Tag: Aoife O’Donovan

Categories
Best Of Playlist record reviews

Best of 2023 – Spaces

Here are some things that moved me in jazz, classical, and other instrumental (mostly) forms this year.

https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/bbe455af-3b1f-4a30-a42c-9a967bc93869

  • Wild Up/Julius Eastman, “If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich?” – The ensemble Wild Up continues their vital grappling with/resurfacing the once-thought-lost work of composer Julius Eastman with a third volume containing several of the pieces on the original three-disc anthology I had the hardest time grappling with. The acidic overtones and sharp stabs on this sardonic, jagged piece are perfectly executed here, under the baton of Christopher Rountree, and reflect a world I see in a way I didn’t when I first heard the piece, also laying bare the sense of hope inherent in getting off the mat every time.
  • Wadada Leo Smith and Orange Wave Electric, “Nzotake Shange” – One of America’s finest composers and trumpeters, Wadada Leo Smith (Anne said, after watching a quartet set at the Stone, it sounded like “Falling down stairs” and she wasn’t wrong but in a good way), assembled a dream team of electric downtown-associated players for his remarkable record Fire Illuminations: guitarists Nels Cline, Brandon Ross, and Lamar Smith; bassists Bill Laswell and Melvin Gibbs; electronic musician Hardedge; percussionist Mauro Refosco; and drummer Pheeroan akLaff. Each tune reflects on an individual or a specific moment in history, and this piece, named for the poet and playwright who broke me when I read for colored girls 15 years after it premiered, exemplifies everything I find so intoxicating about the album, the deep groove and the perfectly refined and directed shots of fire spraying over it.
  • Irreversible Entanglements, “root ⇔ branch” – Irreversible Entanglements not only blew my hair back twice this year but also put on an even more assured and powerful second album, Protect Your Light. This piece, partly in tribute to jaimie branch, has been a favorite since I first hit play, and it’s still a balm, horns slowly waltzing through Moor Mother’s poetry and the deep, circular groove of Luke Stewart’s bass before erupting into a hip-swaying march. “Let the horns open the day and get free.”
  • Johnathan Blake, “Lament for Lo” – Drummer Johnathan Blake released his best record as a leader with this year’s Passages, and it’s full of great players. Still, I kept coming back to this drum solo intro/tribute to fellow New York drummer Lawrence “Lo” Leathers, both as a tribute to conciseness in a playlist more given to sprawling statements and a reminder of how much texture and emotional content one instrument being played alone can be.
  • Darcy James Argue’s Secret Society, “Last Waltz for Levon” – I’ve been waiting for several of the pieces on Darcy James Argue’s latest record, Dynamic Maximum Tension, to be collected on a recording for a very long time. This one, written in the wake of The Band drummer Levon Helm’s passing, I saw him do almost ten years ago in the basement theater of subculture, and he introduced it by paying tribute to Helm’s deep, instantly recognizable pocket. The Secret Society pays tribute to that slippery waltz that shadow-painting sense of time, in one of a record packed with gems – until writing this, the Duke Ellington tribute “Tensile Curves” was my choice for the playlist periodically, it was the Buckminster Fuller-inspired piece – and I can’t wait to see this band again at Big Ears finally.
  • Henry Threadgill, “The Other One: Movement III, Section 13” – Henry Threadgill followed one of the all-time great music memoirs, Easily Slip Into Another World, with a stunning chamber music record, The Other One, from which this is drawn. Not playing horn, just conducting, Threadgill’s affinity for tension and mystery in dynamics shines through loud and clear and his facility for strings takes on dimensions I wasn’t expecting.
  • Kali Malone, “Does Spring Hide Its Joy v2.1” – One of the standout performances I saw at Big Ears last year, composer and organist Kali Malone convenes a trio with cellist Lucy Raiton and guitarist Stephen O’Malley for a long record of beguiling riffs on melodic cells glowing with long tones.
  • Ingrid Laubrock and Cecilia Lopez, “LUNA MAROMERA” – Ingrid Laubrock put out several good records this year but I kept coming back to this duo record with Cecilia Lopez on electronics, Maromas, a continued investigation of the duo format from one of my favorite saxophonists, that also beguiled me when Anne and I saw the duo in Brooklyn in the Spring. There’s grit here, the ragged breathy tones and the long pulses that decay unevenly, that add to the inherent mystery.
  • Thandi Ntuli and Carlos Niño, “Lihlanzekile” – Producer/percussionist Carlos Niño has gotten a lot of deserved heat this year, I saw him anchor a brilliant trio with Surya Botofasina and Nate Mercereau at Winter Jazzfest in January, and my favorite record of his was this gorgeous duo album with South African pianist Thandi Ntuli. This closing track, translating to “It is clean”, was a piece I returned to over and over, an undulating landscape that changes every time I try to perceive it.
  • Andre 3000, “BuyPoloDisorder’s Daughter Wears a 3000® Button Down Embroidered” – The record that put Niño’s name into the wider American consciousness and which I liked a lot; though, as I discussed with Andrew Patton, it fits more neatly into the ambient genre or even downtempo electronica than the “flute jazz” box some people who didn’t know that was a genre tried to put it in. This track features the trio I mentioned above, creating alongside Andre Benjamin, and is one of the two tracks to feature flute instead of what I think is an EWI. It’s beautiful.
  • Allison Miller, “Fierce” – One of my favorite composer-drummers, Allison Miller, outdid herself this year with a small group record co-sponsored by a series of art spaces with Lake Placid Center for the Arts in the lead, Rivers in Our Veins. As always, she assembled a remarkable group of musicians with a deep history with her and each other: Jenny Scheinman on violin, Jason Palmer on trumpets, Ben Goldberg on clarinets, Carmen Staaf on keys, and Todd Sickafoose on bass. The intertwining – I think – Rhodes and acoustic piano comping under Scheinman’s solo that seems to burble out of Goldberg’s is a highlight of this track, and there’s not a dull track on the album. The interplay is really as good as it gets.
  • Damon Locks and Rob Mazurek, “Yes!” – Trumpeter, composer, and bandleader Rob Mazurek has worked with composer/bandleader/polymath Damon Locks in a variety of settings, most notably Mazurek’s shifting Exploding Star Orchestra, but distilling their two languages down to a duo on New Future City Radio paid off big, both on this record and seeing them live at Big Ears.
  • MEM_MODS, “Midtown Miscommunication” – One of my sleeper favorites in the good-for-all-parties category, a deep Memphis groove project from Paul Taylor (Amy Lavere, New Memphis Colorways), Steve Selvidge (Big Ass Truck, Hold Steady, Lucero), and Luther Dickinson (North Mississippi Allstars).
  • James Brandon Lewis and the Red Lily Quintet, “Were You There” – Saxophonist James Brandon Lewis reconvenes my favorite of his bands, the Red Lily Quintet – Kirk Knuffke on cornet, William Parker on bass, Chad Taylor on Drums, Chris Hoffman on cello – for a tribute to his Grandmother by way of paying tribute to the pioneering gospel singer Mahalia Jackson. Every song on For Mahalia, With Love, is a winner, with deep soulful grooves and stretching out without sacrificing any bit of these timeless melodies. The colors of the instruments coming in on this one remind me of Beethoven’s 9th in the best way.
