Whilst Ireland has long produced music of world renown, this tiny, most Westerly European nation has never been quite so famous for producing cutting edge jazz. However, as European jazz has gradually let slip the American accent—an evolution that perhaps gathered its greatest momentum with the birth of the ECM label—so, too, in Ireland, a new generation of musicians are venturing into increasingly more fertile grounds.
One independent label that is cutting a fearless swathe through the choppy waters of conservatism and indifference is Diatribe Records, which promotes some of Ireland's most creative musicians—native and immigrant alike. Formed in Dublin in 1999, the labels first tentative steps were two techno 12" vinyls, long since deleted. Diatribe's first CD wasn't released until eight years later, a concept album of jazz musicians battling machine overlords entitled ZoiD Versus the Jazz Musicians of Ireland Vol 1 (2007). The concept, the title and the graffiti-like artwork probably consigned the music to underground status from the get-go, but the electro-acoustic modern jazz experiment said much about the label's disregard for convention and underlined its commitment to forward-looking, creative music.
Since that first release, a dozen more CDs have followed and numerous digital releases, covering a wide range of styles that encompass modern jazz, electronic music, and a range of hard-to-categorize, highly personal forays into free improvisation and experimentation. The range and breadth of the music is impressive, from pianist Francesco Turrisi's baroque-influenced trio jazz to bass guitarist Simon Jermyn's contemporary experiment in sound; from Izumi Kimura's electrifying contemporary solo piano improvisations to the brilliant contemporary jazz of trio White Rocket and quartet ReDivIDeR; and from the aforementioned electro-acoustic ZoiD and the folk-flavored, jazz-classical melting pot that is Yurodny to Diatribe's latest addition to the stable, Thought-Fox, an original quintet featuring the divine voice of improvising vocalist Lauren Kinsella.
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