Flip Side
Lina Allemano’s Ohrenschmaus
Lumo Records LM 2024-16 (linaallemano.bandcamp.com/album/flip-side)
Forget other recordings of wholly improvised music – not that this is better than Arve Henriksen, Nate Wooley and the rest – it’s merely that such comparisons are redundant. When the musicians of Lina Allemano’s Ohrenschmaus begin to improvise, you get the wondrous impression that they seemingly don’t believe the first bar of a work ought to herald its beginning, nor do they believe that works on this recording, Flip Side, need end with a rousing conclusion.
The result is a meta-work that creates myriad associations, resonances and new perspectives, not just between the lines and spaces of each work but also within the whole cycle of songs from Sidetrack (the recording’s opening salvo) to its explosive end, Sidespin.
In between this panoply of musical gestures trumpeter Allemano, bassist Dan Peter Sundland, drummer Michael Griener and accordionist Andrea Parkins (who also comes to the party with found objects and electronics) continuously let listeners know that they may have stepped into an ongoing dialogue. Sidetrack is initially mouse-like, creeping and scurrying, but subsequent creations do more than suggest that the musicians simply nibble at this ongoing feast.
Everyone contributes wonderfully to the heft of the music. Allemano is particularly engaged, drawing the other musicians into the frenzy of the improvisations. This is especially true of the whirligig velocity of such pieces as Sideswipe and Stricken, from where irruption bursts forth. Overall, this is a muscular, exhilaratingly voiced and lucidly inventive musical excursion.
