94 December, I had a year earlier moved from New York to Paris, I was trying to establish a new way of dealing with improvisation within "fusion" music. Very much inspired by the Indian tradition of supporting imitation behind soloists, I wanted to create a platform where listening and understanding was so alert that there would be a continuos flow of ideas back and forth between the musicians playing. Playing with Ginger Baker thru the late 80's we had touched on this quite a bit. During one of our recording sessions in London the then 17 year old son of Ginger, Kofi, had been down to the studio and played a bit, and I had been very curious to play further with him.

A chance encounter at a Paris musical instrument trade show had finally put me in touch with Shawn Lane, the elusive underground guitar virtuoso. We had found some common ground over a few dinners in Paris, and decided to try to record together at least. For the sessions I had rented a huge (500 sq m/5000 sq foot) Art Gallery, brought in my portable recording set up and prepared about 10 different sketches of musical compositions. Also I had at the time collected a lot of Indian and Pakistani music videos, that I played for Shawn and Kofi in order to explain my ideas of collective improv a little bit clearer. They where both largely unfamiliar with the music I showed them and particularly Shawn was deeply moved and sort of found a new musical path here for the rest of his musical life (which is pretty clear if you listen to the recordings following Abstract Logic).

We did spend a wonderful week with good food and playing, turning these ideas of mine inside out and scraping the surface of my new concept of improv. I was looking for something particular at this time so I did overlook a few things in the final assessment of the takes we had, and I have included 2 new songs in this remixed version of the record. I suppose one of the interesting facts of this record is that it is really a crossroad for three individuals embarking in new directions. Me and Shawn continued down the road together and Kofi took a different route but its a very vivid and happy sonic documentary.

Jonas Hellborg, Paris 4 July 2006