Album review: About Group, Between the Walls (Domino)

On Between the Walls, About Group continue to explore the space between free collective improvisation and Alexis Taylor's songs, extended further by the more formal discipline imposed by impromptu “covers” of standards.

In the case of Willie Nelson's “Nightlife”, it's as if the song is drifting into King Creosote territory thanks to Taylor's wheedling vocal and oblique melody, while “Walk on By” seems to rise, like mist, from a soul organ and drum groove lashed with splintered guitar chords, ultimately building to a thrumming climax powered along by Charles Hayward's Can-like drumming.

Download: Walk on By; All Is Not Lost; Nightlife/Sinking