Sun Ra Arkestra aside, a big band is an unlikely format for experimental music. Too many players; too much history. Yet two veteran experimental musicians -- electronica guru and performance artist Matthew Herbert and keyboardist Naruyoshi Kikuchi, a stalwart of Tokyo's improvisational music scene -- have lately made the big band their chosen format.
Kikuchi's group, Date Course Pentagon Royal Garden, is an improvisers' supergroup featuring, among others, noted drummer Yoshihiro Yoshigaki and Otomo Yoshihide, recently renowned as a turntable artist but here returning to his original instrument, the guitar. Date Course has given many of these artists the biggest audiences of their careers.
Mining the tension between their tightness as a band, responsive to Kikuchi's subtle direction and the members' impressive abilities as improvisers, Date Course puts on a rousing show. There are moments when the shrieking horns are reminiscent of Stan Kenton's discordant white-boy brass distortion, but Kikuchi draws his influences from the freer end of the jazz spectrum with a modern injection of turntable noise and psychedelic guitar. Hidden in Date Course's funky sprawl are touches of Herbie Hancock, as well as the expected Sun Ra, and their cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Hey Joe" is a set highlight.