“A smartly unruly drummer active in devious art-rock and outsider jazz, Ches Smith (Xiu Xiu, Secret Chiefs 3) works often enough in other people’s bands to seem the quintessential journeyman. His stealth proficiency as a bandleader lurches to the foreground on “Finally Out of My Hands” (Skirl). It’s the debut of These Arches, his texture-rich quartet with Tony Malaby on tenor saxophone, Mary Halvorson on guitar and Andrea Parkins on accordion and organ… The group presents a volatile compound of attributes: deft and boomy, ragged and precise. And the album has proportionate doses of knockabout groove, scratchy free improvisation and chamber-esque restraint. This music is impetuous but a long way from careless.”

–Nate Chinen, New York Times

Tony Malaby–sax
Mary Halvorson–guitar
Andrea Parkins–accordion
Ches Smith–drums

Photo by Peter Gannushkin / downtownmusic.net