  • Chris Potter, “You Gotta Move” – Saxophonist Chris Potter has a special affinity for the Village Vanguard. His newest record, Got the Keys to the Kingdom, is another stunning example. Potter and his powerful quartet – Craig Taborn on piano, Scott Colley on bass, and Marcus Gilmore on drums – tear into and pay homage to fascinating repertoire throughout the record, but I kept coming back to this glorious cubist-gutbucket take on Mississippi Fred McDowell’s “You Gotta Move.”
  • Mendoza Hoff Revels, “Echolocation” – Also blues-inflected but with open arms for everything since, the collaboration between guitarist Ava Mendoza and bassist Devin Hoff, featuring James Brandon Lewis in a more coiled, snarling mode than I’m used to, and Ches Smith’s powerful drumming, is the best avant-rock ensemble I’ve heard in recent memory. The liner notes referencing Ornette Coleman’s Prime Time and later Black Flag ring true, but this doesn’t sound like anyone else.
  • Tyshawn Sorey, “Seleritus” – Drummer and composer Tyshawn Sorey digs into the corners of the songbook with his killing trio of Matt Brewer on drums and Aaron Diehl on piano on Continuing. This deep dive into an Ahmad Jamal piece captures the space and silence of Jamal’s kind of shorthand in the common parlance but also captures the heaviness he always brought to the bandstand. A majestic tribute that plays everything these three have learned about the source and brought to their own work through the original.
  • Love in Exile, “Eyes of the Endless” – This supergroup of Arooj Aftab, Vijay Iyer, and Shahzad Ismaily exceeded every expectation I had going in as a big fan of all three players and writers. This piece has Iyer on Rhodes instead of the normal acoustic piano, and both the heavy strike and the ring of that instrument give the astonishing melody from Aftab a different, shimmering texture, like a cape being flung off and tossed into a bay.
  • Kurt Rosenwinkel and Geri Allen, “A Flower is a Lovesome Thing” – The gods of reissuing blessed us with a remarkable document of a duo concert in Paris in 2012 before Allen’s untimely passing. Two voices that shaped the jazz players my age and younger as much as anybody else explode this tune, one of my favorite Billy Strayhorn pieces, thoughtfully, out of love. Every note of this holds the next, waiting to be born, but not in a way that ever feels rote or obvious.
  • Aaron Diehl and the Knights, “Gemini” – Speaking of acts of love, it’s hard to compete with this one. The great Mary Lou Williams wrote her Zodiac Suite – which many jazzers play at least parts of to this day – as a through-composed chamber suite but it’s – I don’t think – ever been recorded as such. Masterful pianist Aaron Diehl restored the score and teamed up with NYC guardians of the contemporary canon, The Knights, for a beautifully recorded, definitive reading.
  • Roy Hargrove, “The Love Suite: In Mahogany – Obviously Destined” – Another gift from the reissue gods: a pristine recording of the 1993 Alice Tully Hall performance of trumpeter-composer Roy Hargrove’s piece The Love Suite: In Mahogany. This movement highlights both Hargrove’s sizzling horn playing and Marc Cary’s piano (that solo a couple of minutes in undulates with silky dynamism, but everyone – Jesse Davis, Ron Blake, and Andre Heyward comprise the rest of the horn section, Rodney Whitaker and Gregory Hutchinson keep things moving and held down as the remainder of the rhythm section – kills it here.
  • Yasmin Williams featuring Aoife O’Donovan, “Dawning” – Columbus was finally blessed with Yasmin Williams as the Wexner Center this year after several cancellations. The entire performance floored me, but I was especially intrigued by this new piece she introduced, revealing Aoife O’Donovan’s involvement. The studio recording delivers on all the promise that collaboration holds. Williams lets every note ring on its own, rolls feel like last year’s snow finally slipping down cliff sides, in a slow drag tempo perfectly suits O’Dovonan’s wordless vocals.
  • Chad Fowler/Zoh Amba/Ivo Perelman/Matthew Shipp/William Parker/Steve Hirsh, “Sentient Sentiment” – Chad Fowler, here on stritch and saxello, assembles a contemporary fire music supergroup and lets them loose in a frenzy of ecstatic, deeply thoughtful play on the five tracks of Alien Skin. The single show I was sorriest to miss in my town was Zoh Amba’s local debut featuring Chris Corsano, and I heard it was just as good as I’ve heard her in the past. Her lines exquisitely intertwine with Fowler’s and Perelman’s, particularly on this slow burn that blossoms into a line of explosions, as Parker, Shipp (both of whom appear elsewhere on this playlist), and Hirsh set up a baseline that shifts exactly as the music needs to.
  • Wolf Eyes, “Engaged Withdrawal” – I’ve been a fan of Wolf Eyes almost as long as I’ve been digging William Parker and Matthew Shipp, and their Dreams in Spattered Lines is another classic, with maturity as a blessing and not a crutch. This song creeps at a measured pace, Nate Young and John Olson leaving one another enough space and care, enough listening, to each make a proper impression on a record that has everything in its place and wastes no gesture, no moment.
  • David Lang/Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra/Sō Percussion, “man made” – The CSO (not that one, the other one), under their director Louis Langrée, teamed up with leading NYC contemporary troupe Sō Percussion for the first recording of David Lang’s stunning piece “man made.” Lang’s program note about the orchestra acting as translators and decoders, for the less traditional instrumentation and movement of the percussion quartet rings true, and that process – showing the strings – makes it all more magical rather than less.
  • Matthew Shipp, “The Bulldozer Poetics” – Shipp continues his growth into a clearer more approachable, even when the work itself gets thornier and more complex, like the world, piano style on the phenomenal solo album The Intrinsic Nature of Shipp. From the crush of those first notes, this driving piece sets up an entire world.
  • Curtis J. Stewart, “vii. Adagio from Johannes Brahms Sonata No. 1 Op. 78 (We Are Going to Be OK)” – Violinist/composer/arranger Curtis Stewart’s remarkable solo record of Love is one of those gargantuan acts of love I keep talking about and being drawn to. An expansive weaving together of pieces he’s been playing for years and knows well by composers who still speak to him, like Brahms and Ellington, and originals, played in tribute to his late Mother in her Upper West Side apartment. 
  • Kieran Hebden and William Tyler, “Darkness, Darkness” – This collaboration between Kieran Hebden, the electronic musician better known as Four Tet, and avant-Americana guitarist William Tyler, delighted me, particularly this take on the Youngbloods song “Darkness, Darkness.” It unfurls slowly, letting the listener glimpse it in pieces, coming into view like a slowly backing-up camera refocusing every few seconds and coalescing into a powerful groove.
  • Rob Moose featuring Phoebe Bridgers, “Wasted” – yMusic co-founder violinist Rob Moose teamed with a variety of singers on his dazzling Inflorescence EP. I kept coming back to this fragile, pulsing collaboration with Phoebe Bridgers. The strings are both stabbing and enveloping light here. “Standing in the parking lot, in the glow of a Rite-Aid sign, everyone I know is staying in tonight. I’ve been here before, just screaming at a cell phone. Seems like a couple of months went by, but it’s years ago.”
  • Gerald Cleaver, “Of the American Dream” – One of the finest jazz drummers, Gerald Cleaver, has been working up a second strain of electronica-based music that I think hit its most assured and together expression yet with 22/23.
