The Italian Jooklo Duo – keyboards-sax player-percussionist Virginia Genta and drummer David Vanzan – and Danish alto sax player Mette Rasmussen share a similar artistic vision. Both sides are fearless free-improvisers, ready for any musical adventure, tour constantly and often opt for limited-edition, DIY products that are not available for digital consumption.
Both sides also enjoy new and challenging collaborations. The Jooklos collaborated with distinct improvisers as C. Spencer Yeh, Thurston Moore and Dror Feiler but also with he Merce Cunningham Dance Company alongside John Paul Jones and Takehisa Kosugi. Rasmussen collaborated with drummers Chris Corsano and Ståle Liavik Solberg but also with larger ensembles as Mats Gustafsson’s Fire! Orchestra and Trondheim Jazz Orchestra. The collaboration between the Jooklos and Rasmussen is nothing but natural and has been and very active in recent years.
Graz Live! is the first official documentation of this collaboration, released as a limited-edition of 120 cassettes, in two different color sleeves, 60 of each, with Genta artwork and no further details. It captures a performance at KiG! (Kultur in Graz), Austria, from November 2016, as part of a short tour in Italy, Austria, and Slovenia. Jooklo Duo and Rasmussen begin with building dense layers of raw and intense sounds, ranging from psychedelic-atmospheric synth through fast-shifting, fractured rhythmic patterns to nervous sax wails, but mid-piece of the A side Genta suggests another course and the interplay becomes sparse, leisured and even ethereal. The second piece – B side – resumes the tough, explosive energy of the beginning of this set and the Jooklos and Rasmussen keep charging it with more brutal power and manic energy. This side – and the set – ends with another fast but less tougher improvisation where Rasmussen sax flights blends beautifully and organically with Jooklo Duo untimely psychedelic attacks of vintage synth whirlwinds and
wild drumming.
Eyal Hareuveni
Mette Rasmussen (as), David Vanzan (perc, dr), Virginia Genta (keys, ss)
