Jack Wright and Bob Marsh - Birds In the Hand
(Public Eyesore)
Though Public Eyesore is best known as a CDR label, proprietor Bryan Day has recently begun to issue releases on LP and CD, with this disc of improvised duets between saxophonist Jack Wright and cellist Bob Marsh representing one of the label's first forays into jewel-cased, factory-manufactured CDs.
Wright and Marsh have a long history of playing together, though, due to a move, it's become harder to bring the two together. For this reason, Birds in the Hand is recorded mainly live, split between the SFALT Festival in Oakland and a live performance in Seattle. The disc contains frantic, scuttling improv pieces made up of small fragments of sound and layered with processed vocals by Marsh. Wright's playing, whether on sax or clarinet, is rarely more than a sputtering series of breathy expulsions of sound, choked-off blowing, and thin whines. Marsh alternates between light plucking and strumming of his cello and short bursts of bowing. His vocals, manipulated electronically into a sort of whimsical stuttering and mumbling, tend to stay in the back of the mix, which works well since they're the duo's weakest musical technique.
Wright and Marsh share a well-developed sense of musical communication, and there's a degree to which Birds in the Hand sounds almost like a conversation, with a comment and response dialogue discernable in some of their playing. Even when the two play at once and go in seemingly different directions, there's a strong sense of unity in the music, and very little that seems awkward or errant. Working together since 1986 seems to have resulted in a rich collaborative relationship, and it's hard not to hope that Birds in the Hand isn't the last we'll see of their work together.
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