  • JD Allen, “Mx. Fairweather” – JD Allen stepped into the ring with electronics on THIS without sacrificing any of that rich, rounded tone. His great trio – Alex Bonney on those electronics and effects, Gwilym Jones on drums – attack this ballad and the other gorgeous originals on the record with subtlety and laser focus.
  • Nubya Garcia, “Lean In” – This killer single from one of my favorite London sax players, Nubya Garcia, summons up some of the textures of the garage club music she grew up with for an infectious mix.
  • Sexmob, “Club Pythagorean” – Downtown New York institution Sexmob – Steven Bernstein, Briggan Krauss, Tony Scherr, Kenny Wollensen – brought longtime collaborator Scotty Hard (Prince Paul, Mike Ladd, Antibalas) into the fold as a full member on their electrifying The Hard Way. This track also features John Medeski on Mellotron for a powerful groove bursting with hooks.
  • Javier Nero, “Kemet (The Black Land)” – Trombonist-composer Javier Nero leads a large band – including guest Sean Jones on a crackling solo on this title track – paying tribute to the ancient African empire of Kemet. The wordless vocals and frenetic cymbal work from Kyle Swan set up gorgeous massed horns, and killer vibes work from Warren Wolf, and a sizzling solo from Nero.
  • Marquis Hill featuring Joel Ross, “Stretch (The Body)” – Trumpeter Marquis Hill approached the ways intention can give our lives meaning and thoughtless action/habits can decay us, in a way that made more musical sense than any other such attempt I can think of, with the riveting Rituals + Routines. This track features vibes player Joel Ross painting constellations around the tight quartet of Hill, Junius Paul, Micheal King, and Indie Buz.
  • Chris Abrahams, Oren Ambarchi, Robbie Aveniam, “Placelessness (Side B excerpt)” – Chris Abrahams (The Necks’ pianist) brought together this trio of avant-garde guitarist and electronics player Oren Ambarchi and drummer Robbie Aveniam for Placelessness, two extended tracks of throbbing minimalism. Those squiggles around the minute mark, creating an interference color between the circular piano figure and the stuttered drums, were my initial handhold into the world of this music, and they still excite me.
  • Greg Ward Presents Rogue Parade, “Noir Nouveau” – Chicago alto player Greg Ward brings together some of his town’s finest players under the Rogue Parade name – Matt Gold, Dave Miller, Matt Ulery, Quin Kirchner – for the delightful concept album Dion’s Quest. This cinematic piece builds slowly, like shadows creeping along a wall, and develops sharper edges and flashes of light.
  • Sara Serpa and Andre Matos, “Carlos” – The vocalist pushing the boundaries furthest in the jazz/improvisation world right now, Sara Serpa, found an exquisite foil in guitarist/bassist Andre Matos. They assembled a great band consisting of Dov Manski on keys, João Pereira on drums, Okkyung Lee on cello, and Sofia Jernberg on additional vocals for the astounding album Night Birds. This original builds up from cells, sharing some sound-world commonality with the last two tracks, and flies to another place entirely.
  • Lawrence English and Lea Bertucci, “A Fissure Exhales” – I’ve been a big fan of Lea Bertucci’s playing and soundscapes for years. This collaboration with field recordings and tape manipulation artist Lawrence English, a standout track for me from their record Chthonic summons a sense of glacial motion, like many of the instrumental records that drew me this year, brings an entire world into my view and keeps revealing new mysteries.
  • Chief Xian aTunde Adjuah, “Shallow Water (Tribute Big Chief Donald Harrison Sr., Guardians of the Flame)” – The power of the statement in Chief Xian aTunde Adjuah leaving his – up to now – primary instrument, the trumpet, behind in favor of his self-created Chief Adjuah’s bow and vocals, paid off big in his remarkable Bark Out Thunder Roar Out Lighting, a mythopoetic tribute to all New Orleans has given us and everything it can still be. This tribute to the great Donald Harrison, Sr., features electrifying playing from Weedie Braimah on percussion, Luques Curtis on bass, and Marcus Gilmore on drums, among excellent guests.
  • Dan Wilson, “Bird Like” – Akron-based guitarist Dan Wilson grapples with his influences on the terrific Things Eternal, leading a great quartet of Glenn Zaleski on Rhodes, Brandon Rhodes on bass, and David Throckmorton on drums. The fluid lines and gleeful interplay make this Freddie Hubbard classic vibrantly, wrigglingly, alive.
  • Matana Roberts, “a caged dance” – Anything Matana Roberts does is worthwhile, and the fifth chapter in her Coin Coin series, delving into her family history and examining its context in American and specifically Black American history, In The Garden, might be the best installment yet. Produced with aplomb by Kyp Malone (TV on the Radio) and a large band of excellent musicians, including Mike Pride and Ryan Swift on drums, Stuart Bogie and Darius Jones on reeds, and Mazz Swift on violin, there’s not a weak track to be found. The stuttering, walking-the-line-between early 20th-century jazz and mid-century free jazz intro of this tune grabbed me immediately, and the rest of the track never let go.
  • Angel Bat Dawid, “INTROID – Joy ‘n’ Stuff’rin”  – When I interviewed Angel Bat Dawid years ago, she was working on the multimedia Requiem for Jazz project. While I’m still chomping at the bit to see it realized, the record was maybe the most ambitious and moving jazz and jazz-adjacent piece I’ve heard all year. Massed vocal writing and those interweaving horns on this tune… it doesn’t get better. I’m still unpacking this Requiem and will be for a while.
  • Ambrose Akinmusire featuring Bill Frisell and Herlin Riley, “Owl Song 1” – Trumpeter-composer Ambrose Akinmusire assembled a trio of guitarist Bill Frisell and drummer Herlin Riley for the gorgeous Owl Song. This lead-off track is a tribute to all three players’ dedication to tone, space, and adventuring spirits.
  • Missy Mazzoli/Third Coast Percussion, “Millenium Canticles Pt 5, Survival Psalm” – The “Millenium Canticles” suite by Missy Mazzoli, one of my favorite composers and who makes one more appearance on this playlist, is the opening salvo to Third Coast Percussion’s dynamic Between Breaths and this final movement feels like you’ve just made your way to shore. A tribute to finding ways and reasons to live.
  • Beverly Glenn-Copeland, “Harbour (Song for Elizabeth)” – Beverly Glenn-Copeland’s first record in 20 years is a rapturous collection of art songs only he could write. The melody and lyrics of this song, in particular, wrecks me every time. “Don’t you know that you’re the deep, where water, earth, and fire meet? Don’t you know that when you sleep, life’s laughing, weeping?”
  • Mark Lomax II featuring Scott Woods, “Ho’oponopono” – One of the performances I was sorriest to miss in the fall of 2022 was the premiere of Columbus’s greatest composer Mark Lomax’s newest collaboration with poet Scott Woods, Black Odes. I’m still sorry I wasn’t in town to see it, but the record is a spectacular document of an opening into a new era for two of our finest artists. “What else do I need but this hem? / What else do I need to decolonize this kiss to make it a worthy offering?”
  • Missy Mazzoli/Arctic Philharmonic, “These Worlds In Us” – I’ve been a big fan of Missy Mazzoli’s writing since I heard her chamber ensemble Victoire on a blog, and a year or two later saw them in Chicago’s Millennium Park. Her work has grown more expansive, covering a multiplicity of forms, and finally, there was a collection under her name with a variety of uncollected orchestra pieces, Dark With Excessive Bright. This one, new to me, was an immediate favorite and falls into my usual tone: a prayerful/hope-for-the-world piece I like to end these playlists on. Thank you all for reading/listening. I love you.
Categories
Playlist record reviews

