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Garage A Trois: Calm Down Cologne

By Chris May
April 2, 2021
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Formed by guitarist

Charlie Hunter

guitar
b.1967

" data-original-title="" title="">Charlie Hunter, saxophonist

Skerik

saxophone

" data-original-title="" title="">Skerik and drummer

Stanton Moore

drums
b.1972

" data-original-title="" title="">Stanton Moore in 1999,

" data-original-title="" title="">Garage a Trois has sparked a slew of "But is it jazz?" debates with every new release. Calm Down Cologne will do it again.

GAT has been through various incarnations since its debut EP, The Mysteryfunk (Fog City Records, 1999), necessitated by the departure of Hunter. The group's last album, 2011's Always Be Happy, But Stay Evil (Royal Potato Family), was actually made by a quartet—Skerik, Moore, vibraphonist

Mike Dillon

vibraphone

" data-original-title="" title="">Mike Dillon and keyboardist

Marco Benevento

organ, Hammond B3

" data-original-title="" title="">Marco Benevento—and the band went into hiatus not long afterwards.

In 2019, the original lineup reunited for a three-night run at Seattle's Nectar Lounge, during which they spent an afternoon recording across the street at Pearl Jam guitarist Stone Gossard's Studio Litho. Calm Down Cologne is the result. It is essentially a live-in-the-studio affair, with only one overdub (the brief appearance of singer Christa Wells) and edits confined to tidying up the beginning and ends of the tracks. Only the title tune was composed prior to the event and the other four tracks were collectively created on the hoof in the studio.

The album is constructed around GAT's longtime reference points—electric era

Miles Davis

trumpet
1926 - 1991

" data-original-title="" title="">Miles Davis,

George Clinton

vocals

" data-original-title="" title=""> George Clinton space funk, and free jazz. A riotous jazz-rock is in the ascendant, with "In-A-Pro-Pro" the only track explicitly to focus on Clinton's

Parliament Funkadelic

" data-original-title="" title="">Parliament Funkadelic . All the knobs are turned up to eleven for the first thirty or so minutes, before dialling down for the closer, "Numinous." Fans of Skerik's saxophone may regret his concentrating on keyboards, but this is a minor cavil, and to expect him to go back later and overdub more saxophone would not be in keeping with the spirit of the album. Is it jazz? Yes. And no. Definitely. But one thing is certain: GAT is on the right side of the barricades.

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Track Listing

No Zone; The Epic; Calm Down Cologne; In-A-Pro-Pro; Numinous.

Personnel

Skerik

saxophone

Charlie Hunter

guitar

Stanton Moore

drums

Additional Instrumentation

Sherik: tenor saxophone, Modal 001 synthesizer, Rhodes 54, Mellotron; Charlie Hunter: Hybrid Big6 guitar; Stanton Moore: drums; Christa Wells: vocals (2).

Album information

Title: Calm Down Cologne | Year Released: 2021 | Record Label: Royal Potato Family

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