Sketches and Ballads

Full Blast is frequently perceived as a Peter Brötzmann band, because the saxophonist's powerful blowing and maniacal stamina are major factors in its over-the-top sound. But this live album reveals the group to be in fact very much a collaborative project, with each member making equal contributions. The single 36-minute piece they perform is based on a score by drummer Michael Wertmüller, which according to the liner notes, runs to some 50 pages while still leaving room for free improvisation. In order to properly execute the composition (for the first time, no less), three special guests were brought in to supplement the core trio of Brötzmann, Wertmüller, and electric bassist Marino Pliakas: trumpeter Thomas Heberer, saxophonist Ken Vandermark, and percussionist Dirk Rothbrust, whose tympani work provides a major thrill, creating seismic rumbles beneath some of the piece's more meditative passages. Structurally, "Sketches and Ballads" is similar to many long-form free jazz works: ballad sections are punctuated by outbursts of screaming and clattering, solos rise to ecstatic peaks before falling away and allowing the ensemble to move forward again. What makes this such an intense and worthwhile album are the unique timbres offered by the combination of Pliakas' massive electric bass, Wertmüller's assaultive drumming (he's probably the closest thing to a blastbeat player in jazz), and the fierce horns. Heberer, on trumpet, is the only horn player who's not going all out here; he seems to fulfill the role Raphe Malik occupied in some of Cecil Taylor's bands, providing an oasis of relative beauty amid the howling vortex that everyone else was busy conjuring. This piece has all the ferocity and power of previous Full Blast discs, but it's not sustained the way it is on their self-titled debut or 2006's Black Hole. Consequently, this album is less exhausting, and more exhilarating, than anything else they've done, and highly recommended.