Playlist – July 2023

Finishing this up as I recover from my fourth round with COVID – right before a new booster is ready – so not a big summation except to say it’s been an excellent summer (even this included). Excellent for seeing people here in my town and in theirs, beautiful culturally and culinarily, and as I’ve got my and Anne’s traditional marking of the end of the summer, Gonerfest, and my first work travel for the new job both in my sights, plus the 13th anniversary of the Pink Elephant, all coming in the next weeks, I’m very grateful. I don’t think this is as dark as June’s churning of emotions – more sunshine grooves and dancefloor bangers; but, as always, I could be full of shit. Thanks for reading and listening – love you all.

https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/c84759f9-3338-415d-b1b3-d242fdd27748

  • Dom Deshawn, “09 Nostalgia” – Columbus rapper-songwriter Dom Deshawn has been on my radar for a while, but I was reminded how much I enjoy his work catching him at the Goodale Park Music Series last week. This benediction and wish for the world is a perfect wave of dancing sunlight that reminds me of Dead Prez’s “Happiness” in the best way. “Built my own lane, don’t care about gatekeeping. You know I’m trying to make it, giving you every reason. Tell me, are you feeling good? Maybe yes, no, I don’t even know.”
  • 79.5, “Club Level” – At the forefront of NYC’s neo-disco scene, 79.5 made one of my favorite summertime albums this year with their self-titled sophomore full-length, produced by retro soul superstar Aaron Frazer. Mike Dillon’s percussion and co-vocalist Kate Mattison’s Rhodes set the sound world of this sticky lead-off track in seconds, and the wild, sexy ride never lets up. Ben Campbell’s thick synth bass, a sizzling horn solo from Izaak Mills, and the union vocals of co-vocalist Aisha Mills send this into outer space. The rest of the album keeps up this pace. “Cruel games. Hot flames. Say you wanna play.”
  • Nubya Garcia, “Lean In” – I’ve written about the great London saxophonist Nubya Garcia many times, and this new single plays with 2-step garage in a really delightful, joyful way that feels like summer in the same way as the previous two tracks but filtered through a different cityscape.
  • Sexmob featuring DJ Olive, “Dominion” – One of jazz’s most indefatigable, questing, and cohesive groups, the quartet Sexmob – trumpeter Steven Bernstein, saxophonist Briggan Krauss, bassist Tony Scherr, and drummer Kenny Wollensen – resume their collaboration with producer Scotty Hard, bringing his contributions of beats, synth bass, and soundscapes to the fore on their invigorating new record The Hard Way. This track adds the great DJ Olive, who helped me down the road of reshaping how I thought about turntables when I was 20 with SYR 5 with Ikue Mori and Kim Gordon. A spiky, shifting mood piece.
  • Gil Scott-Heron and Kek’star, “Whitey On the Moon (Deep Mix)” – South African producer Kek’Star reconfigures one of my favorite Gil Scott-Heron tracks, one I heard on the very first Best Of I bought in early college that sparked the need to have everything he’d touched, including his two novels. Kek’star’s deep house treatment layers an additional throbbing insistence to the coolly reported snapshots of desperation in the original poem that sadly gets more and more relevant. “With all the money I made last year, how come I ain’t got no money here? Hmm, whitey’s on the moon.”
  • BJ The Chicago Kid featuring Freddie Gibbs, “The Liquor Store in the Sky” – Contemporary soul singer BJ The Chicago Kid teams up with fellow Chicago rapper/representative Freddie Gibbs on this gorgeous, honeyed elegy for old friends built around intertwining guitar and organ parts and a loping drum beat. “We was raised blocks from each other; we grew up like brothers. That was my dawg, swear to God, would’ve gave him what I had.”
  • Lucas de Mulder and the New Mastersounds, “Underground Dance” – To my ears, there’s a similar warmth and depth connecting this beautiful collaboration between Spanish jazz guitarist and British funk band The New Mastersounds – hat tip to Andrew Patton for turning me onto them in the first place and nudging a merrry band of us to duck out of Pink Elephant early one month and head down to see them tear the roof off of the Park Street Saloon – also produced by Mastersounds’ guitarist Eddie Roberts. It’s a great track from a remarkably cohesive, empathetic record.
  • Misha Panfilov, “Dr. Juvenal’s Solution” – This Estonian composer based in Portugal flitted around the periphery of my notice for the last few years, but this slab of easy-going instrumental soul is the first time I really sat with one of his releases – I assume he played everything based on the Bandcamp – and it hooked me. Every time I play it, I have a hard time getting that guitar riff out of my head.
  • Dark Colors, “Memories” – I couldn’t find anything about this slice of melodic minimal techno, so I’m guessing this was an algorithm suggestion, but I love it. I love the controlled swoops and the splashes of color seeping through the cracks – the hints of a Bob James/Roy Ayers color palette that vanish almost as quickly as they arise – and it shivers the same parts of my spine as the more direct connections to soul music of the previous two tracks.
  • Annika Socolofsky and Latitude 49, “Loves don’t / go” – Composer-vocalist Annika Socolofsky drills deep into the substrata of her own history and psychology and the whole of the world on her strongest album yet, Don’t say a word, with chamber music sextet Latitude 49. This track sets a Molly Moses poem to riveting, crushing music – the building rumble of the piano and Socolofsky’s voice surfing over it is one of my favorite musical moments of the year.
  • Josh Ritter and Aoife O’Donovan, “Strong Swimmer” – Josh Ritter got my attention with “Golden Age of Radio,” particularly an acoustic version I think I found on AudioGalaxy in 2002, and every time he hits my radar, I think I should delve deeper into his work. This duet with Aoife O’Donovan (who anyone with even a passing glance at this blog knows my love for) is early August morning perfection, fog over the grass, and hints of the oncoming chill threaded through the warmth. “On the night that you were born, your Mama, who had many friends, took you down across the reach to meet the tide come in.”
  • Amanda Shires and Bobbie Nelson, “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground” – This collaboration record between violinist-singer-songwriter Shires and longtime keystone of Willie Nelson’s Family (musical and otherwise), pianist Bobbie Nelson, Loving You, is a stunning, intimate thing, with minimal accompaniment from bass and drums, and this reading of long one of my favorites of brother Willie’s songs devastates me every time, letting me hear a song I’ve known my whole life with new eyes. “I patched up your broken wing and hung around for a while, trying to keep your spirits up and your fever down.”
  • Jess Williamson, “God in Everything” – Last year’s collaboration with Waxahatchee as Plains put singer-songwriter Jess Williamson on my radar, and her new album Time Ain’t Accidental knocked the wind out of my lungs. This song gorgeously captures a time and place, putting her acoustic at the forefront, with Dashawn Hickman’s pedal steel almost serving as a Greek Chorus, flowing over and around the minimal backing and subtle, perfect production from Brad Cook. “Did you see or appreciate the wisdom in me? Was I something for you to play with? Did you notice how I serve my tea?”
  • Madison Cunningham, “Inventing the Wheel” – This new song on the deluxe version got me to go back and check out Cunningham’s Revealer record from last year, and it highlighted what a great piece of work and what a fascinating songwriting voice I missed. The surprising twists in the melody and the unsettling, harmonium-driven atmospheres keep me engaged in this fascinating look at the peril inherent in the hunger of trying to both live as much of life as you can and synthesize it into something that lasts. “Waking up to a heavy cup: ambition drinking me. Helpless, as I watch another death lay out on TV. I render it down to size and sound, ’til it comes as no surprise, to sleep all through the night and still wish to open my eyes. Life and all her fragility, the midwife of this urgency: a moment I may never get again.”
