ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND

One could call this some sort of musical melting pot of sort with more and more members joining forces on each subsequent release. The band's debut "The Blind Watchers' Mysterious Landscapes" hosted an impressive seven musicians on board but three of them only contributed to a single track so really it featured a "normal" band lineup in number however all hell brook loose with the sophomore followup "Reflection In A Moebius Ring Mirror" which incorporated a whopping 17 instrumentalists and vocalists to the mix!

Well can too much of a good thing be bad? Well not for these weavers of music magic. On this year's third release AGAIN ALORS? Segers outdoes himself and casts an amazing 21 musicians for the party. Like both previous albums this one is a lengthy beast and exceeds the 74-minute mark. That's a lot avant-pills to swallow for the uninitiated but if you are into this kind of weird musical expression that sounds something like Art Zoyd meeting The Necks and perhaps Heldon with hints of Univers Zero as well as other prog references then you won't think that this is too much music at all. In fact when music is this well crafted and original how can you NOT want more?

Only eight tracks but once again THE ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND showcases a diverse roster of talent that adds up to an amazingly wide range of stylistic approaches. The album opens with the uneasy abstract bleakness of "Disquiet" which exists in a darkened void of what many would deem the world of progressive electronic. Sounding something like a jazz-infused Heldon with angular references to Univers Zero during its "Heresie" era, this jangled mind blowing convocation of sounds eventually morphs into a bizarre strange of avant-jazz punctuated with avant-prog sensibilities, bizarre time signatures and ushers in a strange "conversation" between the instruments.

"Relatable Vertigineux" continues the avant-jazz focus but once again this is the type of jazz that doesn't obey any logic or set rules. Once again the freeness is forged by Segers' studio time that allowed large ensembles to craft live improvisation. The fact that these tunes were actually generated in live time makes them all the more impressive. "Further On The Ladder" lands back on Earth for a mopey yet oddly constructed vocal track. A rare but palatable "groove" keeps this one easier to follow than the freer drifting tracks that dominate. "Tingling Skin" is kept stable by a piano tinkling but enshrouded with a swarm of instrumental ambience that trades off the droning process while other instruments oscillate and reverberate as if everything has become an acoustic jazz reinterpretation of Klaus Schulze's strangest moments.

Just when you think it can't get more abstract "Voici Voila" drifts off into a world where no musical rules apply whatsoever and the entire thing sounds like an instrumental representation of various jungle animals in competition to be heard. Luckily a bass groove albeit on the avant-jazz side of things comes in and tames everything a bit well at the very least adds a bit of structure to make it sounds like a jazz ensemble go Krautrock from the early 70s. "A Beast Trophy" takes a complete left turn and sounds like a genuine jazz-fusion piece from the late 1970s only with lots of flute. Solid bass groove, tight chops and then some bassoon! Univers Zero gone jazz perhaps?

"Smudgy Cartography" is a reverb guitar improv sounding something like Fred Frith in Henry Cow with meandering motifs in full angularity. The grand finale "Atomos Keyhole" is an atmospheric freakfest in full improve mode on steroids. Basically a scary droning effect with lots of wordless vocals and a somewhat jazzy bass groove. Sounds a bit like Dimanda Galas crashing the party while the band is warming up. While it's always hard to express why some improv tracks work and some don't, i can safely say this one is my least favorite of the lot. A simulation of a heartbeat creeps in and so does some guitar licks. Sounds a bit like Magma dropping the zeuhl and engaging in a free-for-all.

Wow. After the more accessible grooves of the previous album i was wondering if THE ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND were going to continue into a commercial arena or even exist at all. This is exactly the direction i was hoping for! This album is even weirder and wilder than the debut and that's in a good way. Of course these improv avant-proggy jazz types of albums will only appeal to the most adventurous and open-minded music freaks out there but i am happy to report that this one is done so very very well. The musicians all gel together perfectly. The tracks all differ sufficiently as to make the album not fall into tedium and the production is perfect as well. There's never a cluster of sounds that suffocate the desired emotional response and best of all this is all very original as it doesn't sound like anything else out there and even distinct from the two previous albums. Overall i'm extraordinarily happy with this third EMB release. Right on, Guy Segers! There is life after UZ and Present!

