Monday, June 2, 2014

Concert Review: Ingrid Laubrock and Tom Rainey at the RecordBar















I stood in mud for 11 hours with 50,000 people at Rockfest on Saturday.  Attending the heavy metal blowout makes me as happy as a pig in slop.  Experiencing amplified, regimented music as part of a vast throng is liberating.

On Sunday I sat amid an audience of 20 for a set of acoustic, improvised jazz performed by saxophonist Ingrid Laubrock and drummer Tom Rainey.

Rather than militant blast beats, Rainey's imaginative playing didn't include a single repeated pattern during the 40-minute opening set.  Laubrock was similarly ingenious on tenor and soprano.  Compared to the previous day's offerings, the New York-based duo's free jazz was entirely soothing. 

I was so relaxed that I went home early to bask in sweet avant-metal dreams.

(Original image by Plastic Sax.)

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