Jazz Articles about Chicago Underground Duo

Chicago Underground Duo: Two Voices, One Sound

by Paul Olson
April 3, 2006

Percussionist Chad Taylor and cornet player Rob Mazurek are the Chicago Underground Duo. Since the Chicago Underground collective expands or contracts with each project, they're also two-thirds of the Chicago Underground Trio and half of the Chicago Underground Quartet. Born in the 1990s out of the fertile Chicago improv scene, the group has, in its various permutations, produced a consistently excellent body of recorded music that mixes large amounts of improvisation with electronica, sampling, and a vast assortment of world ...

Chicago Underground Duo: In Praise of Shadows

by Troy Collins
February 27, 2006

Rob Mazurek and Chad Taylor regroup once again for their fourth album as the Chicago Underground Duo and ninth under the Chicago Underground moniker. The project has varied in size from duo, trio and quartet to orchestra, but the core of Mazurek and Taylor have always been its heartbeat. Utilizing occasional overdubbing and tastefully augmented post-production, In Praise of Shadows is their most stylistically varied and sonically dense recording.

Taking the title from Junichiro Tanizaki's early-20th Century essay ...

Chicago Underground Duo: In Praise of Shadows

by Nathan Haselby
February 14, 2006

In Praise of Shadows, the fourth release by the Chicago Underground Duo, focuses on continuing experiments in sense confusion within a single relationship: music and light. As with previous albums, cornetist Rob Mazurek and drummer Chad Taylor spend considerable time on piano and vibes respectively, creating a surprisingly full sound that is matched by a wide stylistic palette, from free bop to minimalism, in settings both austere and exotic.

Their interest in the visual power of music, most obvious in ...

Chicago Underground Duo: Axis And Alignment

by Mark Corroto
April 12, 2002

The Chicago Underground Duo, made up of Rob Mazurek and Chad Taylor, has expanded and contracted from the two core members to alternately become the Chicago Underground Duo (which actually was a trio), Chicago Underground Trio (was sometimes a quartet), the Chicago Underground Quartet (was actually a quartet) and the Chicago Underground Orchestra (don't ask). This year's release finds the duo scaled back to just Mazurek and Taylor pushing ever outward into the nexus of jazz, electronics, and improvisation.

Chicago Underground Duo: Synesthesia

by Derek John
October 1, 2000

The Chicago Underground Duo, despite its name, is not a shadowy pair of comic book- inspired crime fighters. This dynamic duo has no underground lair and the only thing they're fighting on their new album might be the rigid conventions of the jazz musical establishment.

The group consists of accomplished musicians Rob Mazurek and Chad Taylor. Part of the Thrill Jockey consortium of musicians who revolve around the label's popular practitioners of sugary coated progressive rock, The Sea and Cake, ...

Chicago Underground Duo: Synesthesia

by Mark Corroto
June 1, 2000

Chicago's jazz and new music scene seems free from the heavy peer pressure foisted upon the New York Downtown crowd. Where New York's creative musicians tend toward holding things close to their chests, their Chi-town counter-parts are continually forming new bands, interchanging parts and creating music without the self consciousness and over-examination that goes on at der Knitting Factory. This openness is evident on the second release by the Chicago Underground Duo. The Duo comprises cornetist Rob Mazurek and percussionist ...