[Davey]

Some other big favorites a bit off the beaten path, check out China Gate by Cul de Sac. Great musicians and some great guitar parts and some very nice atmosphere. Kind of a middle eastern surf sound at times.

And Laika, especially that great Silver Apples of the Moon debut.....

Laika named themselves after the dog the Soviets launched into outer space (and never recovered); they named their second album Sounds of the Satellites; if there was anything to justify comparing them with Stereolab, it was that retro-futuristic Sputnik fetish. Their actual sounds, though, sit pretty far apart. Silver Apples layers head-nodding breakbeats into a druggy haze that has a lot in common with Tricky's early trip-hop. On a track like "Marimba Song," which folds in a swirl of jazzy sounds, it's not so far from Maxinquaye; elsewhere they drop out into stiff beats, dub bass, and steely-eyed cooing, leaving them sounding a bit like the electronic duo Lamb.

 

[Asr]

If you can put up with a heavy dose of electronica & psychedelia, Future Sound of London should be considered essential. Their last two albums, The Isness and Dead Cities, are super-trippy modernistic stylings that mess around in all kinds of directions, rhythm included.

FSOL also moonlights under another alias, Amorphous Androgynous. While AA's first release Tales of Ephidrina doesn't really qualify for avant-garde, you'd be hard-pressed to not put that genre label on their 2005 release Alice In Ultraland. I'm still waiting for the U.S. release (if/when it comes out) but in the meantime you can get a killer streaming sample of the entire CD on their Web site: http://www.futuresoundoflondon.com/amorphous/

 

[Aman]

Rhythmically-focused avant-garde is hard to come by, because the cultural trends of today specify that the avant-garde artists try to avoid such concepts.

However, there exist many musicians like this. Susie Ibarra is a female avant-garde percussionist - she's been doing a lot of excellent work in the field of rhythm. Naked City, John Zorn's thrash-jazz band, has an extremely tight rhythm section, and may be right up your alley (though, they are pretty aggressive!).

Anthony Braxton's "Ghost Trance Music" compositions are all based off of quarter-beat pulses. This is SERIOUS avant-garde music - very complex, very progressive. It's so rhythmically-focused that it practically circumvents all traditional aspects of the term entirely. You may be interested in any one of the "Yoshi's" albums from Anthony Braxton, or perhaps the Victoriaville 2006 release?

Squarepusher is a pretty "out there" electronic artist, who is very interested in complex and odd rhythmic feels. Think Aphex Twin with a little Neil Peart thrown in there.

Ari Hoenig is a downtown Manhattan drummer who chromatically tunes his four-piece drum set, so that he can solo on any scale that the rest of the band is. He is an incredible player, and a great guy to boot. His pianist, Jean-Michelle Pilc, is both a player of the avant-garde and the traditional methods, so he witnesses a lot of variety in between tracks. Both of his trio/quartet releases are stellar.

 

[JadeEast]

If you like Isaac Hayes, I'll repeat my self check out Fela Kuti.
You can check out a bit of him here.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MdsI...elated&search=

 

[gsolman6]

I can recommend Art of Noise's "Who's Afraid...." and "In Visible Silence."

 

[Uncle Erik]

Maybe this is a little off track, but check out Ali Farka Toure. A little blues, a little middle-eastern and a little African. Unlike anything I've heard before. Familiar yet exotic and there are some terrific rhythms in there, not to mention his guitar work. More rootsy than artsy, but it's hard to stop listening.

 

[AudioJunkie]

Don Pullen.

 

[bwu]

There's plenty of out-there avant-jazz and -rock that don't eschew accessible rhythm. For instance:

A good deal of Tim Berne's work, especially with drummer Tom Rainey - try Feign, The Sublime And., Unwound (no Rainey but this is a 3-disc live set with an absolutely killer rhythm section in Michael Formanek and Jim Black)... etc. Pretty much any Berne is good stuff if you can handle very complex long-form jazz.

More improvisatory are the collaborations between Nels Cline (Wilco), Andrea Parkins and the aforementioned Tom Rainey - two albums, Ash and Tabula and Downpour, are heavy on guitar fireworks with Rainey keeping pace spectacularly.

A really fun one is the Satoko Fujii Quartet - collab between Japanese free-jazz pianist Satoko Fujii with a rock bassist and famed avant-rock drummer Tatsuya Yoshida (of Ruins and countless other loud bands). Yoshida is one of the most hyperactive drummers EVER in either rock or jazz, but somehow Fujii and her trumpeter husband keep up.

Maybe the ultimate in rhythmic free jazz are some of Ken Vandermark's groups. The Vandermark 5 are his main combo, playing an aggressive, muscular kind of stuff, where lately Vandermark has mostly been holding down heavy rhythm lines on the baritone sax. But even more accessible is a collaboration between his Spaceways Inc. ensemble and Italian free-jazzers Zu, called Radiale, in which these guys cover Sun Ra and Funkadelic songs with a serious emphasis on funky beats. This one's a must!

And then there's the realm of avant-rock... Henry Cow, Thinking Plague, Present, Magma... all worth checking out and all featuring rock-oriented, complex yet accessible rhythms. I can post more on this stuff if there's interest...

 

[3DCadman]

Stereolab's "Dots and Loops" or "Cobra and Phases Group Play Voltage in the Milky Night". Great beats, with wonderful Stereolab layers of sound.

Also, in the Jazz vein, try the group The Bad Plus. The drummer in that band is crazy busy all the time.

 

[terriblepaulz]

x2 on:

Fela Kuti
Can, Faust
Mahavishnu Orchestra

let me add:

King Sunny Ade
Neu!
Kraftwerk
Tortoise


since you mention V.U.:

Yo La Tengo
Sonic Youth, esp. Evol and Daydream Nation
The Feelies - The Good Earth

since you mention James Brown:

Various Artists - James Brown's Funky People, James Brown's Funky People, Part 2, and James Brown's Funky People, Part 3

 

[s m @]

I think the OP might really like some of the later Boredoms stuff. Particularly, Vision Creation Newsun and the recently re-released Super Roots 7 EP. It has that constant building rhythm with assorted other stuff over top.

For no apparent reason I also think Ali Farka Toure was a really good recommendation.

Almost all of the recos here are cool stuff I think, but I think what the OP desires is a taste of the out-there anchored by a solid beat, rather than totally avant-ized beats....

 

[werdwerdus]

sort of avant-garde: Black Lung and Xingu Hill - The Andronechron Incident (2002). It's electronic music that sort of sounds like something Aphex Twin or Venetian Snares might have done.

 

[wower]

I was looking at Ali Farka Toure, Erik. Can you recommend any of his albums specifically? thx

 

[asmox]

Quote:

Originally Posted by bwu /img/forum/go_quote.gif I can post more on this stuff if there's interest...

There is.

I love Thinking Plague, Magma, and a few of the others mentioned. Anything similar on the lesser known side that you could recommend would be great :]

 

[Debaser86]

If you love Magma, then you definitely need to check out Ruins!