World-renowned Danish saxophonist John Tchicai participated on the debut album which was met with great approval in the press in Denmark and the US. Now the Copenhagen based band ELEkTRO is ready with their new album with award-winning musicians – among others a Norwegian heavy metal guitarist.
The jazz gazette The New York City Jazz Record ranked “ELEkTRO feat. John Tchicai” as one of the ten best releases in 2011. In Denmark the album called forth a nomination in Danish Music Award Jazz in the category ‘Crossover’ and put the band on stage at Copenhagen Jazz Festival and Roskilde Festival the same year.
On the 15th of November 2014 ELEkTRO released the successor “ELEkTRO feat. Rudi Mahall & Even Hermansen – Vol 2″ on BlackOut Music. The album is without John Tchicai who passed away in 2012 at the age of 76. The death of Tchicai temporarily put an end to ELEkTRO’s international breakthrough and forced the band to seek new creative inputs.
“We were getting overseas with John who opened a lot of doors for us, so when he passed away we went standby and used the pause to think in new terms. We talked about giving the music an approach towards rock, a kind of edge. And we found that in the Norwegian guitarist Even Hermansen who is able to build bridges between the foxy stuff in jazz and the blacksmith in heavy metal” says ELEkTRO bassist Lars Winberg.
Besides Even Hermansen, who in 2007 was elected best soloist in Young Nordic Comets, the band has teamed up with German bass clarinetist Rudi Mahall, who in 2011 was honoured with Südwestrundfunks Jazz Award. The expression and approach in Mahall’s playing style is indeed the sound of ELEkTRO, and Lars Winberg is looking forward to presenting the new album to an audience.
“In many ways the album is similar to the first one but the distance between the elements of ‘kick ass’ and meditation is wider and deeper”, says Lars Winberg about “ELEkTRO feat. Rudi Mahall & Even Hermansen – Vol 2, on which he continues the co-operation with his two sons, Tobias and Adam, playing respectively laptop and drums. Finally the band is completed with trumpet player Mads la Cour who is a member of the respected Danish Radio Big band.
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