Edmonton’s AUDio SQUADron seem to stand alone in this city–and in more than a few ways. How many local bands manage to combine the two extremes of free improvisation and composition? How many bands from Edmonton have hauled Indian Tablas onto the stages of the Sidetrack Café? And how many bands cull from influences as diverse as Jaco Pastorius, Mr. Bungle, and Mastodon?

If you ask Travis Short, who happens to provide the bass duties for AUDio SQUADron, his reply to all of those questions will probably be simple: "Just one," he might say, and he’ll be talking about his own.

AUDio SQUADron have provided Edmonton with an indescribable amalgamation of almost every musical style imaginable since its formation in 2002. Now with the inclusion of Mark Sazavsky on trombone, their sound has taken an even greater leap into the realms of jazz and avant-garde free improvisation.

"The music is borne, for the most part, on the free improv," says Short. "But, we record the improvisations and re-learn the parts almost exactly. We take a 45-minute jam and cut-and-paste it down to the parts we like and treat that as an entire jazz head. It’s split down the middle; there’s a strict composition going on there, but everyone can take slight liberties with how they do it. It’s the best of both worlds."

It would be wrong to limit the AUDio SQUADron’s sound and style to just "jazz," however, and that can be easily proven by the group’s complex instrumentation. At an AUDio SQAUDron show, don’t be surprised to see mandolins, tablas, and a double-bass share the stage with an electronic sampler, a synth, and racks upon racks of effects pedals.

"We don’t give much thought into whether or not anyone really likes this stuff," Short remarks, on the subject of being such a musical anomaly. "For us, it’s just the result of coming from a lot of different backgrounds, and nobody really wanting to say ‘no’ to anything. There’s no such thing as a wrong feel, or a wrong part, and you get these weird little instrumental jams because we’ve got a country drummer, an East Indian percussionist, and a punk-jazz guy like me."

For AUDio SQUADron, the devoted local following the band has amassed in the past four years in only growing. "Truth be known, we haven’t played a lot of shows in Edmonton," Short admits. "The reality of playing this music is that it’s difficult to play in a club setting. It stands out, it’s like this little oddity."