A Trio & Alan Bishop - Burj Al Imam

The “A” Trio gig I’ve attended three years ago was the most “out there” performance at that festival which is quite an achievement, considering they only play acoustic instruments and the festival was the infamous Konfrontationen 2012. The group consists of Lebanese artists Mazen Kerbaj (trumpet and accessories), Raed Yassin (double bass) and Sharif Sehnaoui (acoustic guitar).

Mazen and Raed are also visual artists whose work is definitely worth checking out. I fondly remember listening to one of Mazen's recordings from Beirut where he was playing the trumpet on his balcony while the Israeli Air Force was bombing the city. Trumpet and bombs, that combination now seems to me to foretell the one on this album, where “A” Trio are joined by none other than Alan Bishop, one third of the legendary group Sun City Girls, founder of the Sublime Frequencies label, who also records solo as Alvarius B.

The trio use non-conventional techniques and motorized devices for their instruments to create acoustic improvised drones while Alan intervenes with malicious rhythms on his electric guitar and sings in a high falsetto, like a feminine muezzin.

A remarkably coherent album, Burj Al Imam can transport the listener through these these troubled, north-african lands like a windowless Mercedes running at full speed. After four largely improvised pieces, the album couldn’t have had a more perfect ending with a cover of traditional Americana song “Gently Johnny”, which appeared on the Wicker Man soundtrack, a movie about an island inhabited by a morally bankrupt cult that was so brainwashed, they believed murdering people in cold blood was good and rational as it would bring back their crops and appease false gods. It’s hard not to see the parallels with today’s politics. For me, this is already a classic. Released on Annihaya Records, limited edition of 500.

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