Escape Of The Fire Ants

– General Description: Swiss quintet Le Rex features two saxophonists, trombone, tuba and drums. Their fourth album ‘Escape of the Fire Ants’ draws on musical connections to Chicago, Belgrade, Cape Town, New Orleans, and Lagos. They play a lot of clubs and concert halls (and department stores, farms, construction sites, scrap yards) with no amplifiers. Makes me smile.

The group named themselves after an abandoned cinema they found on the island of Corsica. Formed in 2009, Le Rex became united due to their common musical interests and a love of busking. They claim to be “street smart and road-tested” — I agree. Play this! You really can’t go wrong with any of these tracks.

– Musicians:
Benedikt Reising - Alto Saxophone
Marc Stucki - Tenor Saxophone
Andreas Tschopp - Trombone
Marc Unternährer - Tuba
Rico Baumann - Drums

– FCC Compliant: YES
– Recommended Tracks: 1, 4, 5, 6, 8
– Track Reviews:

1. **(8:23) Escape of the Fire Ants - funky medium-fast; like film-noir soundtrack; really fun call-and-response
2. (6:41) Alimentation Générale - transl: Grocery; nice and smooth; tenor sax solo is very nice
3. (6:59) Smoking Flowers - moderate tempo; tuba takes the lead many times
4. ***(6:11) One Must Imagine Sisyphus Happy - rompy low continuous moderate beat and wonderful lazy yawning delivery of horns
5. **(5:54) Harry Stamper Saves The Day - swing drumming under riff-based tune (title references Bruce Willis’s character in the film ‘Armageddon’)
6. ****(3:58) Elliott's Theme - quieter relaxed conversation
7. (5:05) Bädumeh Landing - tuba pushes right in and keeps it pumping with quite the back and forth above
8. ****(3:23) The Funding - Talking Heads-meets-Zeppelin
9. (5:08) Strong Woods - smooth tempo and very moody solos
10. (4:32) Glow - easy-going piece
11. (6:50) Ballad For An Optimist - expressive trombone and roving sax
12. (6:11) Der Knochige Dürre - transl: The Bony Drought; spacey, thoughtful and then wild