[F]erocious and elegant....All four musicians play so much with wringing unusual sounds from their axes that the story is less about how Young's aytpical instrument fits in, but how all four create an intense alien landscape.
- Shaun Brady, downbeat.com
The essence of Pretty Monsters (the band) lies not in Young’s
willingness to go in...different directions, but rather her
willingness to travel these seemingly oppositional routes almost
concurrently, and certainly within a given composition. This keeps
listeners on the edge of their seats; at the music’s best, it threatens
to upend any comfortable divisions between music and noise.
[E]ven in moments of abandon, this music feels
controlled; the improvised solos sound like essential facets of the
compositions. This is because Young, like her occasional employer
Anthony Braxton, understands that selecting a musician and creating the
right opportunity can be a powerful compositional act.
[L]ike someone
improvising to a Melvins record.
- Peter Margasak, The Chicago Reader
Heavy metal jazz on steroids with layers of texture that
include guitar washes, violin drones, electronic flights of fancy all
somehow tied to a virtuoso bassoonist whose compositions take everything
you thought you knew or familiar with in the free or experimental jazz
genre and politely tosses it right out the window and this is a
beautiful thing. I would be remiss if I did not mention the incredible
cover art done by Rob Patterson.
- Brent Black, criticaljazz.com
The cyclical “Patricia Highsmith”...is rendered with slinky
undertow, lunkheaded beats colliding with fractured and skittering
guitar (Stewart-Robinson is a no-wave blues revelation here) and mated
with swooping ponticello bowing and low, reedy blats. Young’s bassoon is
not always in the foreground; frequently, she supports higher-pitched
statements from guitar and violin with droning warble or a patchwork of
live electronics and loops.
- Clifford Allen, New York City Jazz Record
[T]here’s nothing at all typical about the bassoon playing of one
Katherine Young, and as a fascinating, unbounded extension of her
musical personality, neither are her Pretty Monsters. Katherine Young’s Pretty Monsters
is a brash, assured first statement from a talented young performer who
is poised to do for the bassoon what Tom Cora did for the cello.
- S. Victor Aaron, Something Else
[B]assoonist Katherine Young transcends the instrument’s reputation with a
shrewd combination of talent and technology; she employs extended
techniques and effects pedals to subtly expand the horn’s range...
- Troy Collins, All About Jazz
It doesn't happen often that you listen to an
album wondering what the hell is happening here. Pretty Monster's debut
album is one of those albums. You hear lots of familiar stuff, some
jazz, some rock, some classical even, but then everything is stretched
and mangled to fit another sound purpose, something strange, unique and
compelling, covered with a sauce of noise, and all that without losing a
coherent sense of lyricism that ties the entire album together.
- Stef, Free Jazz Collective
These cool inspired tracks
were recorded by folks who are obviously feeding off one another's creative
tendencies...and the results are rather hypnotic and bewildering.
- Baby Sue
Sun 11/4
