At the foot of a face
Improvising bassist, Joel Grip, makes music at the countenance of the other.
Anchored to a spontaneously fermented musical approach, his music reverberates and transforms within a collective body of timing and sound. Joel Grip practice improvising, as a way to learn and develop a forthright sound, and embrace its reactiveness, rapidity, and startling
character with the aim of pushing music to intense, ecstatic and transformative levels. His vivid connection to the history of Afro-American musics (its origins and its avant-gardes on both sides of the Atlantic) has an outlet in celebratory, heavy and risky musical performances. An assumably all encompassing approach to handcraft music making, and the urge of making it publicly available – thus put in ceremonial function in terms of familiar and radical rooms for regular meetings of listeners and creators – have given Joel Grip a vital role in, above all, Central and Northern Europe. He has lived and worked in Stockholm, Baltimore, Paris and Berlin, and is the co-founder of artist run organisations such as Hagenfesten (Dala-Floda), Umlaut Records (Paris, Berlin, Stockholm), Au Topsi Pohl (Berlin), Umlicht Films (France, Sweden), Public Health Music (Ukraine, Sweden), and Curved Pitch.
At the moment he is active as a soloist and in the groups [ahmed], _xamul X, Oùat, Vaka, [ism], Klub Demboh, Sapat, Herr Borelgrip and a frequent collaborator with Sven-Åke Johansson (Stumps, Neuköllner Modelle, Storky Jazz, Erinnerung an Litfass, In Early November).
Joel Grip also make work as a visual artist with a preference of analogue film, drawing (graphite, charcoal) and oil painting. He has a studio and atelier in Berlin (Etwas von Anders) from which much of his recent activities emanate.
As a musician and/or producer he participates in about fifty record releases from labels Umlaut Records, Fönstret, Astral Spirits, OTOroku, Corbett vs Dempsey, Topsi Series, 577 Records, Bison, Rune Grammofon, Olof Bright, A Cheeseboard Production, Two Nineteen Records...
Discography:
2024
2023
2022
2021
2020
2019
2018
2017
2016
2015
2014
2013
2012
2011
2010
2009
2008
2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
Films
Långsamhetens Lov | DV | 50 min | Sven-Åke Johansson & Joel Grip | 2022 (filmed in 2017)
Smalltalk über Zeit | DV | 17 min | Topsi Series | Part 9 of When Will Never Meet
Nyårsfesten | Fic/Doc | S8 | 80 min | Umlicht 2018 | w/ Mauricio Hernández, Leïla Colin-Navaï, Erik Viklund, Lisa Grip and Franziska Hoffmann
Burning Bright| Doc | 16 mm | 52 min | Umlicht 2014 | w/ Mauricio Hernández
Det Snöar om Björken| Fic/Doc | S8 | 80 min | Umlicht 2014 | w/ Mauricio Hernández
Buktalaren| Fic/Exp | S8 | 9 min | Umlicht 2013
Gloende Örats Sång| Exp | S8 | 2 min | 2012
Mellanrum| Doc/Exp | dv | 25 min | 2011
Valerik 0.9s| Exp/Doc | dv | 17 min | Public Health Music 2008
The United Sounds of America | Exp/Doc | dv | 5x5 min | 2005
Printed words and drawings
2023 Fönstret, Att kasta ankare med Tristan Honsinger
2021 Wander & Wonder, Tristan Honsinger illustrated by Joel Grip, Topsi Series, 2021
2019 Moustache and Marvelous, Motvind Förlag, Oslo 2019
2018 Theoral no 14, Tristan Honsinger & Joel Grip, Wien 2018
2017 Room 1, Ornette Coleman, Drawings and texts on David Izenson, Experimental library, London 2017
2015 Materien gör Motstånd, Umdicht
2014 Lösa Blad no 1, Umdicht
2013 Gloende Örats Sång, Les Citadelles 18/2013
Joel Grip, standing on Alexander Markvart's shoulders during a Klub Demboh performance 2023. Photo by Carina Khorkhordina.
Joel Grip, standing in front of a grey wall 2024. Photo by Carina Khorkhordina.
