Fire! Orchestra ‎– Enter (2014)

Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation
Format: CD, Vinyl
Label:  Rune Grammofon

Tracklist:
1.   Enter Part One
2.   Enter Part Two
3.   Enter Part Three
4.   Enter Part Four

Credits:
Alto Saxophone – Anna Högberg
Baritone Saxophone – Martin Küchen
Baritone Saxophone, Clarinet – Fredrik Ljungkvist
Bass – Dan Berglund, Joel Grip
Bass Clarinet – Christer Bothén
Bass Saxophone – Jonas Kullhammar
Cornet – Goran Kajfes
Drums – Andreas Werlin, Johan Holmegard, Raymond Strid
Electric Bass – Johan Berthling
Electric Guitar – Sören Runolf
Electric Guitar, Acoustic Guitar – David Stackenäs
Electric Piano, Organ – Martin Hederos
Electronics – Joachim Nordwall
Keyboards, Mellotron – Sten Sandell
Lap Steel Guitar – Andreas Söderström
Tenor Saxophone – Elin Larsson
Tenor Saxophone, Conductor – Mats Gustafsson
Trombone – Mats Äleklint
Trumpet – Emil Strandberg, Magnus Broo, Niklas Barnö
Tuba – Per Åke Holmlander
Voice – Mariam Wallentin, Simon Ohlsson, Sofia Jernberg
Composed By – Andreas Werlin, Johan Berthling, Mariam Wallentin, Mats Gustafsson

The big band has been part of jazz since the 1920s, but in the late 1960s a new kind of large ensemble began to emerge as part of the directions then taking hold in the music. These groups took a stand alongside other free and avant-garde jazz innovators of the time, their positions energised by the febrile socio-political atmosphere that gripped much of the USA and Europe. They outgrew traditional trio and quartet forms, in tacit acknowledgement that the most appropriate response to racism, oppression and the military-industrial complex was to organise along collective lines. 

In 1968, trumpeter Michael Mantler's forty-strong Jazz Composer's Orchestra released a sprawling self-titled double album with contributions by Cecil Taylor, Pharoah Sanders, Charlie Haden and Mantler's then wife Carla Bley. A year later, Haden's own Liberation Music Orchestra released their debut album, also self-titled, while at the turn of the decade South African pianist Chris McGregor's Brotherhood Of Breath counted British free improv luminaries Evan Parker and Paul Rutherford among its members. As the 1970s wore on, Parker and Rutherford went on to play in Barry Guy's London Jazz Composers Orchestra and Alexander von Schlippenbach's Globe Unity Orchestra, both of which survive to this day. 

With Enter, Fire! Orchestra extends its claim to form part of this illustrious lineage. Like its predecessors it has a strong musical personality as bandleader/conductor, in this case the Swedish saxophonist Mats Gustafsson. The ensemble began life as Fire!, the trio of Gustafsson, bassist Johan Berthling and drummer Andreas Werliin, who released four albums of heady avant rock including collaborations with Jim O'Rourke and Oren Ambarchi. Consisting of the core trio, plus more than 20 fellow travellers from the vibrant Scandinavian avant/improv scenes, Fire! Orchestra made its vinyl debut last year with the live album Exit, and now, Enter is its first studio outing. 

The result is four sides of blissed-out transcendence, galvanised by an immediacy that anchors the ensemble to soul and free jazz even as its joyous riffing takes it in the direction of psychedelic and progressive rock. Opening with a hypnotic Fender Rhodes motif, 'Part 1' sees vocalist Mariam Wallentin (Werliin's partner in Wildbirds & Peacedrums) set out the Orchestra's vision in deep, soulful cries of "Let us all go… let them all go… let it all go… feel it all go…" Metallic sheets of electric guitar are joined by the Mellotron, no less, its distinctive frosty tone harking back to the late '60s as surely as do Wallentin's ecstatic vocals. 'Part 2' kicks in with another '60s reference, as a deranged take on the Beatles' 'Tomorrow Never Knows' morphs into a livid collision between guitar and electronics before giving way to a hymnal section for horns and brass. 

The album's episodic structure makes for a thrilling listen in which soloists and the full ensemble constantly reinforce and counterpoint each other. Gustafsson himself is a forceful presence, his tenor sax laying down some fearsome skronk over 'Part 3's infectious bass groove. Recalling his work with The Thing, the saxophonist alights with glee on a hook or phrase, gathers up his forces and transforms it into a juggernaut statement of intent. If there's a weakness to point out it's the voices of Sofia Jernberg and Simon Ohlsson, whose vocals lack the burning intensity of Wallentin's and occasionally descend into gimmicky abstraction and pompous rhapsodising respectively. 

