check it out:

http://blogs.chicagoreader.com/post-no-bills/2008/04/30/sonic-wizardry-fantastic-merlins/

Here's Marc Medwin's review of the Merlins disc Look around in Signal to Noise. After reading it you surely will not be able to resist going here to buy it.

Fantastic Merlins
Look Around
Innova CD

A whisper of brushed snares, two metallic taps, a snatch of the faintest human voice, and then strings open onto a vast plain of reverberant sound and slowly evolving drone. The opening moments of Look Around evoke multiple landscapes, layers of sonic possibility that are then realized throughout this superb and surprisingly adventurous disc. How many groups claim use of electronics only to disappoint? Here, they shape perspective, providing subtlety and adding delicate shades, never trumpeting their existence as anything but symbiotic. Even when obvious, as in the transition between "Line" and "Bright and Wide," or at the opening of "It Would Seem," the loops only enhance, or reassert, saxophonist Nathan Hanson's seductively pithy motives. Usually though, the group aesthetic, "free jazz" with a "rock" edge, is rendered refreshingly cinematic with electronic aid. "It Would Seem" finds cellist Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan and bassist Brian Roessler in frenzied dialogue, increasing reverb giving the impression that Ferrier-Ultan is gradually leaving the jazz-inflected environment for some distant place. Only when Hanson swoops in does the jump-cut transformation reveal itself in full, Federico Ughis's drumming sealing the rhetorical deal with hard-edged funk precision. Likewise, "A Very Small Animal"'s mysterious opening sounds anything but diminutive as vast reverberant chasms are sculpted and traversed in gorgeous counterpoint, the texture slowly building to Ughi's increasingly dense but translucent interjections. Ughi really shows astonishing versatility here, able to match any group gesture with well-placed support or a gentle nudge in another direction. The others are no less inventive, transcending post-modern superficiality to create a convincing stylistic blend. Innova is the perfect label for the Merlins, who bring just a touch of Musique Concret to the core of this fine production, yet another layer of reference adding equal interest. It will be fascinating to see down which avenue of discovery the quartet chooses to lope, jump or run.

Marc Medwin

Hey y'all. Check out Jim Meyer's review of the Fantastic Merlins.

Reveille Magazine published a great review of Look Around. Read it here

Look Around, the debut release from my band the Fantastic Merlins is finally available! It's been released on Innova Records, and I am super pleased with it. It sounds great, it looks great, it smells great.

You can buy it at our artist site at our label, Innova Records.

You'll be really glad you did.

I've made an overhaul to my site brianroessler.com. there's a new blog there too, which I hereby resolve to write on regularly. you should visit it.

Sitting. My butt pushes down on the cushion, down on the mat, the carpet, the floor, the girders of this building into the core of the eart. Making imperceptible adjustments to the revolution, rotation, of the earth.

My legs are twisted together. My arms heavy heavy heavy resting on my feet. Most of the time I can hardly stay awake. Narcoleptic. I can fall asleep anywhere. Now I'm sitting waiting quietly without moving anything. Just waiting for something that never comes. Just waiting for something that I don't even know what it is, wouldn't even know it if it did come. So despite my sincerest intentions now I'm asleep sitting up facing the corner of my room that looks out at the bridges and buildings.

When I wake up, 2 things. First, how long have I been here? How much longer will I stay? Second, my fucking legs are falling asleep. The numbness starts in my toes and creeps like a legion of little soldiers up my feet, ankles, toward the center of me. And I can't help wondering if this is dangerous. Why are my legs numb? No blood circulation? Will they become gangrenous? Will I get som strange sitting still disease? I hate the way they feel as they come back awake. They're vibrating and aching and every nerve is flipping out.

So, in 12 years of sitting 0 amputations. I'll probably be fine. Back to waiting. Back to waiting. My body heavy, pushing down, being pulled down. Sitting upright above the mess of my legs. What was it I read? I thought? I heard? that made me so sure I would find a way into the mystery by sitting here? What was that mystery again? I'm very sure that there was something about not knowing, not expecting. I'm very sure that I'm waiting.

