Jazz Articles about Vole

About Vole

Album Review

Three stalwarts of the London Improvisers Orchestra come together on the debut outing of the genre-mashing Vole. When playing credits number saxophone iconoclasts Peter Brotzmann, Evan Parker and Ingrid Laubrock, bassist Simon Fell and pianist Alexander Hawkins, then energy and imagination can be almost guaranteed. What's fascinating is how they align improv with noise, heavy metal and prog outbursts, sometimes within the space of a single cut. Although there are some clearly scripted sections, the whole program is ascribed collectively, ...

Album Review

Vole: The Hillside Mechanisms

Read "The Hillside Mechanisms" reviewed by Glenn Astarita

by Glenn Astarita
May 3, 2013

Youthful dynamism and a conglomerate of influences signify a few conspicuous attributes of this European trio's debut album. It's a semi-structured and highly improvised outing. And the musicians pool their resources to indulge in free-form slugfests amid transitory punk-rock grooves, bizarre progressive-rock stylizations and numerous flights into the avant-garde jazz strata. Nonetheless, the band is a lean and mean fighting machine. But the artists do communicate an organized methodology while multitasking via these live performances. “Rampicanti" is a ...