How clever is too clever? How busy is too busy? Listening to contemporary jazz, you end up pondering these questions on a regular basis. Sometimes after you’ve heard enough cleverly sliced-up 11/8 hiphop grooves you wish that people would just cut all the fuss and swing. But then you get a disc like Olaf Ton’s Das dunkle Vermächtnis der goldenen Kuh (“the dark legacy of the golden cow [Golden Calf?]” – doesn’t exactly trip off the tongue, does it?), which is, yes, busy, clever, downright abrasive – and fun as hell. The first thing that grabs you is the in-your-face rhythm section: Michael Haves is one of those rare bassists who seems to be talking rather than playing notes, and drummer Christian Marien’s combination of slinkiness and cartoon thrashiness recalls Joey Baron only to go him one better. The horns – trumpeter Richard Koch, saxophonist/clarinettist Benjamin Weidekamp, and trombonist Matthias Müller – specialize in droll, poised commentaries pitched at an oblique angle to the rhythm section’s herkyjerky activity; they occasionally dip into a free-jazz bag for some grotesque rasping and spitting, but it’s done lightheartedly enough it’s more like they’re blowing raspberries. This is entertaining music, but it’s a little scary, too: “Rufen sie herrn plim,” for instance, starts out genially enough then turns apocalyptic. I had enjoyed the group’s self-titled Leo debut but found it a little too tidy; this new release is considerably stronger – it’s easily one of the best jazz releases of 2005.

Young German bands seem to be fond of peculiar band-names and even more peculiar album-titles, to judge by this batch of CDs. Bassist Roland Fidezius’s quartet is called Odd Shot; their debut is Oscar + Emma. Fidezius and drummer Rudi Fischerlehner work up some simple but juicy grooves that pull together post-Masada jazz, miniaturized funk and a little rock. The horns – Richard Koch and Benjamin Weidekamp from Olaf Ton – get plenty of solo-space, and Weidekamp is in especially strong form; at times he experiments with passages of quarter-tone playing or throws in some splenetic overblowing. (Microtonal playing seems to be a specialty of this particular corner of the German scene – Frank Gratkowski and Hayden Chisholm have also experimented with quarter-tones in the past.) Fidezius is rather low-key and unobtrusive considering that he’s the leader, favouring a moody, minor-key ambience that seems intended to contrast with the brighter, more energetic work of the horns and drummer. Fans of Masada and of funky small-group jazz will enjoy this one, and the presence of Koch and Weidekamp means that listeners who respond to Das dunkle Vermächtnis der goldenen Kuh will want to hear this too, even if it falls short of Olaf Ton’s originality and sheer chutzpah.

It’s hard to figure out which is the bandname and which is the album-title for the third CD in this batch (one of the dangers of quirky bandnames, hmmmm?). Careful inspection of the packaging suggests that Nickendes Perlgras is the trio, while Meat Hat is the name of their new CD. Trumpeter Michael Anderson’s a new name to me, but I’d come across Michael Thieke and Eric Schaefer before in the context of the European ultraminimalist-improv scene: Schaefer was part of Absinth Records’ Berlin Drums project, and Thieke has made frequent appearances on the prolific Creative Sources label. Meat Hat is an entirely different kettle of fish, though, a cheeky bassless trio session in the tradition of Dave Douglas’s Tiny Bell Trio: Schaefer in particular has Jim Black’s goodhumoured thrash down pat. The emphasis is on brevity: the trio zips through 16 pieces in the space of 48 minutes with sparky, slightly exaggerated virtuosity. Listening to these brief, toylike pieces I was never bored, but found it hard to get too involved either. It’s a likeable example of pocketsized modern jazz, but I suspect they’d be making more compelling music if they got rid of the cutesiness.

Nate Dorward

Cadence, January 2006