If the thing I'm waiting for came, I would know that it was not the thing I'm waiting for by virtue of the fact that it came. I think I wait to wait. If I'm not waiting, that means I'm going. And there are so many problems with going. First, I don't know where to go. Second, when I'm going it's always so fast. Impossible to sort everything out. But at least I'm moving. Better than just sitting there waiting, it's so god damned boring.

Ok. Quiet now. Waiting. Waiting for something.

The Fantastic Merlins (Monday, April 17, 2006, Dakota Jazz Club, Minneapolis)

By Andrea Myers

Amidst the ever-growing field of boundary-pushing groups forced by default into the annoyingly broad category jazz, The Fantastic Merlins stand out...This is music for all ears, performed by musicians who impress by way of the heart.
--Eric Fawcett (Producer, writer, drummer for the Hopefuls and Spymob)

All too often, music that even remotely resembles the genre of jazz is lumped together, branded with an all-purpose label, and written off in one fell swoop. Its refreshing when a band like the Fantastic Merlins comes along and is able to truly push the limits of jazz improvisation, pulling in a variety of genre-bending elements while maintaining enough familiarity and melodic substance to captivate the listener.

Its no surprise, really, that the Fantastic Merlins are groundbreaking; after all, cellist Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan and upright bass player Brian Roessler are members of the Twin Cities pushing the envelope of sound family which includes their other experimental, non-jazz local bands Jello Slave and Electropolis. They are joined by acclaimed improvisational musicians Nathan Hanson on saxophone and Federico Ughi on drums, who are both from New York. The group plays mostly original compositions that float between classical and jazz, familiar and out-there, melodic and dissonant. They are a band for bored ears.

At the beginning of their first set, the Fantastic Merlins kept things fairly slow with a few covers of what sounded like old jazz standards. With Hanson and Ferrier-Ultan sharing melodic duties, it was like an experiment to see what happens when the trumpet or second saxophone of a jazz combo is swapped out for a cello; which resulted in some breathtaking improvised moments. As the quartet wound into more of their original material, Ferrier-Ultan began playing off of Roesslers bass movements, and Roessler responded by trading in the more traditional walking bassline for bowed, swooping moans. At times, Roessler and Ferrier-Ultan blended together so seamlessly that it was hard to tell who was playing which notes, allowing the group to forge ahead into uncharted symphonic territory.

Highlights from the first portion of the show included the slow moving, beautiful Inana, composed by Ferrier-Ultan, and the cleverly-titled I Was Behind the Couch All the Time, a composition by Hanson in which the melody peeked out from time to time from behind the swell of the saxophone and cello wanderings and mini-solos. Prior to playing another of his tunes, Hanson announced that an untitled piece was to be dedicated to a good friend lost last night, and the group played a pensive, rolling tune that resembled a jazz combo variation on O, Holy Night at times.

During the second set, the modest crowd thinned out to a group of less than 30 people and the band began taking even more liberties with their sound. Every song sounded like it could be a different band, and there were traces of everything from Coltrane to Celtic melodies to tribal drumming. As they neared their fourth hour of playing, I was amazed by the amount of intensity and pure energy being pummeled into every piece, and by the time the night was over I was surprised that it passed so quickly. I got the impression that each Fantastic Merlins show might produce a different result, and I intend to see them every chance I can get.

The Fantastic Merlins are wrapping up a brief tour of the Midwest on Saturday, April 22 at the Acadia, which will be the last chance to see them for a while as two of the members will be returning to New York.

Andrea Myers is andrea[at]howwastheshow.com

Found at: http://www.touchingextremes.org/

THE FANTASTIC MERLINS - Live (TFM)

Debut EP for a quartet playing an exquisite assortment of contemporary styles and whose lineup comprises Nathan Hanson (tenor sax), Jacqueline Ferrier-Ultan (cello), Brian Roessler (bass) and Federico Ughi (drums). Although some incontrovertible influences are caught here and there - Curlew circa Tom Cora, to name one - these people know what they're doing; desolate themes, vigorous lines and engaging improvisations are intertwined with delicate concentration and a masterful pacing of every section, the tension/release ratio remaining at a constantly balanced grade. On top of everything, the musicians look for a collective coherence rather than straining themselves to put their excellent technical value in front of the listener, which is a major plus in this 30-minute CD anticipating a full-length album that I'll be very curious to listen to.