Jim O'Rourke, Michael Prime, Eddie Prevost "Alpha Lemur Echo Two"

First of all, the title for this disc is misleading; it implies thatthis is a trio recording by everywhere-at-once guitarist O'Rourke andtwo members of the UK's (perhaps the world's) greatest improvisingensembles, Eddie Prevost from AMM and Michael Prime from Morphogenesis.What it actually is is one recording of a trio performance by the threeaformentioned folks, and one quartet performance by O'Rourke, Prime,Andy Hammond (guitar) and Adam Bohman (also from Morphogenesis). HavingPrevost's name in the title doesn't really make sense, as O'Rourke andPrime are the only constants on the two tracks.
The music on the first trio recording is strangely polite, withO'Rourke and Prime providing unobtrusive electronic gurgles whilePrevost plays the insistent (and unusually straight) improv drummer,constantly in a hurry to propel the music forward. It's Prevost who ismost disappointing here; his impatience to build momentum is the markof boring, predictable improvisation. But since Prime and O'Rourkedon't make any bold moves to give the music any other shape or take itin a different direction, Prevost doesn't have much room in which towork, so he runs through his bag of tricks. The result does not soundlike a coherent musical statement to me.
More successful is the quartet track, which is built upon a thick, notunpleasant drone. The drone vacilates around one chord, but remains inplace for the entire 17 minutes of the piece. Some scraping metal whichsounds like Adam Bohman's contribution gets nicely abrasive after about13 minutes, and reminds me of how much I enjoy Bohman's solo albums.Even though the metal overtakes the drone for almost a minute near theend, it cuts out abruptly and the drone finishes off the track justlike it started. I found myself wishing that the piece would move intoa different area, but that damn pleasant loop anchors the music sothoroughly that it doesn't have anywhere else to go. Again, I felt likethe particpants were too polite; with so many interesting sounds (notto mention immense talent!) at thier disposal, they sound like theyhaven't played together before and do not wish to offend each other.Obviously, that is not the case, so I wonder why it sounds like it is.A steadily growing drone and a predictible improv, while not terriblein and of themselves, are not terribly exciting; I expect more fromthese guys.