The Norwegian trio Jøkleba was formed in 1990, establishing itself as one of the most unpredictable groups on the Scandinavian scene. The present disc – the fifth Jøkleba album, but the first for ECM – finds old friends Jørgensen, Balke and Kleive working with pulse and colour and texture in collective music-making, emphasizing electronics, trumpet and voice, in freely created pieces which hint at relationships between inspiration and instability. Track titles make reference to writings by Sylvia Plath, Laura Restrepo, Sadegh Hedayat, Guy de Maupassant and Ken Kesey, in particular to their descriptions of the disintegration of identity, “the human mind when it gets lost”, as Jon Balke puts it. All three musicians have recorded prolifically for ECM in a wide variety of contexts, but the particular chemistry of Jøkleba is unique unto itself.
Die Stücktitel setzen Bezüge zu Schriften von Sylvia Plath, Laura Restrepo, Sadegh Hedayat, Guy de Maupassant und Ken Kesey, speziell zu deren Beschreibungen sich auflösender Identitäten, „des menschlichen Geistes, wenn er verloren geht“, wie Jon Balke sich ausdrückt. Alle drei Musiker haben bereits regelmäßig und in ganz unterschiedlichen Kontexten für ECM aufgenommen, aber die spezielle Chemie bei Jøkleba ist einzigartig.
