Alison Blunt violin - Ivor Kallin viola - Hannah Marshall cello

The first performance bringing the trio together was in 2007 at Freedom of the City Festival in London. It was so enjoyable that the musicians decided to form a band and called themselves Barrel, as it involved a lot of scraping. Barrel has since gained a formidable reputation through their mainland and international performances. Gratuitous Abuse was in the Wire Magazine's annual critic’s choice list of improv’ releases and both this audio documentation and Barrel - Live At Artacts ’12 have received many excellent reviews.

“Decades of instrumental practice along and against the tradition blended inside an inter-mutual jargon that takes something from the classic and the absurd in equal doses. Heterogeneous composites causing inflammatory euphoria.” – Massimo Ricci, Touching Extremes

“To the uninitiated, this trio of string virtuosos might sound like musical terrorists…revolutionary, funny and breathtakingly audacious.” – All About Jazz

Further info: http://www.emanemdisc.com/E5020.html