Ut Gret "The Ancestors’ Tale"

Country: USA
Sub Genre: Avant Prog, Canterbury, Jazz-Rock
Label: AltrOck
Release date: March 2014
Tracklist: 

1. Ancestors' Tale - 5:24
2. The Departure - 0:58
3. Hopperknockity Tune - 4:01
4. Selves Unmade - 5:56
5. The Raw, the Cooked and the Overeasy - 5:27
6. An Elephant in Berlin - 8:29
7. Dinosaur on the Floor - 3:51
8. The Grotesque Pageantry of Fading Empires - 9:17
9. Zodiac - 7:17
10. Walk the Plank - 7:37

Line-up: 
Jackie Royce - bassoon, contra-bassoon, flute
Stephen Roberts - piano, electric piano, organ, Mellotron, mallets, samplers
Gary Pahler - drums, percussion
Steve Good - Bb clarinet, bass clarinet
Joee Conroy - fretless bass, guitars, Chapman Stick, electronics
   With
Cheyenne Mize - voice, violin
Sydney Simpson - double bass
Gregory Acker - saxes, flutes, percussion

Description/Reviews: 

The Ancestors’ Tale features ten tracks, four of which are between seven and nine-minutes, the rest being in the four to five minute range. Looking at the instrument line-up you would right in guessing that the music relies a lot on jazz and classical structures and approach. As such these compositions jump from one musical idea to the next. They continue to experiment along the way incorporating moments of free-form sonic experimentation, loosely structured musical bridges and so forth but they usually manage to pull it all back at some point to the compositions core melody. Given the unique woodwind instruments there is a bit of a Gentle Giant or Gryphon musical feel that surfaces once in a while although here the performance pulls even more from the jazz or classical idioms. In amongst all those instruments, the Mellotron is quite prevalent and fans of the instrument will enjoy its use in a number of compositions. Prog fans in general will also enjoy how Ut Gret take a musical riff and build upon it creating dramatic crescendos all the while taking the core musical themes in some unexpected directions.

Read the full review by Jerry Lucky

Media/Samples 
Progstreaming
The Grotesque Pageantry of Fading

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