Taking bass beyond the final frontier are twin virtuosos Colin Edwin (Porcupine Tree) and Lorenzo Feliciati (Naked Truth, Berserk!). With Bill Laswell mixing them, the Australian and Italian complement each other perfectly. Aided on occasion by Van der Graaf sax player David Jackson, trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer and PFM drummer Roberto Gualdi, they create not just the obligatory ‘ambient soundscapes’, but tracks of real energy and verve.
Stirring opener Shaken teases and simmers hypnotically like Tangerine Dream, with Gualdi propelling the pulse-beats. Alice and In Dreamland possess the cool elegance and elan of Tin Drum-era Japan (Mick Karn is an unavoidable recurring reference point).
Never indulgent, Twinscapes develops grooves and melodies with both clarity and feel. It’s not about showing off, and it’s not even a crusade to champion the world’s most undervalued instrument: the pair have genuine, intuitive musical simpatico.
As the maverick fuzz-funk of Breathsketch somehow both glides lightly and stabs hard with absurdly fine playing, you sense that this is a subtle contender for the year’s first truly great instrumental album.
