Linernotes: Uli Beckerhoff is full of surprises. He's always coming up with a new band or some new combination of sounds or instruments. He 's like a pastel-shaded chameleon. Here he's made a beautifully accomplished album with some little-known musicians who, in fact, play superbly. And by the subtle use of acoustic and electric instruments in fascinating textural combinations, he's created a really fresh atmosphere. This music has a European expansiveness and an American intensity...the best of both worlds. In his compositions and his trumpet solos Uli seems to be "sculpting in time" (to quote the film director Andrey Tarkovsky), because every written or improvised phrase seems to be organic - nothing is superfluous. Of course Uli Beckerhoff is one of Europe`s most gifted trumpet players; he has ALL the virtues - a lovely singing sound, brilliant technique, great stamina, excellent range and a powerful imagination. He`s played with most noted European musicians and many Americans and has led distinguished groups of his own including Riot, his trio with Jasper van`t Hof and John Marshall, and the electric group Tomato Kiss. Uli is a sophisticate, a man of sensitivity and vision, and a very fine composer, and all these qualities are apparent on this delightful and very fresh- sounding-sounding album. At a time when jazz is beset by conceptual poverty, Uli has come up with some music which seems totally contemporary and yet is still in the great jazz tradition. There are discernible influences, but Uli has absorbed them. He has poured in Miles Davis, Weather Report, John Coltrane, but what pours out is pure Beckerhoff . Much thought has gone into the organisation of this music and each piece is very different. Many ways of creating and releasing tension are deployed and the music always `breathes? satisfactorily. `The Chinese Dog? is a skilful combination of wit and sensitivity, and jagged synthesizer bass riffs alternate with smoother passages. `Stay? is highly romantic with wistful trumpet and spacey chords. `Jo Is Watching You? is a wild outing with the whole group in unstoppable mood and Uli's trumpet almost superhuman in its fluency and range. `Colours Of The Late Afternoon?, is a ballad tone-poem. The rhythm section is always excellent, there are some fine keyboard solos from Michael Berger and some good tenor sax from Mathias Nadolny, but this is Uli's record all the way and he plays magnificently.... ....Uli Beckerhoff, trumpet player, composer, band leader - music-maker extraordinaire! lan Carr, London 1990