wilkinson/edwards/noble: 3 of a kind

The trio of Alan Wilkinson, John Edwards, and Steve Noble continue to plot their course ever outward and ever upward. These new songs, recorded in South London at that wonderful performance space -- at the heart of the improve scene here at this moment -- Iklectik, are the very beating heart of improvised music. It's not that they are good, or even representative -- such relative terms fail to express the continuum of which these sounds are a key part. This is music that evades the strictures of scientific measurement or critical theory. It just is. Wilkinson is a master of the tribal, balls-out approach to sax playing. He lets it all hang out. But there is great subtlety in what he does with his horn, in the range of inflection, the space between the phrases, the singing tone. At times he sounds like a tight knit sax section in a swinging big band all on his own. There is definitely jazz in there. Edwards and Noble form the rhythmic base for much that is good and beautiful in the improv scene today. Years of playing together and individual brilliance mean they mesh like the gears of a micro-tuned machine. Together the trio make music. And that is all that needs saying. Personnel: Alan Wilkinson - alto, baritone saxophones, bass clarinet; John Edwards - double bass; Steve Noble - drums.