Broken Hands/Lucky Rabbit - Lucky Hands

TwoThousandAnd 2+11

A live recording on Resonance FM featuring the two duos in various permutations. I confess to having a pre-existing predilection for Broken Hands, having greatly enjoyed the work of Anthony Guerra and Michael Rodgers in this and other contexts, and that opinion was borne out by this set. The first two tracks split up the teams into two other possible duos, Guerra with saxophonist Seymour Wright and Rodgers with guitarist Ross Lambert. Both are ok, the first contrasting Wright’s ultrahigh squealwork with staticky pops, the second setting (I’m guessing) Rodger’s more laid back, tonal approach with Lambert’s noisier one. OK, but nothing too special. The third and fourth cuts are Lucky Hands, the former a rather unfortunate piece with Wright producing some human beatbox imitations, quasi-throat song and desultory splutters over drone-y then spatter-y guitar, the whole thing sounding something like an outtake from an early 80s Zorn session. The other improv is far more involving, Wright (I think…) generating delicate, light-stepping percussive sounds (via his alto?) complimented obliquely but poetically by Lambert’s mixture of scrabblings and long tones.

But it’s the two tracks by Broken Hands that make the disc worth owning. That conflux of laid-back yet intensely contemplative guitar, with its evocations of Fahey, combined with equally finely observed noise is a potion that still causes my knees to weaken. Both pieces are luxuriant and lovely with exactly the right amount of harshness, allowing the feathers to prick from inside the pillow. When the second one finds itself, toward the end, in down and out blues territory, it feels unexpected, wonderful and appropriate. The final cut brings all four musicians together and, as on the initial two duos, the results are perfectly ok but easily a step or three down from the heights of the Broken Hands performance, though this track seems to have been cut off part of the way through, so who knows?

The typically fine and intriguing TwoThousandAnd packaging plus the two Broken Hands pieces make this rather mixed bag something to pick up.