Morsof - Heap (2003)

From www.proggnosis.com:

Morsof is a trio based on Sax, Drums and Bass founded by Mikio Fukushima. In 2000, and after only one rehersal they had a gig performing "the progressive band" style desired by Fukushima. This project was intended to be a "one night session" but after the gig, drummer Morhide Sawada remarked " I want to this again" so the 3 started playing improvised sessions bi-monthly and this was the formation of Morsof.

Morning Machine & Soft Musume (Soft Machine / Morning Musume) are names that can remind on one hand of the glorious bands of the past and on the other hand of the future lighting in every "canterbury" lover. This is the feeling of '...awwww' i want to hear this' - (Soft Musume), and of a famous poppy female japaneese band - (Morning Machine). The cover leans towards the later.

I highly recommend this album to everybody who loves Soft Machine and Matching Mole and other bands with improvised sax-based sound on which the band builds around. The musical ideas in Heap are spread over long phrases with an overhaning bass cycling around in the way of the famous masters mentioned above. The sound quality is not the of the excellent quality that you expect in comtemporary recordings (it is not bad either) and this may be the band's intention.

Track 3, Heap Suite is a highlight and is very dense. It can bring to mind the 'silences' of Weather Report's flavor but growing in an oppressive jazzrock mood dominated by dialogs between sax and guest guitarist, Yulando.

Morsof's music is a good example of how Japanese musicians search out inspiration in European music to blend with their own tradition. The result in this case is a Heap of good music.