Hall, Ranaldo, Hooker - Oasis Of Whispers (2005)

Alien8 Recordings: ALIENCD 059
http://www.alien8recordings.com/releases/hall-ranaldo-hooker-oasis-of-whispers



* Glen Hall : tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone, flute, piccolo, bass flute, bass clarinet, percussion
* Lee Ranaldo : guitar, audio collages, effects
* William Hooker : drums

http://www.glenhall.com/
http://www.leeranaldo.net/
http://www.williamhooker.com/

Recorded live at The Tralfamadore, Buffalo, New York, in September 2001.
Engineer: Steve Baczkowski.
Edited and mastered by Glen Hall at Stimulus/Response.

Reviews

By François Couture
http://www.allmusic.com/album/oasis-of-whispers-mw0000702978

Oasis of Whispers rights all the wrongs that plagued Clouds, a previous live
recording by Lee Ranaldo and William Hooker. The addition of
multi-instrumentalist Glen Hall to the now longstanding (although not often
gigging) duo brings a lot of focus to the music. His saxes, flutes, clarinets,
and hand-held percussion instruments often take the lead seat, drawing up moods
for Ranaldo and Hooker to paint with their guitar loops and frantic
drumming. The nine free improvisations herein are at times raucous like the
best free jazz, gloomy like a film noir soundtrack, or simply Ranaldo-esque in
their starkness (yes, the man does get to lead the way once in a while). No
poetry this time, but you will hear much shouting (Hall?) and occasional voices
trapped in Ranaldo's audio collages. The 16-minute "Conference Call" features
such a collage, with unrelated snippets of telephone conversations
crisscrossing each other. The improvisation these voices underpin is
particularly strong, but the collage gets tiresome early on and will keep
looping until the very end of the track. "The Mechanism" and "View from
Bellevue" provide other highlights, Hooker's tom-tom-heavy drumming style
propelling the trio. Hall made some questionable choices when he edited the
tapes, some tracks cutting abruptly in mid-fade-out, but that is nothing
compared to Ranaldo's post-recording treatments on Clouds. Still, one wonders
why he felt the need to cut up long improvisations into smaller chunks. At
least, Oasis of Whispers retains the urgency of the live performance, recorded
in September 2001, when urgency rang true.

--

By Adam Strohm
http://www.dustedmagazine.com/reviews/2884

By Nic Jones
http://www.allaboutjazz.com/oasis-of-whispers-alien8-recordings-review-by-nic-jones.php

By Dan Warburton
http://www.paristransatlantic.com/magazine/monthly2006/02feb_text.html#8

By Zach Baron
http://pitchfork.com/reviews/albums/4032-oasis-of-whispers/

By Ken Waxman
http://www.jazzword.com/one-review/?id=104954

By Martin Büsser (de)
http://www.intro.de/popmusik/glenn-hall-lee-ranaldo-william-hooker

Par Guillaume Belhomme (fr)
http://grisli.canalblog.com/archives/2006/03/07/8393586.html