Imagine post-Canterbury (Soft Machine, Hatfields, Caravan), mixed with Rock in Opposition (Henry Cow, Art Bears, Aksak Maboul, Univers Zero) suffused with Teutonic precision and obsessive repetition (Magma), imbued with some of Frank Zappa's wit and post classical chic, filtered through post RIO bands like 5UUs, and cocking a snook at the more tame and inhibited post-rock groups like Tortoise; and you get Absolute Zero.
Though the genesis of Absolute Zero began as long ago as 1975, but Drummer Paul Roger and Enrique Jardines co created the band in 1979 when they started to play together, recruiting guitarist Michael Moehle. The band played their first concert that year in Florida.. As trumpeter Keith Hedger began to work with the band- Mike left and the band moved to Massachusetts to regroup. In 1981, after rehearsals, their first gig in NYC minutes before Absolute Zero's scheduled appearance due to a near riot at Inroads Theater due to a prior act taking up their allotted time. The band's first live radio concert was on WMFO, 91.5, at Tufts University, Medford, MA, and proved to be a success.
During the ensuing years, musician came and went in the band, but in 1984, Keith Hedger officially joins the band and the group started to look for a vocalist.
Aislinn Quinn, composer, keyboardist and vocalist, auditions for the band and joins Absolute Zero. Four years later, Keith leaves the group.
1989, was a year for composing, and the group create many pieces that are their bulk of its present-day music for performance and recording.
In the early 90's, the band finally got to recording, creating an EP-length CD, "A Live in the Basement", through a VCR, without the benefit of an engineer. No money and lack of recording equipment leads to Paul's resourceful discovery that his VCR is actually a broadcast quality VCR which would enable the band to record its music. Compositions are recorded live, no mixing, no overdubbing.
Though they have created few disks, the band had a solid following in New England, playing on 25 confirmed radio stations. Reviews for their CD are very positive.
The band used 1995 to gig and play live at festivals as well as concert halls. The band moves to Florida and in 1997, Absolute Zero's second CD "Crashing Icons" and a third CD are ready for post-production. The band starts a fourth CD as well.
Absolute Zero starts compositions for a fourth CD.
In 1999, Paul leaves Absolute Zero to move on to other musical and extra-musical adventures. On May 31, Pip Pyle (Gong, National Health, Hatfield and the North, In Cahoots, Equip' Out) joins Absolute Zero. The band does an October tour.
The `Crashing Icons' CD was completed in 2000 with the help of Pip Pyle, culminating in a concert at Springs Theatre in Tampa, FL.
Both co-founder Enrique Jardines (bass) and long time keyboardist and vocalist Aislinn Quinn have Masters degrees in composition, which perhaps explains the awesome compositional techniques employed to fashion the complex and chaotic melodies and rhythmic structures. `Crashing Icons' features aggression drumming and complexity, at times slamming the music into brutal post-rock shapes. Aislinn Quinn's gorgeous vocals lend a gentler note to the evil fuzz-distorted bass lines or Enrique Jardines; horror movie organs, electronic and sampled noises, repeated riffs set up for abstract improv bursts, sections of gamelan-like ethnic music, and angular blues riffs, all compete for attention within a counter-intuitively cohesive whole.
Absolute Zero have existed in one form or another for 25 years, and have followed a long road to the mature outcome of `Crashing Icons.' Their history includes the accidental burning of the groups' equipment, gigs abandoned due to freak interventions by crazed musicians, and a long line of celebrity personnel have been in and out of the group.
Sadly, drummer Pip Pyle died in Paris on Monday, August 28, 2006, two days after playing a concert with Hatfield and the North in Groningen, Holland.
Tragically 4 years later, Enrique Jardines, bassist and composer for Absolute Zero passed away in April 2010.
Do not know if the band will still survive the turmoil of bandmates passing, their website says: Site Coming. We'll see.
