Aidan Baker, Han-Earl Park, Katharina Schmidt

*2025 stock. 200 copies limited edition* Three eminent figures of the international experimental music scene meet here in an unexpected configuration. Aidan Baker and Katharina Schmidt are well-known for their drone/ambient-oriented work, while versatile improviser Han-earl Park is certainly the person one would expect in an improvising trio. Katharina Schmidt performs as a drummer and percussionist, Aidan Baker switches between guitar and bass, while Han-earl Park appears on his trademark instrument, the guitar. Park, whose list of collaborators includes Lol Coxhill, Charles Hayward, Evan Parker, and Pauline Oliveros, has also been called a 'musical philosopher' – perhaps this is the reason behind the 'thoughts' mentioned in the name of the trio and album title.

Recorded live at Morphine Raum in Berlin in February 2024, the album that was edited from the live set actually seems to symbolise – or much rather perform or embody – the thought process of musical creation. Starting from, as it were, isolated raw materials in the form of noises rather than tones, the seemingly disparate elements gradually click into place at some points, forming rhythmic cells, and at some points even chord-like assonances. What really foregrounds the 'thought process' aspect, though, is the way in which these 'dark extemporizations' (Han-earl Park) constantly perform a certain skepticism and doubt regarding their own method.

These improvisations never go straight for the 'kill' of power-play exultation, but rather prefer to retrace their steps to hear if there isn't, perhaps, an alternative way of getting from one point to another. Once you get into it, it is precisely this tactic which makes the music of these three people who often think twice one hell of a suspenseful listening experience. An experience in which the listener is constantly faced with the question: will this whole thing hold together till the end, or will it fall apart? Thoughts everybody probably knows from their own life, reflected here in a musical essay.