Hyperglyph

Multi-instrumentalists, improvisers and electronicists Rob Mazurek and Chad Taylor have been playing together since 1994, inside and outside their Chicago Underground Duo project. The 11-track Hyperglyph marks their International Anthem debut, and their first outing in 11 years. With engineer Dave Vettraino assuming the role of a Teo Macero-esqe presence in the studio, these men -- always creative in recording situations--employed the recording studio as an instrument. Post-production, always as an important part of their process, is on another level here. On opener "Click," Taylors drumming offers evidence of his many years studying African music and its percussion techniques. Mazureks multi-tracked trumpet is playful and strident; his playing echoes Don Cherrys, one of his primary influences. It segues into the title cut, with layered electric piano, muscular trumpet, triple-tracked percussion, and atmospheric urgency. They give way to a synth bass breakdown before the pair engage in furious improvisation and chanting. Taylor seldom plays this aggressively, one would have totrackk his albums with James Brandon Lewis for comparison. But he is furious in ranging across his kit and percussion instruments. "The Gathering" is introduced with low, open, chord guitar and piano drones, appended by nearly ambient reverb. Mazurek plays a fractured modal melody, hovering alongside the sonics until Taylor enters with rippling tom toms, and heavily reverbed cymbal work. Halfway through, the entire proceeding falls away and were left with a truly gorgeous kalimba solo from Taylor, amid unintrusive, pillowy electronics. "Hinunu," titled after the architect of the Great Pyramids, offers a collision of Middle Eastern modes played around a circular pattern of drums, electronics and keys. The three-part Egyptian Suite is offered as a tribute to the late Bill Dixon, trumpeter, bandleader and Mazurek mentor. Other than subtle reverb, the duo eschew electronics in "Architect." Their furious interplay delivers illuminating improv, around and through circular patterns, before they wipe it all away in "Triangulation of Light." Taylors bowed cymbals and whispering electronics claim the entire first half before Mazurek enters, playing microtonal drones and extended notes that meet the shimmering cymbals and atmospherics to create dynamic tension. Taylors kick drum, snare and cymbal solo introduces final section, "Architetctonics of Time," before Mazureks horn cries like a muzzeins wail, bridging post bop, modal jazz and trumpet his lines with furious accents and rolls. Closer "Succulent Amber" is a folkish ballad wherein synths and kalimba play in duo, embellished by subtle electronics, seemingly creating a hypnotic melody out of ether. Chicago Underground Duos catalogue releases are all impressive in different ways. That said, the interplay, canny collaborative post production, and attention to sonic and musical detail here benefit from the pairs longstanding collaboration inside and outside the Chicago Underground universe. This set reveals their mature, fully developed musical language expanded by sonic and harmonic invention. ~ Thom Jurek