Transvalue - Book III

NOEL TACHET - TARAN'S FREE JAZZ HOUR: This is a hurricane... I am listening to this CD for the nth time, and can’t stop listening to write. I'm struck by the words that escape from Chuck Britt, and the whirlwind of Vlatkovich... It is all purely American without doubt... This once in a lifetime machine, is fueled and at maximum power searching out our violence and tenderness with deadly accuracy.

STEVEN LOEWY - CADENCE MAGAZINE FALL 2008: There's something about Charles Morrison Britt... you cannot deny his powerful presence. Vlatkovich's compositions and arrangements are uniformly superb... (and) layers sounds and mixes genres, in what is arguably his best writing on disc.

RIGOBERT DITTMAN - BAD ALCHEMY (Germany): What is this? A poem cycle in big band jazz clothes? ...this is big! The stories are much more than an ego trip, in fact they inspire the great music of TRANSVALUE, like the tango, Not Knowing with it’s circus music and Ultra Lounge brass arrangement that gives one the arm around the waist and the tongue-in-the-cheek, Britt’s emotions brush against the grain, with his grating presentation itself the yeast steering us in the opposite direction.

EDUARDO CHAGAS - JAZZ e ARREDORES (Portugal): ...multifaceted universe of colors, tastes and ideas. Flashy and noisy, technically competent and flooding with creative ideas, this is a simple, spontaneous, witty and serious adventure into megalomania. Book III is worth the effort and the time.

OTTAWA CITIZEN: If you free associate a little, this session might remind you of the meeting of jazz and poetry in murky, big city cellars during the days of the "beat generation." The sources of stimulus and the subjects may have changed, but this current incarnation of the genre is still socially aware at its core.

NEW TIMES (On Michael): Vlatkovich is an arresting writer who works with many different forms - numerical compositions, tango, waltzes, big band swingers, and more. He also assembles musicians accomplished enough to interpret his pieces with verve and imagination.

RICHARD KAMINS - CADENCE: The music is quite stimulating and it makes one wish for another Vlatkovich record. Charles Britt sounds like he had fun doing the LP - you should have as much fun listening.

RICHIE UNTERBERGER - OPTION: Britt writes simultaneously ridiculous/sublime prose and complements his angst-laden but passionate delivery with a backing crew of stellar musicians.

CADENCE: Vlatkovich does and impressive job of matching the sound with the moods of the words. Britt’s impressions try to be the agent of catharsis and the listener can be (if in the proper frame of mind) moved by their violence and strange beauty.

LOOKING AHEAD (COASTAL JAZZ AND BLUES SOCIETY, VANVOUVER, BC): Michael's hyper-textured compositions create a direct, exciting spatial relationship with the words of poet Chuck Britt. Chuck's narrative voice punctures the boundaries of jazz... frilly trombones to circus -like mayhem sounds trace the path led by Checks bellowing-whispering-lamenting vocalizing. His throaty words range from embraceably morbid to soft and angelic. Its depth is graphic.

BRUCE GREELEY - EARSHOT JAZZ: Vlatkovich, saxist Scott Raffel and, especially, trumpeter Jim Knodle carried on long "conversations," rivaling Britt's poetry in expressiveness....Britt meanwhile, cut through the din, front and center, preaching and exhorting his own brand of cracked whimsy. Imagine a surrealistic Popeye up on a soapbox, eager to relate his dreams, and you get the idea.

HEATHER WISNER - PORTLAND DOWNTOWNER: Vlatkovich draws inspiration from Ornette Coleman while Britt charges through text whispering, shouting and singing about sex death and other poetic themes.