  • Javier Nero Jazz Orchestra, “Kemet (The Black Land)” – I knew very little about trombonist-composer Javier Nero before I think I got tipped to the excellent record this is the title track of through, I suspect, Phil Freeman’s always great monthly column. Trumpeter Sean Jones is the main foil for Nero here; check the fiery solo around the four-minute mark, rising out of but without losing touch with the lushness around him, and the rhythm section of drummer Kyle Swan, pianist Josh Richman, and bassist William Ledbetter provide a richly textured landscape for these intertwining, glowing melodies.
  • Killer Mike featuring Andre 3000, Future, Eryn Allen Kane, “Scientists and Engineers” – I love the Run the Jewels stuff, but it’s an utter joy to get to hear Atlanta’s Killer Mike play in a variety of different sound worlds again on his excellent record Michael. This track is overstuffed with ideas – opening with lush orchestrations and Kane’s vocals that reminded me of the previous track, then powering through a series of hairpin turns – and powered by a fire at its heart, a love for the world – or at least his world, his community – that needs to speak the truth (and, as Hotspur reminded us, shame the devil), with all the collaborators here bringing their A game. “It ain’t enough that I hit my opp and his block: we burned down his whole fucking village. Did it with a smile, not a grimace.”
  • Monica Rocha and Malik Malo featuring The Intuitions, “I Love You For All Seasons (Live)” – Picking up the thread of vintage West Coast soul guitar that was part of the mix on the previous track, this instant classic sweet soul duet between California natives Monica Rocha and Malik Malo, is quintessential wandering through sunny streets or driving slow music, with the rich harmonies of The Intuitions pushing it over the top. “I love you for so many reasons.”
  • Captain Fathands, “The Great Flood” – I remember a conversation at the St James tavern almost two decades ago where childhood friend, bassist/composer Captain Fathands (probably best known musically for his time in the nu-metal comers Groundwar but also the rap-rock fusion The Wick and a series of cover bands) about his desire to put out soundtracks. His music for the wildly popular podcast True Crime Garage the Captain hosts with his brother is frequently my favorite part of the episodes, and I’m delighted to see him expanding and releasing full tracks in this mode like this shadow-splashed, surging piece.
  • Buscrates, “Early Morning” – Pittsburgh-based Orlando “Buscrates” Marshall gives us a sun-drenched, loping, utterly infectious instrumental that nods to Dam-Funk and a history of classic roller skating jams and hints at early Detroit techno in the best way. That rhythm somewhere between a hip dip and a finger snap falls squarely in my sweet spot.
  • Amy Douglas and JKriv, “Freak at Night” – The bouncing, fluid bass line on this courtesy of JKriv doesn’t just set up a backdrop for Amy Douglas’s knock-you-against-the-back-wall sharp disco vocal; the two things joust with one another. The dance floor as seduction and cage match, teetering over the edge but always pulling itself back. “She’s a freak at night. She’s got to satisfy her appetite.”
  • The Crystal Furs, “Gay Bar” – One of my guilty pleasures of all time – and I can do 1,000 words on the problematic concept of a guilty pleasure just like the next blowhard, but you should find me in a bar to go in on that – is that first Electric Six album; as much as I love this song, I wondered how it’s aged. Portland-based queer three-piece Crystal Furs find the pure joy that’s still in this track and give it a contemporary updating that maybe improves on the original’s infectiousness. Kara Buchanan’s Farfisa organ is a particular delight for me on this track.
  • Mightmare, “Can’t Get What I Want” – One of my favorite singer-songwriters working, Sarah Shook, stretches their wings to go different places stylistically with the indie rock project Mightmare. Their voice is right up front over ominous, decay-laden guitars and a crunching postpunk beat. “Anger makes a lonely man. I got things to say I don’t think I can.”
  • Ivan Julian, “Cut Me Loose” – Ivan Julian’s guitar is the blood through the veins of a particular swath of New York music I’ve loved since the moment I heard Blank Generation, and beyond his long association with Richard Hell, he’s lit up records  I’ve loved by Matthew Sweet, Sandra Bernhard, Drivin’ N’ Cryin’, King Missile, and Hunx. The solo record Swing Your Lanterns, and this barbed punk-funk lead-off track is an excellent example of what he’s given to American music and, with a cast of underground music lifers like Florent Barbier and Nicholas Tremulis, still sounds incredibly vital. “I know you brought a whole new bag of hurt from Tennessee and a brand new box of pain that you just found. I kissed you, and I put you on a train; you bit me, and you said we’d meet again.”
  • Kalle Hygien, “Dope Him Up” – This dose of synth-and-drum-machine Swedish punk is adrenaline right into my veins. “His mouth looks like an enema, we’re going to the cinema.”
  • Cerified Trapper, “Trapper of the Year” – The liquid synths and dry, crackling drums are a perfect jumping off point for the furious braggadocio from this rising Milwaukee star, who produced as well. “Tweak out in the store, get hit with this fuckin’ switchy.”
  • Izzaldin, “Spike” – This advance single off the third record – Futura in Retrograde – from rising New York rapper-producer Izzaldin rides a subway-under-not-well-maintained-streets rumble of synth bass and boom bap drums refracted through some contemporary damage with a baritone voice that feels both familiar and fresh. This checked all my boxes. “Took a shot from the three-point arc, took a seat next to Spike just to see the star. I thought it started off as friendly banter: and then he started really disrespecting Indiana, talking ’bout ‘There ain’t gonna be no Pacers shit in here.'”
  • Jay Vega featuring King Ezz and OG VERN, “Smackdown Vs. Raw” – This miniature uses a deceptively easy swagger for a perfect showcase for Columbus producer and rapper Jay Vega, who worked on this with King Ezz and features a verse from OG Vern. Distilled to around two minutes and with no room for filigree. “”No bad business, that ain’t on my name: what they say ’bout you?”
  • System Exclusive, “Party All the TIme” – Pasadena synth-pop duo System Exclusive hit my radar with this surging post-punk take on one of my favorite ’80s guilty pleasures, this Rick James/Eddie Murphy collaboration. “You never come home at night because you’re out romancing. I wish you’d bring some of your love home to me.”
  • King Vision Ultra featuring DJ Haram, Marcus, Dis Fig, “Tragic World Weapon” – I’m not sure how I’ve slept on King Vision Ultra so long but the Algiers connection put this on my radar and it’s exactly the kind of record I love. King Vision Ultra worked with the original stems from Algiers’ record Shook and intertwined them with his own archive to create Shook World (Hosted By Algiers), an investigation of histories, his hometown of New York, his relationships with people, and of the ways we hurt ourselves and one another. DJ Haram from the Discwoman crew supplies the lacerating poetry here, with Berlin-based producer Dis Fig on the sung vocals and a turntablist I wasn’t familiar with, Marcus, adding a perfectly unbalancing layer. “You can’t affirm this madness but I like to imagine it.”
  • The OG Players, “Third Eye Vibe” – Columbus hip-hop/soul super group OG Players consists of trombonist Elaine Mylius (Waves de Ache, Derek DiCenzo), MC/Producer Eric Rollin (Mistar Anderson), Producer Kito Denham, keyboardist Brandon “Bjazz” Scott (Liquid Crystal Project),  and drummer Robert Riley aka Dezoul1 (Talisha Holmes). I had high expectations having seen all – I think, I couldn’t swear I’ve heard Denham’s other work – of their earlier projects and this first single hit it over the fences for me, the loping finger-snap rhythm and that infectious, squelching long, slow drive on a sunny day keyboard part. “Let me tell you about a secret to see us through.”
  • Marquis Hill featuring Joel Ross, “Stretch (The Body)” – The first time I saw Chicago’s Marquis HIll play the trumpet – at Winter Jazzfest – it cut through everything else that night, burning both his name and that tone into my brain. Hill aligns a tight rhythm section anchored by Junius Paul on bass with Micheal King on keys, and new-to-me Indie Buz on drums, and special guests (the great vibes player Joel Ross on this track) to make something that stretches genres. This track bridges lighter flavors of drum ‘n’ and spiritual jazz, riding waves of small percussion instruments and wrapping a wordless chorus around a clattering beat from Buz pinballing back and forth between King’s Rhodes and Ross’s vibes, lit up by Hill’s searing trumpet and a sampled lackadaisical vocal that nods at Ken Nordine.
