Wasted & Wanted

Michael Wollny's [em]

Label: ACT music
Format: CD
Barcode: 0614427951526

Catalog number: ACT 95152
Releasedate: 24-02-12

Reinventing yourself, discovering something new, making a clean sweep, being a bit of a rebel and always being driven by creativity: Michael Wollny's [em] presents ist new, incredible album.
"MAKE UP YOUR OWN RULES! This is jazz." (Michael Wollny)

On “Wasted & Wanted“, the listener won’t hear be greeted by overtly intellectual and ostentatiously academic jazz, but rather extremely energetic music with some nearly telepathic interaction between its creators.
Such energy levels are seldom reached in jazz.
The confusion of terminology is truly wonderful
MAKE UP YOUR OWN RULES! This is jazz
Music can be found inside the spaces where convention wouldn't dare to look
With a bonus CD of Michael Wollny live at JazzFest Berlin 2011

Beauty is not a very reliable term. Some find beauty in Rammstein, others find it in Die Fledermaus. It is impossible to analyze the reasons, even though we are constantly trying to do so. We can't explain to other people why we like a certain picture, and dislike another. Apparently there was a time when Schubert was considered kitsch by some.

As for the truth, things aren’t always much clearer. Some claim that once in a while, a lie can be more honest than the truth. We often lie in order to convince people of our truth. We are looking for an intensity of truth, which can only be achieved by stylization and choreography. Werner Herzog calls this the ecstasy of truth - maybe Mahler would have liked that term, too.

When a band is locked inside a studio, trying to search for new music, they can't avoid pondering these subjects. Of course we want to achieve beauty, and of course we want to be as honest as can be. But how close to reality can a piano trio actually sound on CD? Can acoustic music be made real in this artificial space? Or, to phrase the question differently: why aren't we still amazed by the fact that a symphony orchestra starts to perform in our car as soon as we connect the iPod?

Kraftwerk found themselves in the exact opposite position. Synthesizers were at home in an artificial environment, and ultimately the speakers became the instruments the band performed on, and robots became the actual performers on stage. Some of their audience considered this to be beautiful, while others did not.

No matter when, no matter where: every musician is searching for true and real moments in music. As jazz musicians we seem to find them at times when we’re not desperately seeking them. Music can be found inside the spaces where convention wouldn't dare to look.

In other words: The confusion of terminology is truly wonderful. MAKE UP YOUR OWN RULES! This is jazz.

Wasted & Wanted