For guitar fans – especially ones of crunchy electric jazz rock, Echoes for Sonny is must hear. The result of a collaboration between two veterans of the downtown New York City music scene, the album, a tribute to a mutual friend and influence, Sonny Sharrock, is a powerful and exciting tribute and a highly original album.
Guitarists Henry …
I don’t think you can find a better example of flow then in the sinuous lines of Julian Lage’s electric guitar. A razor thin Telecaster tone slithers out of the speakers at the start of ‘Fortune Teller’ and refuses to leave thereafter.
The smart fusiony opener gives way to the ebullientold-timey ‘Persian Rug’ – a songperformed by Jack Teargard…
Is there reason to buy new vinyl? Is there any reason not to just stream an album, and never to feel that physical artifact, born from the blood, sweat, and tears of so many, working so hard, to bring to life?
I think you know my answer.
Holding guitarist Jeff Parker and Cornetist Rob Mazurek’s vinyl only Some Jellyfish Live Forever, I have…
Last year’s Flight found guitarist Ross Hammond in a contemplative mood – documenting his solo guitar works. This year, he has teamed up with tabla player Sameer Gupta to expand that vision with an ear towards the more rhythmically complex.
The duo has a sound that perhaps recalls a bit of Ralph Towner circa Solo/Trios (ECM, 1973) and maybe a b…
From what I can tell, Hyperbolic Spirals is the most complete manifestation of saxophonist and orchestrator PEK’s musical vision to date. Rarely does something so musically big and audacious come together in such a complete package!
The first track on the fist volume of the set is the core Leap Of Faith band (named below) – a quartet of …
I first put on SumariwhileI was driving through the Catskills in New York State over the summer, little did I know how geographically apropos it was. The trio on Sumarihas its roots in the Hudson valley, going back over 20 years, and the inspiration of the name has something do with a series called the Seth Books, a study of paranormal experien…
Site Specific is a neat entry in the Ken Vandermark oeuvre: a minimalistic, beautifully bound book packed with two CDs capturing live solo field performances in ’14 and ’15, showcasing Vandermark’s photographs taken as he has toured the world. It’s not a travelogue or tour documentary, it doesn’t capture people, or landscapes, rather it’s imag…
Paal Nilssen-Love and Ken Vandermark
This past month, Ken Vandermark presented a showcase of his recent projects during a week-long residency at the Stone. I was thrilled to be able to catch a few of the sets, including a trio with Matt Maneri and Joe McPhee, the ongoing duos with Nate Wooley and Paal Nilssen-Love (who recently released The Lio…
Radiation begins with an aggressive bass-line and a forceful thrust of percussion in a slightly odd-meter groove. Then distorted wah of a guitar joins, followed by the growl of the organ, leading us into the type of post-apocolyptic sonic landscape reminiscent of the Tony William’s Lifetime circa Emergency. The group however is Transmit and is …
The Ches Smith Trio album that I’m waiting for is ‘Live from Winter Jazzfest’. The two times that the trio has played at the NYC jazz festival have been revelatory. The first show, two years ago, was as I understand it, entirely improvised. This time, as a part of the ECM showcase, they performed the compositions, in sequence, off of their de…
The passing of pianist Paul Bleyis a tough way start to the New Year, especially coming after the loss of Ornette Colemanthis past summer. Fortunately, Bley leaves behind a massive and masterful discography. As a tribute, we present some of our favorites:
Paul Bley Quintet–Barrage (ESP Disk, 1965)
Recorded in 1964, shortly after the histori…
British Clarinetist and guitarist Alex Ward begins his Trios & Sextet’s Projected / Entities / Removalwith a trio configuration of clarinet, sax and drums. A rumble on the drums, a drawn out note on the clarinet and the sax and they are off to strong start.
The opener ‘Projected’ features bouts of free playing capped on both en…
