Limited edition split LP from two of the most regularly interrogating modern avantists. Ankersmit's side is a fuzz-encrusted investigation of non-linear routes through the solo saxophone, with wildly dislocated sounds modulated by computer, serge and EMS synths. O'Rourke's side is an absolute beauty, a monolithic 1992 recording that matches massive cycles of minimally-repeating fuzz guitar with the brain-bombing chatter of rapid-firing oscillators. Sounds somewhere between Sunroof, Folke Rabe and Faust. Edition of 750 copies, recommended.

Massive double disc set that pairs legendary Japanese free jazz saxophonist Akira Sakata with Jim O’Rourke on guitar, harmonica and electronics alongside the duo of drummer Chris Corsano and bassist Darin Gray. Akira Sakata has long been one of the key players on the Japanese free jazz underground, playing as a part of Yamashita Yosuke’s trio and forging alliances with players like Peter Brotzmann and Sonny Sharrock, who he played with as part of Last Exit. And That’s The Story Of Jazz... gathers a bunch of recordings from the group’s 2008 Japanese tour and it’s an absolute revelation. Sakata’s style bridges classic post-Fire Music Japanese freedoms with a wild mystic/psychedelic edge and the combined backgrounds of his three collaborators push the whole deal into some kind of post-improvised underground psych zone. Sure, there are raging multi-limbed blow-outs that worship at the altar of Church Number 9 where you can barely make out who is doing what but there’s a whole deal more, picked guitar and droning strings over weird acid folk meditations that cross Holy Mountain-era Don Cherry with Mark Fry and Yatha Sidhra, the kind of raggedy folk/punk euphoria more associated with Finnish tribes like Paivansade and Rauhan Orkesteri, rich Om-ing Coltrane-isms, spiky No Wave blats that reinvent Rudolph Grey and Von Lmo’s vision of free heavy metal... this record throws a spanner in any conception of what a collaboration with a first generation Japanese free saxophonist and three avant punks might sound like. And this is the sound. Highly recommended.

Massively anticipated re-match for the world-beating trio of guitarist/vocalist Keiji Haino, bassist Jim O’Rourke and drummer Oren Ambarchi: recorded live on January 6^th 2011 at SuperDeluxe in Tokyo, this is classic post-Fushitsusha avant rock bombast at an insane high-energy peak. Ambarchi is the perfect drummer for Haino, much more so than any jobbing improv or free jazz percussionist, in that he’s not afraid to drop it into straightahead 4/4 pummel if the power chords demand it. Haino reacts with obvious glee to his pugilistic attack, piling sky-splitting solo upon solo alongside epic levels of fuzz. O’Rourke is on similarly phenomenal form, driving the whole group with these hypnotic two-note grooves that are uniquely powerful and that provide an anchor for Haino to get all the way out. O’Rourke is obviously a serious student of the late Yasushi Ozawa as he has mastered the Ozawa style of single infinitely pulsating notes dropped into deep wells of silence and when the smoke clears and it’s just O’Rourke’s bass and Haino’s voice plotting the void the effect is truly hair-raising. But most of all Imikuzushi is about the wild rockers and it pretty much puts the seal on the group as the true inheritors of the euphoric psychedelic blues of Fushitsusha, with O’Rourke and Ambarchi the only rhythm section to truly approach the classic Ozawa/Takahashi dream team. Totally phenomenal, one of the top five releases in the Haino discography, pretty much destroys any other contemporary ‘rock’ recording and already my album of the year. Comes with a beautiful gatefold sleeve and glossy photographic inners designed by Stephen O’Malley. Already completely sold out at source. Can’t possibly recommend this one enough, a mandatory VT purchase!