Available Formats:
Digital Stream
Description
Time, here, is a serving suggestion. Karl Bjorå Trio – Bjorå (guitar), Ingebrigt Håker Flaten (upright bass), and Ole Mofjell (drums) – treats meter like a toolkit, not a law. The set opens in manic, rattling, chitter-chatter conversation: pattern-shifting, bebop-Beefheart feints; sustain-augmented guitar doubling as its own accomplice. It progresses with angular melodies rolling one into the next with a near train-shuffle, the guitar desynchronising in sudden bursts of tempo yet somehow staying on the rails – a high-wire act that refuses to fall. Mid-flow, the air tilts: textural blankets of wavering loops, overtones that bloom, a slow corrosion into noise – then the interlocking locomotive returns. By now, prediction is useless and that’s the pleasure: insane comping for a song that isn’t there; a burrow into bowed dread; tape stutter and breakdown, double-speed ghosts, vinyl crackle – and then, like a side-door, the sound of 80s electric-piano chords, overdriven drumkit and fuzz riffology wars. What feels like random beat and riff reveals a spine. That’s Bjorå’s trick: melody and structure pulled from chaos like a diamond from a barrel of broken glass. This is jazz but not free so much as—
Milo: Let’s interrupt this monologue for a moment, have an espresso, and talk about the personnel.
Thilo: Yes, Milo – we’re here for that!
Milo: Many things have been said about project leader, Karl Bjorå (guitar): “Each melody takes every sharp angle… executed with surgical precision.” [1]; Aftenposten hailed him as “en gitarist for vår tid” (“a guitarist for our time”)[2]. Time and again, his versatility is noted: that he moves between raw, noise-inflected energy, angular modern-jazz language, and hook-friendly but proggy songcraft. It seems that here he has taken a deep dive into pre-fusion jazz and has come up with some new treasures?
Thilo: Yes, Milo. Reviews and bios consistently frame him as versatile and “exploratory,” and he’s still up to those tricks. He’s predictably unpredictable, catching us off-guard with unexpected choices.
Milo: And what a trio! Ingebrigt Håker Flaten (upright bass), long described as “one of the busiest contemporary practitioners on the instrument,”[3] with a trans-Atlantic footprint from The Thing to Atomic, and an absolutely massive discography that seems to be a veritable who’s who of contemporary jazz!
Thilo: Absolutely! Ingo IS Mister Bass Man! A veritable demigod of the lower frequencies, and seemingly completely unaware of constraints – if he can dream it, he’ll do it!
Milo: Oh yeah! He’s in charge of everything below Middle C. And what about Ole Mofjell (drums)?
Thilo: His hyper-alert time feel and fearless improvising have made him a go-to across Scandinavia’s boundary-pushing scenes. Volatility in service of form: risk as a route to momentum. Restless energy shepherded into service of the music!
EXCUSE ME, GENTLEMEN!
As I was saying: This is jazz but not free so much as untamed. Bass and drums mark the territory; the guitar redraws the map. Micro-fanfares flare, surf-rock conniptions skitter, discord becomes a breadcrumb trail. The trio often sets off in different directions and somehow reaches the same door – then, when locked in cohesion, gleefully disperses on parallel adventures before reuniting as if there were never another choice. Manic, not angry: curiosity at a sprint. When the tape ghosts clear, the shape stands there – lean, a little singed, unmistakably a tune. File it left of free, right of rock: design-forward, road-tested, splinters included – hard-bop Looney Tunes for the post-consensus hangover. It is the essence.
Label: Sonic Transmission Records
Released in:
2025