While the debut album was already an ambitious affair with six musicians cranking out counterpoints as if they existed in their own dimensions and convening at sonic ley lines in unseen morphogenetic fields, REFLECTION IN A MOEBIUS RING MIRROR finds a much larger addition of musicians rotating throughout the album. In addition to Segers, Roland Binet (flute, piccolo), Michele Delville (guitar), Catherine Smet (piano, keyboards) and Dirk Wachtelaer (drums) from the debut, this second offering includes two vocalists (Cathryn Robson, Carla Diratz), three saxophonists (Martin Archer, Joe Higham, Dave Newhouse), a trumpetist (Jean-Pierre Suarez), a violinist (Arlane Plumerai), a cellist (Sigrid Vandenbogaerden), more guitarists (Eric Lemaître, Angel Ontalva) and a second drummer (Frank Balestracci). Many of theses musicians also play second instruments which include clarinet, keyboards and electronic effects. Whoah! Despite such a full house, this album never seems too busy.

The first noticeable difference between the ethereal otherworldliness of the debut and this sophomore album is that this one is immediately more accessible with a funk laden bass groove and jazzy counterpoints in the keys and drums. The atmospheric spaciness is allowed off its leash fairly soon but rather than drifting off into space and into freeform, the music keeps somewhat of a structure but not like the debut that implemented zeuhl styled bass lines. This one adopts various jazz and related styles such as bebop, modal jazz and funk. "Oncoming Season Wake" introduces a vocal jazz style which is layered over the avant-prog and jazz-fusion workouts. It does sound a bit busy but despite being easier on the ear than the debut, this is still far from easy listening. While the vocals do their thing, the remaining instruments take on weird counterpoints with a freaky horror movie styled keyboard run, angular Fred Frith styled guitar workouts all the while jazzy drum rolls pummel away and various instruments peek in and out.

Given the vocals and the more structured bass lines relying on jazz, most other instruments are kept on a leash but always a lengthy one. While the grooves keep some sort of stability to the 11 tracks which takes the album to the 75 minute run of playing time, there are moments that resemble the debut. "Day Of The Tsunami" must have been one of the leftovers from those sessions as it evokes an extremely agitating swarm of angularity that relies on extreme contrast. Dissonant piano tinklings are surrounded by a chilled folky flute run while heavily distorted guitar sounds angrily duke it out in the back with no actual structure. Only the flute has a recognizable melody while the bass becomes a rhythmic time keeper as the drums as missing in action. The piano takes over where the guitars leave off and go completely bonkers as if a bar brawl had broken out on the piano itself. The drums join in and all hell breaks loose. Everything turns into a brutal noise-fest except that totally chilled out flute which emerges from the din after the raucous is over and ends the track as it began.

Overall, REFLECTION IN A MOEBIUS RING MIRROR is a really great followup. While not as out there and more structured, it introduces completely new styles of taking the avant-prog more into jazz territories. While the vocal pieces with lyrics are rather tame and don't jive with the rest of the album as perfectly as i'd like, the haunting vocals used as instruments on "Spreading An Invisible Stream" are right on target. The album is much more diverse with tame tracks and the most avant-garde possible such as the industrial sounding "Belgian Rain Drop" which features a metallic sound simulating rain drops while scary chamber rock sounds evoke the darkness of early Univers Zero, especially the frightening cacophony of "Heresie." The album finishes with the lengthy vocal jazz track "The Perfume Of The Flying Room" which sounds like a strange fusion of Miles Davis jazz, an older version of Billie Holliday with avant-prog backing. This is another bizarre album by THE ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND. Just enough of what came before and a lot of new ingredients. Personally i prefer the debut but can't deny this is a cleverly crafted jump into the pool of ECLECTIC. Love it.

