Kari Ikonen Trio – Wind Frost Radiation (2018) [Qobuz FLAC 24bit/96kHz]

After stints in afro pop, Kari Ikonen’s Finnish background has now drawn him to the wintertime. Spaces of biting cold and horror, of inhumanity and transience – these are the fundamentals of the Ikonen Trio’s third studio album. Meditations on ghost towns and shadowy waltz themes prove: the tradition of the radical break belongs naturally to the jazz understanding of this formation.

Kari Ikonen likes to see the sunny side of life. For example, with his “ultra-positive” Afro-pop jazz project Trio Toffa. As a native Finn, however, winter and dark states of mind are also close to him. Thus, “Wind Frost & Radiation” became a musical search for traces of their own roots, after the Nordic in music. Places of cold and horror, inhumanity and transience – they all form the foundation for the third studio album of the Kari Iconen Trio.

It is hardly surprising that there is another turnaround after the bewitching late-night jazz of “Beauteous Tales and Offbeat Stories”. The experiment belongs to the recognition features of the trio. So Olli Rantala lets his bass dance in a moment, just to make it sound like a cello in the next one. Markku Ounaskari masters not only an irresistible swing, but also the art of playing drums on the edge of dissolution. Icons themselves have fueled fresh inspiration with the eccentric project “Iconostasis”. It goes without saying that it was impossible to create a conventional trio album with this constellation. How far the band is willing to go on “Wind Frost & Radiation” is shown alongside “Pripyat” – a meditation on the evacuated ghost town near the Chernobyl reactor – a stubborn interpretation of Aram Khachaturian’s famous waltz theme. The latter transforms from icons of a whirling dance into a nocturnal world of shadows. The pulse sinks to a glacier-like melting, the music digs deep into the moment, in search of the nerve that hurts the most.

Tracklist:
01 – Harmattan
02 – Pripyat
03 – Levoton
04 – Kuru
05 – Beatamente
06 – The Roaring Frost
07 – Waltz from the Masquerade Suite

Recorded in September 2017 by Michael Dahlvid at Studio Nilento, Sweden.
Mixed in October 2017 by Lars Nilsson ar Studio Nilento, Sweden.
Mastered by Hans-Jörg Maucksch at Pauler Acoustics, Germany.

Musicians:
Kari Ikonen – piano, vioce
Olli Rantala – double bass, voice
Markku Ounaskari – drums
+Mia Simanainen – voice on “6”

Download:

mqs.link_KariIknenTriWindFrstRadiatin2018Qbuz2496.rar