4 Walls (Phil Minton, Luc Ex, Veryan Weston, Michael Vatcher) - Banlieues Bleues 2004 [2004, Free Improvisation / Avant-Garde, SATRip]

The music of 4WALLS is not very easy to define. The beauty and musical tension seem to be evoked out of the very logical combination of tightly rehearsed pieces and free improvisation. 4Walls create their own intriguing world of noises and melodies, and at the same time they very well manage to balance between the different dynamic musical possibilities. You may hear beautiful, more melancholic or dark chords against fast and humorous pieces. Very tiny minuscule sounds against enormous fragments of brutal noise and energy. This is what happens if you have noisy music and avant-garde jazz sitting around one table. It's also a band that combines two previous concept - 'ROOF' and 'WAYS'. The first had the late Tom Cora on Cello and still includes some of his fine compositions. Added, is Veryan Weston on piano who is half of the 'WAYS' duo with Phil Minton- a long term acclaimed collaboration which has yielded numerous compositional projects. Glimpses of both can be heard in this new band.
PHIL MINTON has lived in London most of his life where he has been among the guiding lights of one of the worlds most important community of improvisers. He has often teamed up with Derek Bailey, Fred Frith, Maggie Nicols, Lol Coxhill and Roger Turner (among others) for recording and performing projects. He has been a frequent and recurrent presence at such international festivals as Vancouver, Taktlos, Ars Electronicaa, Linz, Moers and Musica Strasbourg, to name but a few. His composition (for 22 voices) SONGS FROM A PRISON DIARY won the Cornelius Cardew Composition Prize.
LUC EX is Dutch and based in Amsterdam where he has been one of the four main forces behind THE EX for more than 15 years. Starting originally in the "punk period" they evolved subsequently in many different directions working with a wide variety of international musicians such as Kurdish singer Brader and jazz musicians Ab Baars and Han Bennink. Recently The Ex recorded a nice CD with Steve Albini Last few years he also worked with the late Tom Cora and Michael Vatcher in the band called ROOF.
VERYAN WESTON was born in 1950 and has been living in London from 1972 where he has been working and developing as a free lance jazz pianist and as well as improviser. He also worked on many different projects with dance and other visual arts. Throughout the 80s and early 90s he worked primarily with Eddie Prevost Quartet, Trevor Watts Moire Music and duets with Lol Coxhill and of course Phil Minton (as well as other ensembles projects with Minton). He has been playing all over the world on different international jazz festivals.
MICHAEL VATCHER is an American percussionist/drummer who has been ringing the different corners of the Amsterdam music scene for more than a decade. His deft contributions can be found on the recordings of Michael Moore (AVAILABLE JELLY and THE PERSONS), Maarten Altena, Franky Douglas and John Zorn and many more.

2003 DAVE DOUGLAS SEPTET "Freak In"
2003 NEW-YORK. BOBIGNY
2004 SAINKHO NAMTCHYLAK
2004 4 WALLS
2005 AKI TAKASE Plays Fats Waller "Underground Railroad"
2005 OTOMO YOSHIHIDE - Music(s)
2005 YOHIMBE BROTHERS
2006 THE JUNGLE BLUE SUITE
2006 HORS CHANT
2008 IVA BITTOVA, DON BYRON, HAMID DRAKE "Improvisation"
2008 ERNST REIJSEGER "do you still ?"
2008 COSA BRAVA
2009 THE WORLD SAXOPHONE QUARTET
2011 VIJAY IYER, PRASANNA, NITIN MITTA "Tirtha"
2011 BILL FRISELL "The Disfarmer Project"
2011 LAÏKA "Nébuleuse"
2013 TOUMANI DIABATÉ & LE SYMMETRIC ORCHESTRA mpg