Label: Outside in Music, 2021
Personnel - Jorn Swart; piano; Benni von Gutzeit: viola; Lucas Pino: bass clarinet.
Questioning what means to be human and the value of art in a technological age, the trio Malnoia - led by the pianist/composer Jorn Swart and featuring Benni von Gutzeit on viola and Lucas Pino on bass clarinet - releases their sophomore album, Hello Future, and fills it with carefully crafted scores that escort commissioned short stories about science fiction and the future. The trio boasts a boundary-leaping style with abundant lyricism, pointillism and contrapuntal movements, showing a masterful control over the flow of their music and its artful transitions.
“First Ocean” blends tempered folk and contemporary chamber music in a seamless, enjoyable manner. There’s a practical urgency in the harmonic accompaniment that counterbalances the poignancy of the melody. The result does justice to a story, written by Swart himself, about a space traveler who has forgotten the smell, feel and sensation of the sea.
The nature of “Paultjuh” moves the band into a lulling, shimmering space capable to create a balmy, if nostalgic, effect on the listeners. The viola cries appear to be moaning howls, while the bass clarinet validates the emotionally-driven piano harmony through patterned constellations of notes. There’s more light than darkness in this poetically profound exertion inspired on Radiohead’s “Pyramid Song”.
Whereas “The Ghost” is a slow waltz drowned in pathos, the classical-soaked “New Religion” embeds three layers of a time-shifted melody that evolve with grace, in a pure investment of uplifting Mozart-like dynamics.
Classical and Latin passages are coupled with elegance on “DemocrApp”, while “Choro Humano”, disclosing its real nature on the title, explores the Brazilian genre with the happy vibe and staggering virtuosity for what it’s known. It’s all here, with no need for bass or percussion.
“Tubifoot” brings back all that jazz, exhibiting a mainstream posture and swing language. Distant from this mood, “Prelude to Singularity” employs unwavering dreamy piano, euphonious viola scratches and ruminative woodwind sounds to sonically depict the story of a man who found out that the concert that most affected him emotionally had been created by an algorithm. The latter number precedes the suave closer, Vangelis' “Tears in Rain”, the sole non-original composition on the album, which served as an emotional intensifier of Roy Batty’s famous monologue in the sci-fi classic Blade Runner.
All contrasting stylistic elements of Hello Future are woven together with a methodically organized discipline and filtered into a unique blend of music that has its charms.
Grade B+
Favorite Tracks:
01 - First Ocean ► 02 - Paultjuh ► 07 - Choro Humano