Putting the ECLECTIC back into the world of avant-prog, Segers is joined by a cast of like-minded sonic experimentalists who master the art of polyrhythmic overdrive in seemingly opposite universes but somehow meet at the crossroads where the ley lines of sound conspire to take the pointillistic approach of Karlheinz Stockhausen woven from a tapestry of Univers Zero styled avant-prog, free jazz, squiggly progressive electronica and then transmogrified into a surreal atmospheric soundscape that's part semi-structured and extremely improvised. The results of this maelstrom of maddening motifs and oscillating fluctuation of rhythmic flows is the debut album titled THE BLIND NIGHT WATCHERS' MYSTERIOUS LANDSCAPES. And yep. It's weird. Very, very, VERY weird. On this debut Guy Segers (bass, samplers) is joined by Roland Binet (flute, tenor sax), Joe Higham (electronics, soprano sax, doudouk), Michel Delville (electric guitar), Catherine Smet (keyboards) and Dirk Wachtelaer (drums.)

Drifting somewhat like a massive murmuration of starlings blackening the sky as they make unpredictable hairpin turns in both creepy chaos and breathtaking unison, THE ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND crafts its sound by recording some of the simpler tracks, such as the bubbling zeuhl bass lines accompanied by jazzy drum rolls and then allowing the multitude of sounds to shapeshift around them faster than a chameleon can change its colors. Add to that an impeccable production job that offers freaky echoing effects, timbre fluctuations and subliminal Doppler effects and it's like a circus act of sound where Magma, UZ, Miles Davis and Amon Duul II went to an LSD party and pushed the record button. The list of tricks and trinkets seems endless and such mastery only results from a talented cast of avant-garde musicians who can simultaneously reach that mysterious quantum sphere of musical madness that remains out of the reach of mere vocabulary but channeled through the mysterious gods of sonic vibration whatever they may be or where they reside. Given the intensity of this music, it's a match made in heaven for the experimental label Discus Music which excels at sniffing out the strangest of the strange.

THE BLIND NIGHT WATCHERS' MYSTERIOUS LANDSCAPES is avant-progger's paradise which runs the gamut of somewhat accessible (but let's face it, this is TRUE difficult listening all the way through) tracks like "Gradual Assistance" which at least finds the instruments behaving as if they were in the same band, to the most outrageous noise rock fueled freak-a-zoid sectors of the album such as "Godsmacked Distraction" which finds each band member existing in its own universe and somehow connecting through an invisible thread to adhere the proper quantum elements to a greater whole of which we can only perceive but never quite grasp. If this sort of maddening "OMG can this even be called music?" sorta shtick is your ticket to ethereal ecstasy then THE ECLECTIC MAYBE BAND will scratch that itch many times over. While often erupting in a chaotic tumult like colony of lepers climaxing in intervals, the compositions generally speaking, start off with some sort of bass groove that ratchets up the tension along with the percussion and some atmospheric embellishments. New elements slowly ooze in until wham bam thank you, m'am, something hits your G spot and didn't even tell you.

Not for the faint of heart THE ECLECTIC MAYBE band seamlessly imbues its unique sonic thrust with a freeform Krautish looseness fortified with jazzy motifs, supple folky flute passages and jittery bass lines that stick to the avant-prog playbook only corralled into the a zeuhl fueled backbone that sustains the rather airy feel of the album. Despite the unorthodoxies exhibited in full regalia, THE BLIND NIGHT WATCHERS' MYSTERIOUS LANDSCAPES does not come off as the least bit scary as did early Univers Zero experiments such as "Heresie" (with the sole exception of the frenetic and gloom and doom fueled "Godsmacked Distraction." Rather this music is lighter and more akin to the soundtrack of an astral body experience where different timelines and even dimensions sort of bleed into one another thus creating a multi-reality experience but at times merging to the point where it feels like a full-band experience in one universal coordination. This debut album really hit hard and went for the avant-garde jugular much like a 20th century classical composer like Xenakis, Stockhausen or Cage would have done only with more layers on the accessibility spectrum. If this is too weird for you try the following album "Reflection In A Moebius Ring Mirror" which builds off of this debut and offers much more structure especially in the jazz arenas. For my avant-garde tastes though, this first offering REALLY hits the spot for unhinged freakiness.