  • Chris Abrahams, Oren Ambarchi, and Robbie Avenaim, “Placelessness – Side B Excerpt” – Chris Abrahams, pianist from longstanding Aussie avant-garde trio The Necks teams up with guitarist/electronics player Oren Ambarchi (who I got into via SUNN O))) and a gorgeous eai record Cloud with Keith Rowe, Toshimaru Nakamura, and Christian Fennesz in the same year) and drummer Robbie Avenaim who’d done other work with Ambarchi I loved. This excerpt from the upcoming full-side piece is full of the powerfully understated drama and righteous mystery I want from these players and left me hungry for the whole thing.
  • Marisa Anderson and Tara Jane O’Neil, “Wishing Well” – This stunning collaboration on a Bert Jansch classic (written with Anne Briggs) features an OG of the kind of guitar that fuses the accessible and the avant-garde, sometimes disparate histories of the instrument and the future, Tara Jane O’Neil (also on vocals) from the great Louisville band Rodan (who I finally saw live at Terrastock 15-ish years ago) and someone carrying that torch high, Marisa Anderson. Clarity and clatter in exactly the right measures. “Wishing well, wilt thou waters hide my burden until I return, return this way again?”
  • Nora Stanley and Benny Bock, “Into the Flats” – Saxophonist Nora Stanley and keyboardist Benny Bock teamed up for a luminous collaborative record (they co-wrote all compositions and play almost everything heared) Distance of the Moon that reminds me of classic ECM but still has its arms around what’s come since. That splash of sparks from the keys washed over by a saxophone figure around 3:30 exemplifies what I love so much about this album. Drummer Myles Martin, a rising star on the LA scene I wasn’t familiar with and the only guest on this track, adds some fascinating color, less driving forward propulsion of the track and more presenting other options.
  • Emily King featuring Lukas Nelson, “Bad Memory” – Singer-songwriter Emily King has always been at the periphery of my awareness but this single from Special Occasion, a burnished, ’60s-vintage slow dance duet with Lukas Nelson landed squarely between my ribs. Their matched low-key vocals and that aching, echoing guitar, the clatter of castanets skipping across the languid melody like a polished stone, it’s all perfect. “Used to dream about my past, now I’m running from it fast.”
  • Melenas, “Bang” – The sense of similar tones getting stretched out and the pulsing krautrock beat gave me the sense of taking off from the last couple of songs in placing this lilting slice of pop-rock perfection from Pamploma-based band Melenas right here.
  • M. Ward featuring first aid kit, “Too Young To Die” – M. Ward’s Supernatural Thing reaffirms his status as one of the great melodists of my generation, full of examples of that rare gift of playing with retro sounds without seeming stuck in some other era. And this perfect example, aided by the sparkling harmonies of first aid kit, is one of the songs on the new one I go back to the most often. “Sailing, sometimes failing, that’s the only way, the only way to fly. Crying, sometimes wailing, that’s the only way that we learn how to try.”
  • Tommy Prine, “Mirror and a Kitchen Sink” – Tommy Prine’s This Far South, produced with Rushton Kelly and Gena Johnson, plants a flag in territory that’s clearly his own, using contemporary colors and rhythms alongside the kind of sharply defined characters and witty wordplay that defined his legendary father. This, like the M. Ward, was a hard call to make – I think at one point I had three songs from this record on the nascent version of this month’s playlist – but I kept coming back to the jaunty bounce of this track, that impossibly catchy acoustic guitar riff underpinning the gimlet gaze of the lyrics. “So what’s the difference between you and me? I’ll tell you right now, it’s a couple teeth. And then I decide whether or not to be crueler than I already am.”
  • Tanya Tucker featuring Brandi Carlile, “The List” – Sweet Texas Sound builds on the momentum and power of Tanya Tucker’s great comeback record While I’m Still Livin’, pairing her again with producers Shooter Jennings and Brandi Carlile. This track is one of several Tucker co-wrote with Carlile and it’s a brilliantly clear-eyed taking stock and kiss off, with a classic sawdust-spattered two-step backing highlighting Jennings’ piano and John Schreffler’s pedal steel. “I ain’t here to make excuses and I’ve since lost all track of my demons and their muses. But if you’re still keeping score, then you can keep your heart attack.”
  • Dale Watson, “I Ain’t Been Living Right” – Dale Watson leans into his spending more time in Texas after some fruitful years in Memphis with the lean and mean Starvation Box, inspired by the example of Marshall, Texas’s legendary son Leadbelly (the title is what Ledbetter’s father called the guitar). This acoustic-driven shuffle is exactly the slow twisting of a knife in the gut that I think Watson does better than any country artist and what drew me to him 25 years ago, making the most of every crevice and scar in that magnificent baritone. “Now, the older I get, I’m finding more regrets: regrets that have been lurking in my mind. Maybe I’ll find solace in my old age and forget I ain’t been living right.”
  • Brian Thornton and Iranian Female Composers Association featuring Katherine Bormann, Alicia Koelz, Eliesha Nelson, “And the Moses Drowned” – I’m ashamed to say I wasn’t familiar with the IFCA before this beautiful record Sirventès but I was a little more familiar with cellist Brian Thornton of the Cleveland Orchestra. The quartet he assembled for this evocative piece by Mahdis Golzar Kashani finds every bit of nuance and mystery, it’s a stunning lead-off to a marvelous record.
  • Tyshawn Sorey Trio, “Seleritus” – Tyshawn Sorey continues to dig into standards with surprising, breathtaking results on Continuing, his new record with Aaron Diehl on piano and Matt Brewer on bass. This gorgeous Ahmad Jamal piece gets to the heart of the fragility and power Jamal conjured simultaneously in a way few piano trios have been able to live up to since; it’s a magical reminder how much life still pumps through the veins of this music and also a stunning tribute to a generational artist who opened up an entirely new pathway in American music.
  • Greg Ward presents Rogue Parade, “Noir Nouveau” – Chicago-based saxophone player and composer Greg Ward’s quintet Rogue Parade’s follow up Dion’s Quest expounds on everything great from their debut Stomping Off From Greenwood. This appropriately smoky, hard-shadows track flanks a blue flame of a saxophone line with the sparkling guitars of Matt Gold and Dave Miller, and the rich, subtle rhythm section of Matt Ulery on bass and Quin Kirchner on drums.
  • Olivia Dean, “The Hardest Part” – British R&B singer-writer Olivia Dean’s debut full length Messy is a remarkable record, consistent and smooth – mostly cowritten with Bastian Langebæk and Max Wolfgang – but knowing exactly when and where to cut and how much of a mark to leave. This smoky slow-drag number exemplifies the mood I come back to this record for, reminding me of early Erykah Badu, and I can’t wait to see what else Dean turns into. “Call me up to meet you: static on the phone. Normally I need you; this time I don’t wanna go. Lately, I’ve been growing into someone you don’t know. You had the chance to love her, but apparently you don’t.”
  • Kris Gruen featuring Anaïs Mitchell “Anchors” – I’ve been hearing the name Kris Gruen – singer-songwriter son of famed photographer Bob – but it took seeing this luminous duet with one of my favorites, Anaïs Mitchell, to finally check his work out. It’s soaring and wistful, like a sunrise over the Hudson. “I forgive you, circle broken, by and by.”
  • Miranda Lambert and Leon Bridges, “If You Were Mine” – Two of my favorite Texas singer-songwriters of relatively (I still had roommates when I first heard Lambert so it’s been at least 20 years) recent vintage team up on a perfect example of finding middle ground, and that space where their voices meet on this perfect piece of longing, this moment frozen in amber, hits exactly right. “‘I’d drink you down like fine wine, till there was nothing left.”
  • Gus Dapperton featuring BENEE, “Don’t Let Me Down” – Another duet shot through with longing and promise but set to more of an insistent clubby rhythm, this duet between New York-based Guy Dapperton and New Zealand-centered BENEE has an extremely appealing groove; I especially love the way their voices melt around one another. “I’m just gonna burn out and fall out of my head.”
