Jazzwise

Norway’s Ingar Zach has made some wonderful records, not least as a member of Huntsville; he has also worked with the likes of Jim O’Rourke, Derek Bailey, Evan Parker and Keith Rowe. Now on SOFA, the label he co-founded in 1999, comes his fifth solo album: four compositions crafted from percussion and electronic sources, encased in minimalist, black-andwhite packaging. The dominant mood is haunting and atmospheric; the abstract textures evolve slowly and, while not always pleasant, are somehow mesmeric. On ‘Il Battito Del Vichingo’, though, we get something much more rhythmic and, through chiming overtones, with a sense of pitch too. Sounding like someone with a great sense of rhythm taking a pair of hammers to a prepared piano in a large, empty room, it’s as pounding and enveloping as ambient techno. Eight minutes in, though, the pulse drops away, and we’re off again into the (enjoyably) abstract.