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Ken Vandermark:
Wow! I've been waiting a couple of months for someone to talk about avant jazz created within the last 10 years and it finally winds up under the category of things we don't get. You are right as long as you think Ken Vandermark is playing avant jazz.
To my ears, lots of his output is literally based on the groundbreaking stuff Albert Ayler did in the mid-sixties. In 2002 that is not covering new ground anymore, so it can't be avant jazz. I would call this aspect in Vandermark's career retro-free music, or even neo-new thing. Good thing is, that Vandermark himself is open in his quoting of Ayler. Bad thing is, most foreign (european) critics don't recorgnise the fact that Vandermark's biggest promotor in Chicago, is doing the promotion while being paid as an independent jazz critic>> John Corbett. So over here, Vandermark is being applauded for his free jazz, while he is actually playing pieces off of SPIRITS REJOICE (by Albert Ayler) note for note. If there ever was such a thing as free jazz, Vandermark doesn't do it. Regards, Remco Takken