In 1996 Terrie goes on a year long round-trip through Africa. Although The Ex are supposed to have a sabbatical this year, it’s members are not idle. Singer Sok tours with the troubadouresque punk-folk posse De Kift, bass-player Luc can be heard on the album The Untraceable Cigar of melancholic free-jazz quartet Roof (featuring a.o. Tom Cora, check a clip above), and Andy plays with the energetic klezmer-noise outfit Kletka Red who release the CD Hijacking on John Zorn’s Tzadik label.

The next year G.W. Sok publishes Ex-rated, a collection of 69 used and unused lyrics he wrote during the first 17 Ex-years. The Ex are offered the “Jazz Compositie Opdracht” by the Dutch broadcasting company NPS: they are commissioned to compose an hour of music, and invite the Instant Composers Pool (ICP) to join them for the performance of it. Then the five-piece go back on the road, first in Holland, together with the Malian kora player Djibril Diabate, followed by the American East coast and Chicago.

In June 1998 they record their new CD in Chicago (USA), recorded and produced by Steve Albini, an old fan, in his recently built studio. The new album, released in October 1998, on Touch & Go USA and Ex Records Holland, is called Starters Alternators. The well-received album is dedicated to Tom Cora, who died earlier that year. After the Summer The Ex tour Holland, together with Lanaya, a trio from Mali, with a.o. Djibril Diabate.

The Ex will perform and curate an evening at Incubate 2010 on Monday September 13th.