like this trio so much… and what better drummer to accompany this bizarre music than Tony Buck, who has an unmistakable and instantly recognizable language when he plays and one that seems to get better and better every time I hear him. It’s also an inspired choice because Tony plays the same way he speaks: fast, funny, with surprises and lots of words and sentences that take unusual corners.
Kenta’s guitar sound has many more textures and variations that recall early Keith Levine (PIL) and Roland S. Howard (Birthday Party) especially on the opening track “You Wait to Publish”. Guitar and voice in unison for me has always been a challenge to listen to… we know the guilty parties without mentioning names… but here it works because it’s done with incredible, detailed care… Alessandro continues his bizarre texts… similar to Morton Feldman’s musical phrases… repeating the same sentence over and over yet each one sounding different.
Somehow he manages to sound dead serious and very funny at the same time… “Matta Clark” made me laugh… who is following whom?? but that isn’t really the point… this music demonstrates the musicality of spoken word… and seems to be mocking it and celebrating it at the same time… Tony’s drums are clearer, better recorded and more present than on the previous two releases and this gives the whole sound a brighter, more dynamic, exciting element. On some pieces, maybe due to the addition of Hilary Jeffrey’s trombone and Els Vandeweyer’s vibraphone, they accidentally venture into Beefheart territory… but it sounds so great because it does seem to be accidental. I also listened to this CD while driving… and for me it seems to be the best way to listen to Trophies… its ideas and tempo seem very similar to a car moving at about 130 km an hour, but it doesn’t feel fast or rushed… just full of moving energy and constant change.”