Uton
Sax On, Sax Off

These days I've been captivated by a couple of beautiful releases (released in digital format or on cassette in limited edition) on Eiderdown Records, a small label from Seattle, Washington. The first is "Lionfish" by Elkhorn, the NYC-based duo composed of Drew Gardner and Jesse Sheppard (highly recommended), while the second is this record released by Uton, the moniker of Jani Hirvonen, a Finnish artist born in 1979, who here engages in an operation of sound reshuffling in a drone key in a way that has been spreading interestingly lately and is presented here as a meeting between two different worlds. Or rather: a true collision.

Jani Hirvonen is a true sound alchemist: "Sax On, Sax Off" is practically an album based on the work of saxophonist Janne Martinkauppi, whose recordings have been virtually transformed into a new synthetic form, which teeters between new age and what is defined as avant-jazz. In this sense, thinking of the now boundless production of Mats Gustafsson is certainly not wrong, just as recalling historical experiences like The Ex or even ZU themselves is fitting. However, the noise component or that plasticity defined as "post-rock" is missing here, but this is a specific choice moving towards a supernatural and transhuman dimension, practically with cyberpunk derivation connotations rendered in a drone reinterpretation inspired by Vangelis.

All this happens in six excerpts, six sequences modulated on Janne's saxophone recordings and rendered by Javi Hirvonen in noisist and noise sessions, where a post-industrial component reigns and moments of synthetic minimalism and noise soundscapes alternate, ambient suggestions that fill those voids created by the experimental avant-jazz that is the foundation of the project. Recorded in February 2016 in Turku, "Sax On, Sax Off" moves from free improvisation and reaches a form of experimental drone and suburban jazz, a fortunate combination, but one that also requires smart work and respect for the other part. Here, everything fits.