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    ‘Parable 3000 (We All Come From Somewhere Else’ from the 2020 album ‘Dimensional Stardust’ from Rob Mazurek’s Exploding Star Orchestra, with Mazurek piccolo trumpet/synthesizers/electronics, Jaimie Branch trumpet, Nicole Mitchell flute, Macie Stewart violin, Tomeka Reid cello, Angelica Sanchez keyboards, Jeff Parker guitar, Joel Ross vibraphone, Ingebrigt Haker-Flaten bass, Chad Taylor drums/percussion and Damon Locks vocals/electronics.
     

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      Three Blue Note recordings from the late 60’s this morning, starting with ‘Paean from the 1967 album ‘Dimensions And Extensions’ by Sam Rivers, with Rivers on tenor and soprano saxophones, James Spaulding alto saxophone, Donald Byrd trumpet, Julian Priester trombone, Cecil McBee bass and Steve Ellington drums.
       

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        The title track from pianist Duke Pearson’s 1968 album ‘The Phantom’, with Bobby Hutcherson vibraphone, Jerry Dodgion flute, Al Gafa guitar, Bob Cranshaw bass, Mickey Roker drums, Victor Pantofo percussion and Carlos ‘Potato’ Valdes percussion.
         

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          The title track from the 1967 album ‘Easterly Winds’ by pianist Jack Wilson, with Lee Morgan trumpet, Jackie McLean alto saxophone, Garnett Brown trombone, Bob Cranshaw bass and Billy Higgins drums.
           

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            I’m a huge fan of the Norwegian band Needlepoint. Their music captures the whole late 60’s / early 70’s Canterbury prog/psych vibe so perfectly, it’s easy to imagine that you are listening to some long-lost recording from that period. This is ‘Shattered Into Memories’ from their 2015 album ‘Aimless Mary’, featuring Bjorn Klaklegg guitar/vocals, David Wallumrod keyboards, Nicoli Haingsle Eilertsen bass and Olaf Olsen drums.
             

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              ‘Grasshoppers’ from Needlepoint’s 2018 album ‘The Diary Of Robert Reverie’ with, as before, Bjorn Klaklegg guitar/vocals, David Wallumrod keyboards, Nicolai Haingsle Eilertsen bass and Olaf Olsen drums.
               

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                The music of Needlepoint provides a perfect segue into Swedish organist Eric Malmberg’s glorious ‘Verklighet And Beat’ from 2007. When I first heard this album, I was struck by how similar Malmberg’s organ sound was to that of Bo Hansson, one of my very first prog heroes. I was then delighted to discover that Hansson, who died in 2010, actually played on several tracks (possibly his last ever recording), and was something of a mentor to Malmberg. This is ‘Milda Doden Hamtar Oss Alla Till Slut’ (which translates as A Mild Death Awaits Us All), with Hansson on synthesizer, Jaari Haapalainen guitar/percussion, Goran Kafjes horns, Cecilia Osterholm key fiddle, George Kentros violin, Lisa Rydberg violin, Anne Pajunen viola, Leo Svensson cello, Johan Berthling bass and Lars Skoglund drums.
                 

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                  Finally, ‘Chasing Clouds’ from Bjorn Klaklegg’s 2008 album ‘Sidewalk View’, with Klaklegg on guitar, Andreas Utnem harmonium/synthesizer/piano, Per Willy Aaserud trumpet/melodica and Harald Skullerud percussion.
                   

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                    Only just discovering Eric Dolphy. This is very good.

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                      Shorter working with Brazilian musicians to great effect.

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                        Portico Quartet recently found my radar. ‘Isla’, the second album, is excellent. I’ve been told the first is even better.

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                          Originally posted by Tony C View Post
                          Portico Quartet recently found my radar. The second album is excellent. I've been told the first is even better.
                          There's not much to choose between the first two albums, Tony - they are very similar in style and dominated by the the hang drum (Vietnamese metal percussion instrument not unlike a large upturned wok).that was their signature sound. The main hang player Nick Mulvey left after 'Isla' and the band sound has gradually evolved into one that makes greater use of synthesizers, electronics and samples. I think you would like their more recent albums just as much - 'Memory Streams' from 2019 is excellent.



                          Originally posted by Tony C View Post
                          Shorter working with brazilian musicians to great effect.
                          'Native Dancer' is lovely - quite unlike anything Shorter had done before even with Weather Report.



