Neil Leonard & Scanner - The Berklee Sessions (2024)

This session took place over one day, but remarkably took a decade to mix and release. There was no rehearsal, we simply set off into the unknown with each piece, and the players found their feet within the music almost immediately.

Guided by Neil Leonard, who has worked with Magdalena Campos, Fujiko Nakaya, Phill Niblock, and Tony Oursler, the session was truly magical.

It’s psych rock embodied with an electronic spirit, spiralling off into thunderous rhythms, blistering solos, ethereal melodies and sampled voices, with exuberant playing and focused improvisation.

Working with David Tronzo on electric (slide) guitar (David Sanborn, John Cale, The Lounge Lizards, Sex Mob, Wayne Horvitz), Mike Rivard on bass (Cab Calloway, Frank Zappa, Morphine, Jon Brion), and Dean Johnston on Drums (Superhoney, Club d'Elf), they propelled the music into entirely fresh and dynamic territory.

The session was part of a residency in the Berklee Interdisciplinary Arts Institute at Berklee College of Music, Boston. Huge gratitude to Neil Leonard who steered the production in the right direction.

This exclusive version on Bandcamp features a reworking of Time Code by legendary American musician Richard Devine in collaboration with Neil Leonard live in Boston in 2014

“It hits the kind of openended all-consuming groove to be found in The Necks, Tortoise or Miles Davis in modal mode: pulsating, circling jazz patterns, bass bubbling through ring modulation and envelope filters, sax and slide guitar, with Rimbaud’s shortwave radio and electronics dusting through the gaps”
The Wire Magazine

“The album provides a powerful document of the idea that music is a living, breathing force of nature and as an ever-evolving possibility. The interplay with between the electronics, punctuating drums, bass, and horns delights in newfound measure. From the night-time atmosphere of grainy cinema or the nostalgic whisper of words to the more colourful excess of psychedelia, to the edge or life-affirming all points are referenced, touched upon, and then exercised.”
Magazine Sixty