  • Ingebrigt Håker Flaten and Paal Nilssen-Love, “Part 2” – One insistent rhythm gives way to another. Nyemiah SThis classic Norwegian rhythm section who’ve lit me up so many times, live and on record, team up to pay tribute to the Trondheim Conservatory of Music where they met, on its 40th anniversary, with Guts & Skins. They assembled a killing octet featuring players whose work I know well like pianist/organist Alexander Hawkins and completely new to me like baritone saxophonist Hanne deBacker, and delivered a record that walks the line between post-bop and free jazz that doesn’t sell out the pleasures or core of either.
  • Nyemiah Supreme, “Last Day” – The stabbing cymbals and rumbling bass on the track for this electrifying song from rising Queens rapper Nyemiah Supreme seemed to call on the previous tracks and I was stunned by the crackle of her pavement-mosaic-dry delivery and the flashing wit of the wordplay. “There’s nowhere to get – all of that paper, you only enrich.”
  • Wireheads, “Detective” – The bluesy post-punk chug – Fall-ish vocals laid against a mournful harmonica like the smokestack of a passing train – of this Adelaide-based band made me immediately sorry I hadn’t heard their earlier work; Potentially Venus is a terrific rock record. “‘I’m merely scratched,’ he hollered. I am bothered less than Donna; she’s like a fire burning carefree in biosolids.”
  • Smug Brothers, “Let Me Know When It’s You” – I got turned onto the Smug Brothers through friend and Columbus locus Kyle Sowash’s involvement. This song is a lovely slice of middle-American powerpop, jangle poured over a crunching rhythm section like syrup, and it’s on a record The Book of Bad Ideas spilling over with these big hooks and sparkling harmonies. “When you think you’ve heard about a situation and you’re trying to tune into the conversation, you know I won’t pass the test and maybe that’s for the best.”
  • Byron Messia, “Talibans” – St Kitts-based dancehall artist Byron Messia is having a moment with this bolt-from-the-blue (at least to those of us outside the genre) smash hit. While I love dancehall, I don’t pretend my knowledge goes deep; this infectious, menacing watch-yourself tune with a smooth quaver in the vocal over clipped drums, caught my ear immediately. “Make unruh sleep inna yard in four months.”
  • Vox Sambou, “Libète (remix) – Montreal-based singer-bandleader Vox Sambou draws on the various music of the African disapora and mixes it in a way that never feels random or scattered. This single in advance of We Must Unite starts with the Haitian Creole word for freedom and builds to a powerful crescendo, rippling guitars and a thicket of percussion rising behind a powerful, ragged voice.
  • Ken Ishii, “Liver Blow (Ken Ishii 2023 Remix One)” – I got into Ken Ishii a little late – the Nonesuch compilation Reich Remixed came out when I was 18 or 19 and drew a connection between the electronic music I loved getting down to with my friends in clubs and at parties and the avant-garde classical I’d recently discovered. One of my favorite tracks was Ishii’s so I started grabbing anything of his I could find. When I finally got to see him spin in person with my old roommate and friend Jon Rood a couple of years later, in a club I don’t think lasted 9 months called Pulse, it was every bit as revelatory as I hoped. I haven’t done the best job of keeping track but this rework of a 2022 track hit my radar and it gives me the same jolts of experimentation and sensuality his work did when I first discovered it, without feeling like he’s been static.
  • Jorja Smith and Nia Archives, “Little Things (Nia Archives Remix)” – I don’t think it’s any surprise I think London’s Jorja Smith is one of the great soul singers to emerge in the last 10 years, and I’ve loved everything I’ve heard from Nia Archives. Their collab on this remix delivered on those high expectations and then some – the speeding up and layering it over post-jungle drums actually enhances the cold menace in Smith’s original; snippets of vocal dance in the air  between the verses, like slivers of shattered mirror in an image I always remember from a poem of old pal Dave Gibbs. “It’s the little things that get me high. Won’t you come with me and spend the night?”
  • Tego Calderón, “La Receta” – One of the voices that helped define reggaeton to the world, Puerto Rican superstar Tego Calderón returns eight years after his last record, and over 20 since he first appeared, with this dance floor smash of the perreo variety, produced by DJ Urba & Rome. If this doesn’t make your hips move, I’m not sure what to tell you.
  • Tyson, “Promises” – Like the warm breeze coming in from a door opening on a cool dark bar just before the late-evening sunset of Jul while watching a carved ice cube tumble into a rocks glass that fits just so in your hand, this single by Tyson, the daughter of Neneh Cherry and Cameron McVey (Massive Attack, Groove Armada, Yossou N’Dour), is the perfect mix of sensations and architecture. The spaces and the echo around the sparse, crisp beats slit the skin to make space for that melody. “How do I read you when you’re giving me nothing?”
  • Miles Miller, “Passed Midnight” – Another perfectly constructed song keyed for the sweltering middle of summer, from Miles Miller, better known as Sturgill Simpson’s drummer, and exemplary of his stellar Solid Gold. “The shape I’m in doesn’t make me want to give you a call. You’re probably holding on so tight to somebody else tonight. Well, I’m holding on to nothing but the twilight; ain’t it a pretty sight?”
  • Jerry Joseph, “The War I Finally Won” – Singer-songwriter Jerry Joseph’s been making great records since the mid-’90s that completely flew under my radar until 2020’s breathtaking The Beautiful Madness and even that I heard late, so I’m still playing catch up. If this evocative barn burner, with a fiery tambourine so far up in the mix it feels like it might break the fourth wall and slap me in the face, is any indication, the follow-up Baby, You’re the Man Who Would Be King, is a record to watch out for coming up. “I see the enemy is still right here. Let me sleep till the morning; the indecision weighs a ton. I hear the trumpets blow, and I know it’s the war I finally won.”
  • PJ Harvey, “I Inside The Old Year Dying” – Like most old cranks who loved something so much at a formative time, it took me a while to get on board with the differently abstract, spacious music PJ Harvey’s making now. I kept holding her work to a yardstick based on the four-album run almost no one has ever come close to she put out in my youth. It finally opened up for me, cracking wide and letting me lose that chrysalis of bullshit, with the last record so I was ready for her excellent new one, of which this is the title track. Soaring and searing, an indictment and a call to arms. I’m not sure exactly where I think the “ending prayer” portion of this month’s playlist starts – the Miller or the Joseph – but this is where it hits critical mass. “Slip from my childhood skin; / I zing through the forest / I hover in the holway / And laugh into the leaves”
  • Spencer Zahn, Dave Harrington, Jeremy Gustin, “Daylight” – I’ve been a big fan of Spencer Zahn since our mutual friend Mike Gamble introduced us and turned me onto his band Father Figures – and he’s shown up in these playlists several times. I like the music of Harry Styles but I don’t know it all that well, and from the liner notes, neither did this trio when they decided to take it on, but this is the opposite of a piss take. This track, and the rest of A Visit to Harry’s House, treat the song forms with love and generosity but leave enough room to bring their own life to it, their own light, and leave us all smiling. Like you always want a visitor to leave.
  • Joni Mitchell and the Joni Jam, “Amelia” – As soon as I heard Joni Mitchell was singing again at Newport I watched those Youtube videos for the next week almost to the exclusion of everything else. This official recording – backed by a collection of musicians with Brandi Carlile and her band as the nucleus – makes me tear up every time. This version of a song from Hejira that’s not only given me comfort since I was a teenager but has changed with me, featuring a lovely vocal from Dawes’ Taylor Goldsmith, is a stunning example of the kind of love and compassion this kind of tribute/celebration needs. “A ghost of aviation: she was swallowed by the sky, or by the sea. Like me, she had a dream to fly. Like Icarus ascending on beautiful, foolish arms – Amelia, it was just a false alarm.”
Categories
Playlist record reviews

