tony oxley & derek bailey

The Advocate

The first three pieces in this four-piece collection date back to 1975, and are recorded documents of the collaborative work by two of the great elder statesmen of British improvised music, percussionist Tony Oxley and the late guitar legend, Derek Bailey. As you might have come to expect from these remarkable artists, the music sounds astonishingly ahead of its time, with the opening 'Sheffield Phantoms' sounding like it might have come from the same ferocious free-jazz tangle that gave birth to the first three Supersilent albums. The fourth piece on the disc is Oxley's solo tribute to Bailey in the format of an improvised work recorded at the Barbican last year. For a man not far from 70 years of age, Oxley's still on top of his game as a furiously animated, effortlessly dextrous percussionist, here aided by some well-placed electronics. A fitting tribute to the great man indeed.