Penny Rimbaud & Louise Elliot announce album 'Touch Is Hold'

Penny Rimbaud & Louise Elliot   Album ‘Touch Is Hold’ out April 18th via Caliban Sounds   Single ‘Not They’ out now   Smartlink Spotify

“Penny remains a relevant and vital voice of anarchism" – Vive Le Rock   “As for Louise Elliott... I think she is past brilliant - her flute is enchanting loveliness in the heart of darkness” – Louder Than War   Recorded in the Summer of 2012, ‘Touch is Hold’ could, if it weren’t for its deeply prescient nature, be seen merely as a piece of archive material. However, Penny Rimbaud is quick to retort with, “What’s changed? Wars continue, politics fluster, and all the while love too easily loses its lustre”. Rimbaud has spent much of his long life in seeking to remedy these ails, notably with Crass, and then with his much-loved aphorisms of which “Love is all or love is not at all” just about nails it. “There is no authority but yourself” tags in as a second runner.   Rimbaud, working alongside saxophonist and flutist Louise Elliott, will release ‘Touch Is Hold’ through his own imprint Caliban Sounds on April 18th.    Rimbaud and Elliott display a richly intuitive relationship founded through their long-term collaborative efforts. “Louise and I rarely rehearse together, and generally we don’t attempt to analyse our results. To us, it’s all a matter of simply doing it. Yes, it’s more usually called improvisation, but I prefer simply to call it trust, the poetry of jazz and the jazz of poetry. And so it is that we exist both before and beyond all consideration of sentience. The touch which is hold; the eternal solemnity of being.”    Penny Rimbaud co-founded seminal anarchist punk band Crass, who disbanded in 1984. Up until 2000 he devoted himself almost entirely to writing, returning to the public platform in 2001 as a performance poet working alongside a wide variety of jazz musicians. In 2003, together with Crass vocalist Eve Libertine, he founded what was at first known as 'The Crass Collective', then 'The Crass Agenda', then 'The Last Amendment’ and finally 'L’Académie des Vanités' – a loose collective of jazz musicians, artists and filmmakers who shared Rimbaud's lifelong interest in progressive, improvisational art.   Tenor saxophonist/flautist Louise Elliott was known for her appearances with cult rock outfits Laughing Clowns, The Saints, Ed Kuepper and Paul Kelly. She left Australia for London in 1985 and has performed with a wealth of international musicians, notably a distinguished selection of African and South American musicians from the Grand Union Orchestra, South African pianist Mervyn Africa and American drummer, the late Clifford Jarvis in his band The Jazz Prophets. Louise has appeared with Brian Abraham’s District Six, The Annie Whitehead Group and has toured regularly with British jazz guitarist Deirdre Cartwright. While working in London she has featured on recordings by Annie Whitehead, Jah Wobble and Deirdre Cartwright. Louise’s own music reflects the diversity of these influences; a rich blend of saxophone with electric guitar, a fiery commitment to inspiring and energetic live performance which has been referred to in the media as “her profoundly diverse smorgasbord of funk, blues and rock”.   Art credit: Gee Vaucher   Track listing   In Silence Not They Braking Point Of Flanders Garden Stepping Out In Red Song Of Self Ti Jean (1st Version 2010) Sax Duet (Louise Elliott & Lol Coxhill) Us Boys   Music credits   Written by Penny Rimbaud and Louise Elliott   Louise Elliott – sax and flute Penny Rimbaud – poetry and voice Lol Coxhill – sax (Recorded with Louise Elliott at London’s Marx Library 2003)   Recorded by Harvey Birrell at Southern Studios. Summer 2012 Mastered by Alex Gordon at Abbey Road Studios. Winter 2023   Follow Caliban   Facebook Instagram X