Dan Nicholls
Ruins
Loop ***
Apocalyptic samples-laden futurist electroprog, an air of alienation framed within a maths-jazz design, Staffordshire-born London-based keyboardist Nicholls’ hard boiled post-Wikileaks anti-war morality tales come complete with blotchily anarchic computer generated images splashed psychedelically all over the artwork. Random snippets of dense text cut into patterns inside containing disturbing messages scattered about like a Guantánamo rewrite of Finnegans Wake simply add to the effect. A challenging listen the work of a high powered band that includes Troyka’s Kit Downes on organ, Shabaka Hutchings on bass clarinet and the seemingly ubiquitous James Allsopp on tenor saxophone and clarinet confront rather than caress the listener, although it’s never aggressively projected. The rhythm framework provided by Outhouse’s Dave Smith is deliberately fairly loose and allows greater harmonic possibilities to develop, it’s as much about creating a tech-heavy electronica soundscape as anything else. Improvising in an obvious jazz sense is not really the point here beyond its use as a compositional vehicle, and Nicholls’ randomising method seems to go some way towards minimalism by the end of ‘Voice Intercepts’. Very much an anti-war record for a generation still coming to terms with the unwarranted war in Iraq Ruins makes its point forcibly and effectively. Stephen Graham
Released on 1 June