Despite the Orchestra's evident liking for full-on collective freakouts, there are hooks and melodies aplenty here that drive the group's mighty impulse to communicate. That delicious opening Fender motif returns in 'Part 4', building joyfully with brass and horns as the three singers declare "This is not a dream, this is an awakening… so I have experienced both life and death". It's a powerful appeal to transcendence, one that's at once emotionally draining and utterly inspiring.

Richard Rees Jones / The Quietus

Fire! Orchestra ‎– Exit! (2013)

Style: Free Jazz, Free Improvisation
Formar: CD, Vinyl
Label:Rune Grammofon

Tracklist:
1.   Exit! Part One
2.   Exit! Part Two

Credits:
Alto Saxophone – Anna Högberg
Baritone Saxophone, Clarinet – Fredrik Ljungkvist
Bass – Dan Berglund, Joe Williamson, Joel Grip
Bass Clarinet, Sintir [Guimbri] – Christer Bothe´n
Bass Saxophone – Jonas Kullhammar
Drums – Andreas Werliin, Johan Holmegard, Raymond Strid, Thomas Mera Gartz
Electric Bass – Johan Berthling
Electronics – Joachim Nordwall
Guitar – Andreas Söderström, David Stackenäs, Sören Runolf
Organ – Tomas Hallonsten
Piano, Electronics – Sten Sandell
Tenor Saxophone – Elin Larsson
Tenor Saxophone, Electronics, Conductor – Mats Gustafsson
Trombone – Mats Äleklint
Trumpet – Emil Strandberg, Magnus Broo, Niklas Barnö
Tuba – Per Åke Holmlander
Voice – Mariam Wallentin, Sofia Jernberg
Voice, Guitar – Emil Svanängen

Sometimes it's best not to predict. If the idea of expanding Fire!'s core trio of saxophonist/electric pianist Mats Gustafsson, bassist Johan Berthling and drummer Andreas Werlin into Fire! Orchestra's massive, 28-piece behemoth was based on the trio's extant discography— You Liked Me Five Minutes Ago (Rune Grammofon, 2009), Unreleased (Rune Grammofon, 2011), and In the Mouth of a Hand Rune Grammofon, 2012)—then a relentless album of high energy and high volume density would be expected. Which makes Exit! a complete and utter surprise, and in the best possible way.  

That's not to say there isn't plenty of cacophonous chaos amidst Exit!'s two-part, multi-episodic, continuous 44-minute suite; when there is, beyond its six reeds and five brass, a total of three keyboardists, four bassists and four drummers means plenty of potential for some seriously joyous noise, and given Fire!'s predisposition for unfettered and unrelenting improvisation, it's no surprise that, at times, the music builds to wave after wave of climactic peaks. And even when the dynamics drop, there's plenty of angularity clearly not meant for the faint-of-heart.  

Still, Exit!'s biggest surprise—though, following Gustafsson's career in particular, perhaps this should not be a surprise—is that it is a more dynamic piece that, if not exactly beautiful, does break down into quieter passages of greater clarity that allow for Arnold de Boers' text to be delivered—from near-lyricism to ululating freak-outs—by three singers including Sofia Jernberg, whose 2012 Trondheim Jazz Festival performance with The New Song made her an inevitable participant here.  

There's still plenty of freedom, and room for extremes like screaming, whammy bar-driven electric guitars and electronics from a number of sources including Gustafsson, whose occasional unmistakable solo—here, on tenor saxophone rather than the baritone more commonly associated with Fire! (leaving that to fellow Swede, Atomic saxophonist Fredrik Ljungkvist)—is of the visceral, cathartic nature that's become a personal signature. But with its broader dynamic range and Gustafson's conducting, Exit! is somehow more eminently accessible than Fire!'s usual work, the inevitable consequence of past large ensembles like bassist Charlie Haden's Liberation Music Orchestra and keyboardist Sun Ra's Arkesta. Still, neither of these precedents had Berthling and Weliin's joined-at-the-hip grooves, which drive most of the proceedings. Further bolstered with additional players including drummer Raymond Strid and ex-Esbjorn Svensson bassist Dan Berglund, they're even more potent as the group shuffles through a variety of meters ranging from the ¾ ostinato that drives the opening of "Exit! Part One" and the slower, greasier groove in its second half, to the fiery 5/4 rhythm that emerges from the freer opening of "Part Two."  

Exit! ultimately ends with a cluttered free-for-all the builds from sparer, more defined components to an ending more in keeping with Fire!'s usual modus operandi, as more and more of the musicians enter the fray, leading to five minutes of truly joyful abandon. It's a fitting ending to this expanded version of Fire! that's unequivocally its greatest accomplishment to date. Broader instrumentation and a stronger sense of construction make Exit! both an exhilarating first experience and one to return to time and again, as its multiplicity of rewards unfold with each and every listen.

John Kelman / All About Jazz