_{Changing the face of jazz: Alarmist step up to the plate with OKO at Dublin double header} 

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ashed in electronica and ambient dub OKO, the Irish band who are part of the prog-jazz Match & Fuse family, recorded I Love You Computer Mountain in Dublin in 2012 and play a double header with Alarmist at Whelans in Dublin on 21 July. This four-piece (Shane Latimer eight-string guitar/electronics; Darragh O’Kelly, keys, synths; Shane O’Donovan, drums/percussion/sampler; and DJackulate turntables/kaval/sampler/sax) open the album with ‘Shoehorns & Axelgrease’ sounding like a dubbed-up Floratone for a minute while ‘Totes Awky Momo’ moves the goalposts into more of an ambient space. ‘Under Over’ is more about the beat O’Kelly’s chord changes eventually opening up the tech-laden jam after an initial Indo-fusion and early Return to Forever-like foray. Out and out improvising in a blowing session style is not what OKO are about at all although the music has an open experimental feel to it where improvising progression is vital, the samplers and sheen of tech maybe blunting the message a little although it’s not aimed at the idea of people dancing around laptops, which would have been fatal. ‘Cell Cell Cell’ has more of an industrial feel at the beginning mutating into dubstep while ‘Axelgrease’ following lobs in overt dubby-bass and patches in a Steel Pulse-like reggae feel that then develops. Expansive Lonnie Liston Smith-like keyboards change the mood at the beginning of ‘What’s The Concept?’ an unfortunate bit of titling there although the mood shift is effective. ‘Oblong’ hovers a little on the edges of a trancey worldbeat sound while ‘Magnet Paste’ has a subdued drum ’n’ bass-like opening.

Sharing the night Alarmist, who played the recent Down with Jazz festival in Dublin, were the Irish representative at this year’s 12 Points in Sweden. Melding Tortoise-like rock and jazz flavours with skittering electronica and soukous-like sounds their second EP Pal Magnet, recorded at the Meadow Studios in County Wicklow in 2012, was released last autumn. The Dublin four-piece (Neil Crowley, drums/keyboards; Elis Czerniak, keys/guitar; Osgar Dukes, drums; and Barry O’Halpin, keys/guitar) first surfaced in 2011 with the release of their self-titled debut EP Alarmist.
Stephen Graham