I have great difficulties making up my mind about This Is Not The Ending from the American band Information Superhighway. I know, we as reviewers shouldn't pigeon-hole the bands we get to review, but our listeners do ask this from us to get at least a feel for the music. And that's the issue here: is it jazz (Almost Mornings), is it almost freejazz (The Real Things) or is it prog (again Almost Mornings) ? Well, what is it? It seems this quartet from Chicago also has a problem with this, looking at the tags they give themselves on the rather concise website: ambient, brad mehldau, brian blade, improvisation, indie, jazz, rock, Yes, Chicago, and I would like to add folk Americana. The songs - mostly in the range of seven to twelve minutes - aren't always easy to listen to; that's for sure! The breathy voice of female singer Leslie Beukelman is often in the centre which isn't a bad thing, but the compositions are either too exciting - that is freaky improvised jazz - or not engrossing enough. I'm afraid Information Superhighway is not the cup of tea for the average prog rock lover. To find out whether it's yours or not you can visit the website. You can download another album there for free. *+ André de Waal (edited by Peter Willemsen) Where to buy? |
