Recording of the Week, Tenderlonious, 'Still Flute'

Multi-instrumentalist, music producer and label boss Ed Cawthorne, aka Tenderlonious, is a musician who’s always known what he wanted to make. His work - both solo and collaborative - has spanned not only jazz fusion, but electronica, hip-hop and even Indian classical music. After spending a few years in his early 20s on the grind in London - hitting up jam sessions as well as doing session and touring work - Cawthorne now curates his own label, 22a, which serves as a platform for music made solo and with anyone who wants to collaborate with him. He’s prolific and eclectic by nature, and yet all of his work retains that signature ‘Tenderlonious’ touch; a jazz fusion sound from a beatmaker mentality, each new release revealing a different flavour of his personality. This time, however, he’s returning to some familiar sounds. Cawthorne spent much of his early music career (predating the Tenderlonious alias) producing beats using samples and drum machines, and although the saxophone was his first ‘proper’ instrument, it’s the flute that’s been his main focus as of late. Combining his love of synths and drum machines with his now well-practiced woodwind chops, Still Flute is a release that’s bound to please jazzers and fans of classic electronica alike.

But this isn’t the first time Cawthorne has combined his love of electronic music production with live instruments, specifically the flute; Still Flute is very much a sequel, as the name suggests, to 2016’s hugely popular On Flute, and the core of the record feels very similar in approach to its predecessor, retaining the tried and true blend of improvised flute over house-influenced electronic beats. Tracks like the opener ‘Song for My Mother’ and the title track will be familiar territory for fans of On Flute, upbeat instrumentals with a driving beat and coolly subdued chords forming the bedrock for Cawthorne’s improvisations. Even then, there are elements of Tenderlonious’ work from intervening projects since On Flute that make their way into Still Flute; ‘Seti Khola’’s undeniable raga influence no doubt drawing from Cawthorne’s time spent with Pakistani quartet Jaubi out in Lahore, complete with string drones and tabla drumming.

And then there’s the bold use of classic drum machine sounds - also appearing on more unapologetically ‘house-y’ releases like 2019’s Hard Rain, 2020’s After the Storm, or the 808-worshipping TEK-88 from earlier this year. Coupled with Tender’s heavy use of jazzy chords on his Fender Rhodes, Still Flute at times has a real ‘90s acid jazz energy. Cawthorne also gets some chances to flex his extensive hardware synthesiser collection on some of the more ambience-heavy tracks like ‘Journey to Thra’ and ‘End Transmission’, the former making for a nice ambient pace-breaker between the driving house beats.

Cawthorne has never been a straight-ahead jazzer, so don’t expect any wild harmonic zig-zagging or standards here - his beats have much the same appeal as a good sample flip; focussing on the sweet spot of the instrumental where the groove, melody and mood are the ripest - giving himself a fruitful musical space to jam out to his heart’s content. Even then, Still Flute never feels self-indulgent, his improvisations carefully serving the songs rather than overtaking them. Even amongst the more metallic beats on the record, Cawthorne’s flute twists and twirls around above, and gives what could otherwise feel like a wholly mechanical affair (not that I’m adverse to that) a distinctly soulful, natural edge. As much as Still Flute’s gimmick is in this electronica-flute combo, there’s plenty of variation packed into the album’s runtime to keep things fresh, and despite pulling from two apparently disparate musical corners, in Tenderlonious’ hands the ingredients work all too well together.

You can also check out the interview we did with Tenderlonious here.