                          Originally posted by Tony C View Post
                          Only just discovering Eric Dolphy. This is very good
                          I have mixed feelings about 'Out To Lunch' - for the most part it's a great album but there are sections where Dolphy gets a little too free for my tastes. I've just dug out my treasured copy of Leonard Feather's 'Encyclopaedia Of Jazz', which includes transcripts of a number of 'blindfold' tests that Miles Davis did for 'Downbeat'. (Essentially listening to and commenting on records without being told the name of the artist beforehand). I found that I had remembered correctly - Miles really didn't think much of Dolphy. "That's got to be Eric Dolphy - nobody else could sound that bad! The next time I see him I'm going to step on his foot. You print that. I think he's ridiculous. He's a sad motherfucker". Harsh, but not untypical as there didn't seem to be very much that impressed Miles if the blindfold tests were anything to go by.

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                            ‘Duty To The Last’ from the Neil Cowley Trio’s 2016 album ‘Spacebound Apes’, with Cowley on piano, Rex Horan bass and Evan Jenkins drums.
                             

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                              ‘The Student’ from the 2020 album ‘Jane Austen Texas’ by Fornuft Och Kansla – Fabian Kallerdahl piano, Johan Birgenius drums and Alfred Lorinius bass.
                               

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                                ‘Evidente’ from pianist Domenico Sanna’s 2014 album ‘Brooklyn Beat’, with Ameen Saleem bass and Dana Hawkins drums.
                                 

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                                  ‘Linda Lee’ from harpist Brandee Younger’s 2019 album ‘Soul Awakening’, with Chelsea Baratz tenor saxophone, Freddie Hendrix trumpet, Dezron Douglas bass and E.J Strickland drums.
                                   

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                                    From alto saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin’s 2020 album ‘Pursuance: The Coltranes’, a version of Alice Coltrane’s ‘Turiya And Ramakrishna’, with Surya Botofasina piano, Lonnie Plaxico bass, Darrell Green drums and Bendji Allonce percussion.
                                     

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                                      From thee self-titled debut 2021 album by Artemis, a pleasing version of Lennon and McCartney’s ‘Fool On The Hill’, with Ingrid Jensen trumpet, Melissa Aldana tenor saxophone, Anat Cohen clarinet, Renee Rosnes piano, Noriko Ueda bass and Allison Miller drums.
                                       

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                                        Herbie Hancock’s ‘Fat Albert Rotunda’ album from 1969, his first for Warner Brothers after leaving Blue Note, is a bit of a hit and miss affair. Featuring music recorded for a TV cartoon series voiced by Bill Cosby, it saw Herbie moving away from the modal jazz of his classic 60’s recordings and adopting a soul-jazz style that functioned perfectly well as a soundtrack but didn’t quite measure up to what had gone before. The exceptions are the title track, which carries hints of the classic Headhunters sound from the mid-70's, and two songs, ‘Tell Me A Bedtime Story’ and ‘Jessica’, that are head-and-shoulders above everything else on offer and would not have sounded out of place on ‘Maiden Voyage’. This is ‘Jessica’ (named after his infant daughter), with Hancock on piano, Joe Henderson tenor saxophone and flute, Garnett Brown trombone, Johnny Coles trumpet/flugelhorn, Buster Williams bass and Albert Heath drums.
                                         

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                                          ‘Wise One’ by Chico Freeman wasn’t on the original 1979 release of ‘Spirit Sensitive’, but gathered up with a few other tracks that didn’t make the original cut for a 1988 re-release. Featuring Freeman on tenor saxophone, John Hicks piano, Cecil McBee bass and Billy Hart drums.
                                           

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                                            ‘The Time Of This World Is At Hand’ from pianist Billy Gault’s 1975 album ‘When Destiny Calls (The Music Of Billy Gault’), with Ellen DeLeston vocals, Joe Lee Wilson vocals, Bill Saxton tenor saxophone, James Benjamin bass and Michael Carvin drums.
                                             

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                                              "Wise One" is such an incredible piece of music. I think Crescent might be my favourite Coltrane album. I've bought myself a new CD player for the kitchen, and it's the jazz track I used to test it.

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                                                ‘Nearly Invisible Stitches’, the advance single release from trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer’s forthcoming album ‘Stitches’, with Johan Lindstrom guitar, Jo Berger Myhre bass and Erland Dahlen drums.
                                                 

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                                                  ‘Room 1003’ from the 2020 album ‘Multiverse’ by Jim Hart and Ivo Neame, with Hart on drums/vibraphone/percussion, Neame clarinet/keyboards and Matt Calvert synthesizer/samples/electronics.
                                                   

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                                                    The title track from the 2021 album ‘Insomnia’ by Moonfish – Maria Chiara Argiro keyboards/electronics and Riccardo Chiaberta drums/keyboards/electronics.
                                                     

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