Playlist – May 2021

I spent April in an anxiety-ridden state of transition: a dash of survivor’s guilt, a splash of irrational exuberance, a sprinkling of always-remember-it’s-not-over-yet, and a magnum of remembering how my socialization muscles feel when they move.  

May was better, even as my heart went out to friends still suffering – with a particular eye on the Hyderabad team who I work with every day and who have taken some horrific losses. Only time will tell, but I think this month’s selections reflect that. As always, thank you for reading, for commenting, for turning me onto stuff that made this list, and for being part of my life. 

Bandcamp links where available, courtesy of Hype Machine’s Merch Table feature: https://hypem.com/merch-table/53h8NSehhgehtUqPtube5l

Continue reading for notes on each song: 

Continue reading “Playlist – May 2021”
Categories
Playlist record reviews

Playlist – March 2021

Spring feels good as it comes in fits and starts. Optimism leavened with more loss – most recently one of the best, kindest, most enthusiastic music fans I ever had the opportunity to know (and not know as well as I wish I had), Matt Bush. It’s hard to think of going back out to shows again and not seeing Matt’s face. Continue reading for notes on these songs.

Courtesy of the Hype Machine’s merch table function, links to Bandcamp for much of this: https://hypem.com/merch-table/57zbpIN0jYPAPewlwQJBE5

Continue reading “Playlist – March 2021”
Categories
Uncategorized

Things I’ve Been Digging – 09/21/2020

A grey sky and a choppy sea, like I’ve been feeling

It feels like not a week goes by that doesn’t give most of us a reason to go, “It’s a dark week. Things look bleak.” Losing Justice Ginsburg was one of the hardest of those hits in this fucked-up time. A beacon of how to live, passionate about your work but also the greater world and your friends and your greater community and a way to harmonize all of those things I constantly strive for and frequently fail at. One of the best of us and another reminder to keep trying. Keep working.

As always, one of the biggest things that pulls me back from those whirlpools of despair is art. The other is friends. I hope you’re also finding something that gives you light in this darkness and my sharing this is always tied to the hope you’ll share those things with me and your own community.

From left: Wayne Shorter, John Patitucci, Teri Lyne Carrington, taken from livestream and edited

Music: Wayne Shorter Quartet at SFJAZZ.

I’ve waxed rhapsodic here a few times about SFJAZZ’s essential work and their breathtaking pivot to digital with their site closed due to the pandemic. Their monthly Wayne Shorter tributes have been a key part of this – the first four monthly, featuring a different frontline each time backed by Shorter’s rhythm section of Danilo Perez on piano, John Patitucci on bass, and Brian Blade on drums were all special. 

This week, they ended with maybe even more of a bang: a 2017 performance of Shorter with his quartet featuring Teri Lyne Carrington on drums instead of Blade. Shorter’s universes beguiled me almost since I knew what music was, his intricate compositions that feel like nothing I’ve ever heard at the same time they feel as familiar as the blood in my veins, his ability to write for specific band contexts that still work generations removed. 

This presented an example of one of the great working ensembles with that uncanny communicative empathy that jazz is based on, that conversation so many of us use as a metaphor for collective improvisation, everyone building up a situation by listening to one another and finding a new angle on whatever’s happening. 

As Herbie Hancock said in the YouTube chat (if I haven’t mentioned it before, one of the excellent things SFJAZZ does is engage artists and listeners in the chat while the video plays) during their hypnotic dive into Arthur Penn’s early 20th century standard “Smilin’ Through,” there’s a great, shifting parallel quality with Patitucci and Carrington dialoguing on a related but separate plane to Shorter and Perez. A rich, swirling take on the Fairport Convention-popularized folk standard “She Moves Through the Fair” detonated landmines of surprise and delight. The entire set beguiled and charmed and sometimes baffled me in the best way.

Kate Hutchinson, Lonnie Holley, Immeasurable Explosions – taken from Livestream and edited.

Music: Immeasurable Explosions (Knoel Scott and Marshall Allen), Chiminyo, Lonnie Holley, and Kate Hutchinson, from the Boiler Room with Night Dreamer and Worldwide FM.

The Boiler Room – known for hard-hitting, cutting edge DJ nights – has become a vital livestream player in the last few months and is always something I’m glad to see pop up on my YouTube subscription reminder. This week’s was a truly delightful surprise. On a sunny afternoon with the first chill of the season in the air – anyone who knows me knows how much I love Fall – they put together the perfect lineup for straddling these seasons. 

Kate Hutchinson kicked off the night with a perfect DJ set hitting on light reggae, tropical house, throwback disco, horn-drenched drama, electro hip-hop… summer beats with just enough of a chill. Just enough dashes of melancholy, enough grit in the oyster (or cynar in the fizzy champagne) for a tribute to the sunshine and the long shadows. Hutchinson also contributed excellent, insightful introductions to the broad spectrum of artists.

Lonnie Holley gets a lot of praise for the spiritual, incantory quality of his work, and the use of the materials of his life in a way that merits comparisons to his work as a sculptor; all of that remains true and was clear here. But there’s also an autumnal quality, a sense of honoring people around him and the people who’ve gone before, the changing of seasons in a lot of senses, that felt rich in this short set. Anytime I see him, even over a screen, I feel like I’m bullshitting and need to try harder.

Chiminyo previewed a marvelous record out later this week – I Am Panda – with a combination of tracks and live percussion: light dub, classic spiritual jazz, and early 80s synth textures flow together into roiling, stormy anthems. Sun Ra Arkestra alums and longtime friends and collaborators Knoel Scott and Marshall Allen teamed up for a mix of poetry and multi-instrumental duets that recalled nature and cracked the thought of nature open to the “Other worlds they have not told you of” in their old bandleader’s parlance.

Aoife O’Donovan, taken from livestream and edited

Music: Aoife O’Donovan at the Church of the Sacred Heart in Barrytown, New York, presented by Dreamstage

Anyone who’s ever read any of my writing – best of lists, etc – knows what a massive fan I am of Aoife O’Donovan. This stream, on a new-to-me platform called Dreamstage, took excellent advantage of a gorgeous-sounding church in the Hudson River Valley that let her voice and guitar (and piano on a couple numbers) breathe.

O’Donovan might be our finest current songwriter of the key decision, that moment when a character is on a precipice that will change their life. She has a fine eye and ear for those details when everything about to change, how it feels in the moment and how it feels when recollected. Prime examples of that here were the opening one-two punch of “Hornets” with its cautious reassurance “I’ll be there to have and to hold you” on the chorus but also the verse, “Turning back’s the only way to go;” and “Porch Light,” maybe my favorite of her songs, with the weary, imploring taunt “You want to live a life of loneliness? Baby, so do I. I want to sit under the porch light and watch the yellow moon rise.” Just a devastating as the first time I heard both those songs, maybe more, as her voice has found new contours and places to shine the light in a few years of touring them.

She also hit songs from previous bands of hers: a lovely, rippling, Sometymes Why tune, “Clover,” and two standards she did with her first widely known band, Crooked Still, “Ain’t No Grave Gonna Hold My Body Down” and “Lakes of Ponchartrain,” in new arrangements. That knack for rearrangements also shone in her settings of Peter Sears poems, “Night Fishing” (dedicated to the late Justice Ginsburg) and “The Darkness.”

The centerpiece of this dazzling hour of music was two of the lustiest songs in her catalog. “Ryland,” which she performed in the supergroup I’m With Her, with its silky chorus  “Just let me lie, under the apple tree, I planted for my love and me.” She segued that – with a laughing, “Of course I pair the song about apple cider with the song about bourbon,” – into the aching, affectionate standout from Fossils, “Oh Mama,” with its infectious sing-along chorus: “Oh Mama, sing me a love song, pour me some bourbon, and lay me down low.”