The axe has fallen into the honey.
ØKSE, after all, means axe in Danish. The band assembled by the renowned Mette Rasmussen is bombastic at first glance, and their debut album and concerts are setting new standards in creative new jazz music. The bold experimental jazz project features musical elements that incorporate internalised musical traditions in connection with the fluidity of hip hop, all presented in a provocative impro-jazz context.
FOR FANS OF: Ljubljana Jazz Festival, Billy Woods, Moor Mother …
And speaking of hip hop – ØKSE’s debut was released by Backwoodz, the label run by Billy Woods, who also guests on the album, along with a Brooklyn rap heavyweights such as Elucid, Maassai, and Cavalier. Perhaps we’ll get the chance to experience live how the absence of rappers in the live version translates into the musical expression of the quartet. A key role in this will likely be played by the electronic sorceress Val Jeanty, a Haitian artist from New York, whose project Val Inc. we also heard at the 2006 Ljubljana Jazz Festival.
Alongside her will be Savannah Harris, one of the most sought-after drummers in the jazz world, making her first appearance in Slovenia. The other two members are already familiar to us – Swedish bass maestro Petter Eldh (Post Koma, Speak Low, Punkt.Vrt.Plastik, Enemy, Supersonic Orchestra) and the unmatched alto saxophonist Mette Rasmussen, a true Danish gem. A graduate of the renowned jazz department at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology in Trondheim, she remained in the city and became an indispensable part of the Norwegian avant-garde music scene. Unlike the other three, she is the only one who has already performed at Kino Šiška (Godspeed You! Black Emperor). She explains the band’s name as follows: “ØKSE has a lot of connotations, being one of humankind’s oldest tools. Axe is also Ashe; the life-force that runs through all things, living and inanimate. Ashe is a current or flow, a groove that initiates can channel so that it carries them along their road in life. These are the energies that flow through ØKSE, and animate this ambitious record.”
The ØKSE concert will be a spectacular introduction to the spring-summer festivals of creative music in Slovenia, starting with May’s Jazz Cerkno and Druga Godba festivals.
Line-up:
Mette Rasmussen – saxophone
Val Jeanty – sound chemist
Petter Eldh – bass, samplers, synthesisers
Savannah Harris – drums
Tickets on sale online and at Eventim outlets.
Organisation: Kino Šiška in collaboration with Domingo Productions.
A Liveurope concert: the first pan-European initiative supporting concert venues in their efforts to promote emerging European artists. Liveurope is co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union and supported by the Nordic Culture Fund.
