Susana Santos Silva / Julius Gabriel / Gustavo Costa / Goncalo Almeida

Adding to the Iberian contingent of the German-Portuguese trio Ikizukuri, Portuguese trumpeter Susana Santos Silva makes a rare foray into pseudo-Metal sounds here. That’s pseudo-Metal though, because while the beats from fellow Portuguese electric bassist Gonçalo Almeida and the drums of Gustavo Costa are repetitive and hard-hitting, they never descend to mere pounding. Plus the split tone and smears projected by German soprano saxophonist Julius Gabriel reflect on his grounding in expressive improvised Jazz. As for Silva, she’s involved with many experiments from solo sessions to combo sessions with Torbjörn Zetterberg.

On Suicide Underground Orchid Silva’s slurs and plunger work appropriately judders against Gabriel’s squeezed trills as crunching string twangs and object manipulation from the drummer provide the harsh base to propel dissected tones that reflect the band’s Japanese name, a translation of a sashimi using live ingredients. Although back-and-forth whinnying brass stings shattered reed squeaks and angled bass lines aren’t lethal, jagged trumps polish every time. The program has some respite though. “In the We Some, No S Can Though”, a title which all the others appears to arrive from a failed ESL student’s dialogue, toy piano-like clinks mated with guitar-like suppleness from the bassist, sets up more delicate undulations. Later, a cumulative freight-train-like response returns the theme to near opaqueness.

Costa’s post production, responsible for the toy piano sounds is used more extensively on the concluding “The and Flesh His”. Amplified whistles and synthesized mutations deconstruct screaming brass high notes, reed growls, wood-splintering drum raps and electric bass sluices to multiply audible tones. But no matter the aggregate of timbral shakes, inflations, speeds and echoing repeats that arrive, an authoritative yet distinctive narrative is maintained until the end.

With appeal for Metal Heads and Free Jazzers alike, the quartet combination is an experiment that mostly works. Still, even linguists could have trouble working through the English and Japanese lingos that affect song titles.

–Ken Waxman

Track Listing: 1. Kindhearted Part Wrestle 2. Wealth, to the Poison in the Wash 3. Goldfish Tooth Variable 4. In the We Some, No S Can Though. 5. I a an Failures 6. The and Flesh His Resources

Personnel: Susana Santos Silva (trumpet); Julius Gabriel (soprano saxophone); Gonçalo Almeida (electric bass) and Gustavo Costa (drums and electronic post production)