Estamos Trio is the working group initiated by the musician/activist Thollem McDonas following his 2010 effort to create a sonic dialogue across the Mexico/U.S. border. The keyboardist/vocalist is joined by Mexico City performer/intermedia artist Carmina Escobar and Mexican percussionist Milo Tamez on the trio’s upcoming release Dire Warning due out December 22nd via Relative Pitch. The effort is the third for the group and their second on the label following 2013’s People’s Historia.
Dire Warning was commissioned for SITE Santa Fe‘s 2018 biennial “Casa Tomada” (House Taken Over), and it was recorded live at the non-profit arts center. Following that biannual’s focus on “home” in its various permutations, Dire Warning centers its attention on global migrations caused by climate change. Featuring titles like “The Brink of Failure,” “Ecological Solitaire,” and “The Sixth Extinction,” the LP finds the improvisational trio crossing a multi-varied sonic terrain in their search for higher ground through musical community.
Estamos Trio will embark on a brief East Coast tour this coming December. The dates will include a triple album release show in Nerw York City on the 22nd celebrating Dire Warning, as well as the ESP-Disk release of Reality and Other Imaginary Places by Thollem’s Radical Empathy Trio as well as the Thollem/Parker/Cline album. You can find a list of upcoming dates below…
December 19th: Red Room (Baltimore, MD)
December 20th: Fire Museum Presents at Vox Populi (Philadelphia, PA)
December 21st: Rhizome (DC) with Jim Ryan’s DC Current
December 22nd: Barrio Artspace (New York, NY) Triple album release concert: Estamos Trio Dire Warning, Radical Empathy Trio Reality and Other Imaginary Places (with Michael Wimberly and Nels Cline on ESP-disk), plus William Parker.
