New Loft is a pretty much all-improv "free" "jazz" trio "playing an aggressive blend of improvised music with a 20 year history of troubled and adventurous aesthetics." We started existing in 1996, in Richmond, VA. Past histories: Tim and Sam played together in the Richmond-based collective Tad Thaddock in the early '80s, and later in the short-lived Office Ladies. Sam moved to Boston and played in UYA. Tim played in Always August. Tim and Jimmy were founding members of Hotel X, which still exists. Jimmy and Sam worked as a duo for a while before bringing Tim in. Then we added trumpeter Jon Mela (also ex-Tad, Office Ladies, Always August) to become New Loft Quartet. Jon died in early 2005. Jimmy and Tim play sometimes with the Four-Story Sax Quartet. Tim works extensively with Hotel X. Jimmy plays and records all over the place. We've also all played in the Joyful Noise Big Band.
There could be much more detail here, I'm sure. What kind of music do we play? It depends. Abstract, expressionistic, "out," noisy, clunky, non-composed, fluid, other words. Right now we have settled on half-hour excursions. Half an hour seems to be a nice time for us to say what we have to say at that time. We play once a week, used to be in Jimmy's basement, now in Tim's house. We record it all. Sometimes we have guests.
We have put up several full-length improvs available for free download as lossless flac, mp3 or streaming audio at: http://www.archive.org/search.php?query=mediatype%3Aaudio%20
AND%20subject%3A%22New%20Loft%22
