Invite Your Eye

Language available : english

Tenor saxophonist Ilhan Ersahin made the after-hours of his small East Village club, Nublu, world famous within underground circles with his legendary jam sessions. This unlikely trio brought together drummer Kenny Wollesen (who’s previously worked alongside John Zorn, Bill Frisell, Tom Waits and Norah Jones!) and guitarist Dave Harrington (best known for forming the electronic duo Darkside at the turn of the 2010s with Nicolas Jaar) and would go on to develop a musical identity based mainly on groove and trance. Up until this point, there had been no phonographic trace of this group’s unique sound, which has continued to move from strength to strength over the years. This was rectified in the summer of 2019, when Harrington was working on a film score. He decided to invite his friends to the studio where he was working to record long, improvised sessions that would revive the wild Nublu jams. The decision was quickly made to not release these recordings as they were, but to put them through a meticulous post-production process. Harrington cut, sampled and reassembled the tracks, adding multiple layers of percussion and guitars (reminiscent of Teo Macero’s production of the famous Bitches Brew by Miles Davis). Ersahin and Wollesen recorded compositional second-takes, re-recording saxophone licks and drum rhythms. The result is an atmospheric and enchanting record that unfolds like a daydream, much like a David Lynch film. It’s carried by Ersahin’s lyrical saxophone, filtered with electronic effects and pulsating with haunting rhythms that can sometimes feel surprisingly soft and earthy. This record definitely sees this group venture into the realms of trance and hypnosis. © Stéphane Ollivier/Qobuz