Enneads

Enneads is a New York-based trio featuring pianist Phyllis Chen, drummer Hamir Atwal, and Zach Layton on the rare 17-string electric bass. Named after the writings of the neoplatonic philosopher Plotinus, the ensemble approaches improvisation through the ancient idea, first articulated by Pythagoras, that harmony is “number made audible.” The trio uses natural string harmonics as the foundation of its concept of improvisation. Harmonic and inharmonic overtones, sympathetic vibrations, rhythmic proportions, and resonant room acoustics are all parameters of an emerging musical form explored through Chen, Atwal, and Layton’s intuitive approach to spontaneous composition. Layton’s gigantic and unusual instrument, the 17-string bass, is played in a variety of tunings and functions almost like an amplified Greek Lyre (or maybe a Baroque electric Theorbo), running through heavy fuzz, distortion, and ring modulation, while Chen explores the interior of an amplified grand piano, producing rich constellations of expanded sound clusters, and the percussive attack of the hammers as they strike the strings, running through a Rat distortion circuit. Atwal’s drumming grounds it all through fluid cycles of hypnotic pulsation and propulsive motion that contributes to a hypnotic and sensitive and tactile sense of temporal structure. Recorded between 2024 and 2026 at Layton’s studio in New York’s Hudson Valley, the material on the Enneads’ debut self-titled record is a distillation of the trio’s approach towards improvisation.

Throughout the album, harmonics drift into slowly beating patterns, while dreamy reverberant atmospheres evolve into dense layers of distorted harmonics, recalling the gravitational pull of doom metal within the context of experimental music and contemporary jazz. Drawing upon a musical influences including the Necks, John Cage, Gerard Grisey, Alvin Lucier, Cecil Taylor, Pauline Oliveros, Sunn-O))), Ed Blackwell, and Iannis Xenakis, Enneads has created a dense world of sound.