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Avant jazz and improvisational group
Food were founded in 1998 as a collaborative effort between British saxophonist
Iain Ballamy and Norwegian drummer
Thomas Strønen after a chance meeting. By the time they began recording, they had expanded to a quartet that also included trumpeter
Arve Henricksen and bassist
Mats Eilertsen. Their self-titled debut offering, as well as Organic & GM Food, appeared on the Feral label in 1999 and 2001, respectively. By the time they released
Veggie in 2002 and
Last Supper in 2004, they had moved on to Rune Grammophon.
The band was pared down to the original duo of Bellamy and
Strønen for 2007's
Molecular Gastronomy. After numerous tours and festival appearances as both a duo and in collaboration with other musicians,
Food signed with
ECM for 2010's Quiet Inlet. The addition of
Christian Fennesz on guitar and electronics and
Nils Petter Molvær on trumpet and electronics expanded the group to a quartet once more. For 2012's Mercurial Balm (also on
ECM), the lineup expanded further, adding
Prakash Sontakke on slide guitar and vocals and
Evind Aarset on electric guitar and electronics.
Food played a series of European dates in the wake of the album's release.
Strønen and
Ballamy along with
Fennesz reconvened in engineer
Ulf Holand's (
David Bowie,
Satyricon,
Motorpsycho) Oslo studio in June of 2013. They recorded a wealth of material.
Strønen took the tapes and worked on them alone for five months, radically reshaping what the group had cut. The end result more directly referenced rock and driving electronica. Label head
Manfred Eicher mixed the tapes while the bandmembers were rehearsing to perform the material live.
This Is Not a Miracle was released by
ECM in November of 2015, while
Food were on tour. ~ Thom Jurek