And despite the whole prog/jazz-fusion thing (which frankly would normally make me want to do a Van Gogh on my ear lobes) the sheer energy of the thing prevents it lapsing into the realm of the chin-stroking tosspot community.
Elephant9 – Dodovoodoo
www.myspace.com/elephant9theband www.runegrammofon.com/artists/elephant9/
Elephant9 are three Norwegians playing an acid-fried kind of jazz-prog-funk powered along by Hammond Organ, Fender Rhodes and monstrously epic drumming. The title track with which the album opens is a frenetic take on Bitches Brew-era Miles Davis and sets the scene for an album which for all the wig-outs and noodling rocks pretty damn hard.
The three players are all members of various other groups – Ståle Storløkken plays keyboards for Supersilent and Humcrush; Nikolai Eilertsen bass is normally heard on National Bank records and Torstein Lofthus bashes the pigskins for Shining. Despite the other commitments the band sounds incredibly tight, even when entering into long improvisational passages. And despite the whole prog/jazz-fusion thing (which frankly would normally make me want to do a Van Gogh on my ear lobes) the sheer energy of the thing prevents it lapsing into the realm of the chin-stroking tosspot community.
There are moments of subtlety: second track I Cover The Mountain Top starts quietly – all shimmery synths building slowly. It then turns into something with more balls towards the end and starts to emulate the same frenetic ferocity of the opener. On Hymne the pace slows right down and one of the rare uses of guitar on the album serves not to ratchet up the drama, but to keep a lid on it. For the most part though, the tracks are full of ebullience and drive.
Words: Rover