AMM with Sachiko M
Recorded 13th December 2004.
I first wrote about AMM at some length about 25 years ago. The most durable sentence in the piece (further expanded at length ten years ago and since supplemented with regular reviews) might be “AMM deserves hearing in inverse proportion to which it can be talked about successfully.” While I still believe that, I’ve learned nothing from it, and continue to try, if only to alert fellow listeners to the availability of new releases.
When I listen to an Eddie Prévost release, I often think about just how shocking this type of quiet non-jazz improvisation must have been in the late 1960s when so many of the early AMM's contemporaries were leaning into Ornette, Ayler, and their heavier followers on the continent. Certainly, the AMM has lost much of that shock value over their 57-year run. However, they have lost none of their creativity and, instead, refined their approach and vision over those decades.
