CHANDLER NAKAI KUGEL
Listen to the trio here
Knox Chandler e-guitar, electronics
Daigo Nakai e-bass, double bass
Klaus Kugel drums, percussions
The trio's explosive music emerges in spontaneous play, in a flowing communication of direct ideas and sophisticated artistry. The newly founded CHANDLER NAKAI KUGEL succeeds in developing the most complex soundscapes.
Archaic and transcendental beauty, abstraction, flowing melodic chains and metrically unbound tonal colour play come together in its music. Often an atmosphere of contemplation, of concrete slowness and silence is created until the ensemble again gets stuck in suspenseful improvisation adventures, some of which are very rock oriented.
Knox Chandler’s career has spanned for over four decades, including performing, recording,arranging and producing,with such acts as REM, Depeche Mode, Grace Jones, Marianne Faithful, Natalie Merchant, The Creatures, Dave Gahan Paper Monsters and The Golden Palominos etc.. His long stints as a member of The Psychedelic Furs,Siouxsie and the Banshees and Cyndi Lauper’s band; has given Knox the experience of a worldwide recording and touring musician.
Since taking up residence in Berlin, in 2012, he has concentrated on his solo project, Sound Ribbons/Tone Poems. This project is an auditory and visual expression of four decades of experience in processing, manipulating and looping the electric guitar. Recent shows with X Patsy’s (Robert Longo, Barbara Sukowa), J.G. Thirwell, Butterfly Percussion Parade (Budgie, Mabi, Sugizo, Leonard Eto), touring and; and his solo guitar performances demonstrate his current importance in contemporary music.
He has scored several films for film director Christina Voigt. One of which, Fontana Promenade” was part of an installation at the Deutsches Historisches Museum.
When he is not touring, recording and arranging with German acts “Miss Kenichi”, “Jesper Munk”, “Them There”, “Robot” and “TAU”, Knox is teaching at BIMM Berlin, where he is the head of the guitar department; as well as continuing his own project “Bursting Blue Bone Bark” with Eric Mingus.
In 2003, Daigo Nakai left Japan where he was born, and went to live in Melbourne where he studied Performing Art/ Music. After he gained bachelor degree, he has worked with many musicians, and been invited to perform in Festivals and concerts as well as independently curated events across Australia, Japan and Europe performing Jazz, free improvisation, Electronic music, Rock and Folk.
His unique style of playing bass is obtained from his life experience in different countries and diverse range of music influence such as old and modern jazz, classic music, punk rock, hip-hop and the other 90’s music.
He has performed as a session musician appearing in many host bands, ensembles and their recordings including Berlin Tap Session, Melbourne based group Captain Apples, as well as Ade Ishs Trio - of which Daigo had been a member for 4 years.
„Klaus Kugel is one of the great contemporary European drummers, and plays all over the kit with a sharp hard pulse.“ - Carl Pearson, Jazz Director, WFHB Bloomington, IN USA
"Drummer Klaus Kugel is one of Central Europe's most articulate modern jazz drummers ... he treads the boundary between inside and outside playing in a particularly incisive way; always listening and never getting caught up in his own considerable chops." - Dave Wayne, AllAboutJazz
"Percussionist Klaus Kugel is a commanding force behind the drum set. He creates layers of tension drawn out from intuitive listening." - John Barron, Jazzreview.com
"Most ensembles can only wish for a percussionist with such high skill and perceptive musicianship as Klaus Kugel" - Frankfurter Rundschau
Klaus Kugel attracted attention worldwide through projects with Petras Vysniauskas, Karl Berger, Tomasz Stanko, Charlie Mariano, Kent Carter, Michel Pilz, Theo Jorgensmann, Kenny Wheeler, Vyacheslav Ganelin, Bobo Stenson, Glen Moore, Steve Swell, Sabir Mateen, Robert Dick, Peter Evans, Perry Robinson, Hilliard Greene, John Lindberg, Gerd Dudek, William Parker, Bobby Few, Roy Campbell, Jemeel Moondoc, Waclaw Zimpel, Mars Williams, Charles Gayle, Conny Bauer, Ken Vandermark, Joe McPhee, John Edwards, Jaimie Branch a.m.o..