MILFORD GRAVES and BILL LASWELL release SPACE / TIME ・REDEMPTION; their first duo recording

On the five extended improvisations that comprise Space / Time ・ Redemption, Graves and Laswell, who have in recent years occasionally performed live as a duo at The Stone and other New York venues, jointly create a sound world all of their own. The album was produced by Bill Laswell and the recording took place at his studios in West Orange, New Jersey.

"Understanding the unique rhythmic thrust and fractured sonic patterns of Milford Graves´s tribal matrix is like trying to synchronize raindrops. Time is lapsed, accelerated and finally erased. Time is that which ends," says Bill Laswell about Milford Graves. "For my part, I was probably subconsciously channeling recent experiences in Africa or childhood memories of sound and silence, long open spaces and endless distance. An unknown point of departure with no designated destination."

Milford Graves (b.1941) was born and raised in the Borough of Queens in New York City, where he continues to live. He became deeply involved with New York´s avant-garde or free jazz scene of the early 1960s and has since worked almost exclusively within this idiom. Early in his career, Graves performed with the likes of saxophonists Giuseppi Logan and Albert Ayler, pianists Paul Bley and Don Pullen, guitarist Sonny Sharrock, drummer Andrew Cyrille and percussionist Sunny Morgan, among many others. He also joined one of the key groups of the 1960s, the New York Art Quartet, with saxophonist John Tchicai, trombonist Roswell Rudd, poet Amiri Baraka et.al. In more recent years, Graves has performed with saxophonists David Murray, John Zorn and Anthony Braxton, among others. He has also performed and recorded with his own groups and as a solo artist.

Bill Laswell (b.1955) moved from the Detroit area to New York City in the late 1970s and soon became an important part of the so-called Downtown scene centered around the East Village. His early groups included The Zu Band andMaterial, which combined rock influences with electronic experimentation and improvisation and often featured prominent guest artists. As a producer, Laswell may be best known for his collaborations with pianist Herbie Hancock that began with "Rockit" on the album Future Shock. Laswell has also produced countless other albums ranging from Laurie Anderson to Mick Jagger, from Yoko Ono to Pharoah Sanders and from the Last Poets to the Gnawa musicians of Morocco. Laswell´s best known remix credit may be for Panthalassa, an album that features Miles Davis´s music from his electric period. As a musician, Laswell has continued to lead and participate in a number of groundbreaking groups, including Massacre, the Golden Palominos, Curlew, Last Exit, Praxis, Painkiller, Arcana and Method of Defiance. He has also released two solo bass recordings.