Saxophonist Patrick Shiroishi, bassist Luke Stewart, trumpeter Chris Williams, guitarist Jessica Ackerley, and drummer Jason Nazary comprise the avant-jazz/ improv/ experimental ensemble SSWAN, with their debut Invisibility is an Unnatural Disaster available now on black vinyl (first pressing of 400 copies), digipak CD (first pressing of 500 copies), and digital through 577 Records. Fiery and abstract in its explorations, the album’s three pieces are also cohesive in their interplay. SSWAN can kick up an impressive racket, but there are also passages of considerable beauty. Freedom rarely sounds better than this.
To hopefully communicate the brilliance of SSWAN, three of the five participants landed on my list of 2021’s best new releases found on this very website. That’s Jessica Ackerley with Friendship: Lucid Shared Dreams and Time Travel, her striking duo record with multi-horn man Daniel Carter, Patrick Shiroishi with his massive solo effort Hidemi, and Luke Stewart as part of Open the Gates by Irreversible Entanglements.
The CD Numbers Maker by Desertion Trio, an outfit that includes Jason Nazary, was a candidate for inclusion on said best list as well, and San Soleil, a cassette by the duo of Chris Williams and Shiroishi, would’ve been a serious contender had I actually heard it last year instead of only recently in preparation for this review. San Soleil is loaded with closely recorded splatter skronk and hovering extended tones made even more varied by the use of multiple horns. The set also served as my introduction to Williams and worked as a proper prologue to the three pieces that comprise Invisibility.
For it is easy to speculate that the familiarity of SSWAN’s participants adds to the record’s power. In addition to Sans Soleil, Shiroishi is heard on the lathe cut LP Live by the Chris Williams Quintet, which was mixed by Nazary. Shiroishi and Ackerley also have Extremities, a cassette of often wonderful sonic mayhem and brutality from 2020 that notably documents the first-time meeting of the pair, and another tape, Across Water, that was issued just a couple months ago.
There are no hard-set rules in avant-jazz and free improvisation (this extends to noise and experimental music in general, natch). There are working groups that rely to varying extents on compositional motifs, with Irreversible Entanglements and Thumbscrew springing to mind from the current scene. On the other side of the spectrum, there are more first-time meetings on recordings than one set of ears could be reasonably expected to soak up in a lifetime.
Invisibility benefits from the rapport detailed above, while as a debut recording concurrently possessing an air of spontaneity with clear ties to free improv, though in the opening title cut, Ackerley comes out swinging hard with a tangible Hendrix-ian edge, though I also hear a smattering of late-Coltrane in the equation, a similarity enhanced by Nazary’s Rashied Ali-like energy at the kit. And is that a smidge of The Process of Weeding Out-era Greg Ginn I detect in Ackerley’s overall sound thrust? Here’s hoping.
The entrance of Shiroishi’s reed wiggle and Williams valve blare sets up a sweet stretch of uncut Fire Music, action that’s shrewdly followed by a redirect away from the flames of forward momentum toward a rich bundle thicket of spiky improv, as Ackerley chords up a storm. And then, a fine solo showcase for Williams emerges with Stewart and Nazary getting off big time underneath. All the while, the tide gradually turns back to ensemble ecstatic mode before a quiet culminating comedown. What a bunch of freedom slicksters.
For much of its 11-minute duration, “Pattern Phases” is more about stretched tones, borderline drones, buzzes and burbles, clatter and thump, and all in a manner a tad reminiscent of ’70s Euro free improv, but with a little more heat generated as the interactions unfold. Interestingly, the track never really comes to a boil, though beaucoup rhythmic ruckus arises in the back half.
The 17-minute “A Miracle’s Worth” covers the length of side two, beginning with Ackerley alone, her playing sounding like morse code tapped out on a mbira in the hands of Eugene Chadbourne, as Nazary’s light percussive touch sneaks into the scheme like tendrils of smoke. As the rest of the group enters, they work up an eerie sustained tension rather than spitting out free jazz sparks, with the horn tones mingling with out-of-nowhere wordless vocal lamentations. The spirit of Ayler is hanging just off in the periphery as Shiroishi’s tones are warm in the wind down.
With Invisibility is an Unnatural Disaster, SSWAN has dished an unpredictable and wholly digestible platter of exquisite avant improvisational gush. It’ll surely be amongst the best of 2022.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
A
