Monday, March 16, 2020

Ossos D´Ouvido- Asa Nisi Masa (Watermelon Music WTRMLN002)


ODO is a fairly new instrumental trio consisting of: Pedro Almeida (Drums, Percussion), Diogo Lourenço (Guitar, Theremin) and João Masssano (Bass, Throat singing) are the main band. Francisco Matos plays the trumpet on a few tracks. I was sent this CD, their first, although there are some recordings from 2015 and 2017 on bandcamp,  and was really surprised how much I have grown to like it.  The CD is a mix of composed and more jammed out tracks. The CD features 6 main tracks and starts with an intro track and then into Jam II. This is like straight up jazz fusion with a nice upfront bass, noodling guitar to start. Nice clear sound production with a little reverb.  After a couple of minutes the guitar tone changes to something like a synth and sounds quite cool. The energy level is rocking now when the wah guitar kicks in. Great guitar playing as the rhythm section is really solid. Os lobos tambêm Dançam starts with some gong’s and a field recording of kids in the background. The guitar starts alone with a really nice theme before the throat singing slowly comes into the soundscape with the drums and lastly the bass. Some really nice spacey guitar with long delays on this track as well. After this section the trumpet kicks in.  This is a very long and diverse track with lots of cool parts.


After a short Interlude I, is Quem me Sigo, which is a more energetic tune and that keyboard like guitar effect returns. Nice melody and great drumming on this one. A total freakout breakdown at 4mins leads into a new section with some aggressive sounds and guitar. Very cool.  Dom Mantis is back to the intro track style of music.  Some very fluid and nice guitar playing. Bretêma has a sort of feeling like something is not right. A wild intro with an effected guitar but then it drops down to just a bass and then the guitar and drums slowly come back in with a bit of funk feel and the guitar is layered where one sounds a bit like a steel drum. Later a full on high energy wah solo kicks in.  Zinco is the last track on this hour long record and sees the return of the trumpet on this sort of spacey and laid back track. Great record.


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