Punk Kong is the Brussels-based quintet that offers a unique blend of free jazz, psychedelic rock, African blues, dreamy drones, and free improvised music, This trio features the edgy guitar lines of Greek bandleader, guitarist, and main composer Giotis Damianidis, the hyper-dynamic Belgian sax players Grégoire Tirtiaux (alto and baritone), Viktor Perdieus (tenor and baritone) and Ruben Verbruggen (alto and baritone), and Portuguese drummer João Lobo. Same But Different is the third album of the quintet, and it was recorded at studio Grez in Brussels in February 2022.

Same But Different breaks a golden silence of six years but corresponds with Punk Kong’s colorful amalgam of genres and as before references a famous cinematic ape. All the music was composed by Damianidis, who also produced the album, and it is structured as an eight-part, dramatic suite. Part of the music was used as the original score for the film Vita Altra (Life Another) by Italian director Davide Belotti (2023) about a Sicilian man who confronts his past as two strangers embody his conflicting desires, blending reality and fantasy.

Damianidis’ effects-laden, bluesy guitar lines lead and set the cinematic atmosphere of this album, echoed by the sax choir and colored by Lobo’s percussive touches. Italian, Brussels-based pianist (on Fender Rhodes) joins Punk Kong on «Epsilon» and intensifies the sensual, repetitive, call-and-answer trance-like bluesy vibe. The quintet’s music keeps flowing with a similar, bluesy seductive feeling like a clean transparent river into the mountains.

Eyal Hareuveni

Giotis Damianidis (guitar), Grégoire Tirtiaux (alto saxophone, baritone saxophone), Viktor Perdieus (tenor saxophone, baritone saxophone), Ruben Verbruggen (alto saxophone, baritone saxophone), João Lobo (drums), Giovanni di Domenico (Fender Rhodes)