Tag: Mark Turner

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Best Of Playlist record reviews

Best of 2024 – Spaces

As I’ve done for the last few years, I create a couple of lists that are loosely grouped by impact – if it feels like something I’d play on a jukebox or has lyrics, if it creates a sharp impression that might reverberate later – if I feel like it’s a “song” I put it in songs. It goes here if it feels spacious or dreamy, like architecture or a painting or landscape. Obviously, in a lot of cases, these distinctions are porous.

Similarly to my songs list, there was so much good shit this year and I’m looking forward to getting this posted so I can really dig into everyone else’s lists.

  • Wadada Leo Smith and Amina Claudine Myers, “Central Park at Sunset”– Two veterans of Chicago’s AACM movement – equally prominent as composers and virtuoso instrumentalists – teamed up for a duo record Central Park’s Mosaics of Reservoir, Lake, Paths and Gardens that’s as rich, sprawling, and vibrant as the urban park that inspired it. This particular piece reaffirms the poetry in both artists’ playing – I’m not sure anybody plays a sunset on any instrument as well as Smith, and those delicate and powerful chords from Myers are like the shifting moods of a summer breeze.
  • Mary Halvorson, “Desiderata” – I liked both of the last two Halvorson records on Nonesuch, but Cloudward synthesized those pleasures and reaffirms her Amaryllis octet as one of the great working ensembles, able to conjure any mood, any atmosphere her writing requires and bring in their own personalities without overwhelming the overall tone. A band of leaders that are always in service of the music. The way the jaunty swing in the beginning shatters into abstraction to flow back together in a new form is a Halvorson trademark, executed perfectly here.
  • David Murray Quartet, “Free Mingus” – Elder statesman and master at blending the melodic and the free, David Murray, assembles a brilliant quartet with pianist Marta Sanchez, bassist Luke Stewart, and Russell Carter, for his breathtaking record Francesca. On this track the band digs into an undulating saloon song tempo with the intensity and beauty it demands – that flow from Murray’s solo into Sanchez’s brings me to the edge of my seat every time, and every bit of the record is this good.
  • Vijay Iyer/Linda May Han Oh/Tyshawn Sorey, “Ghostrumental” – The second record with Iyer’s world-beating trio with Linda May Han Oh and Tyshawn Sorey exceeded even the high expectations I had. Thick grooves that shifts almost imperceptibly into deep abstractions and switch up again without feeling like an exercise, and melodic cells that swirl around and lock into place. There are a lot of piano trios on the playlist this time because all of them kicked enormous amounts of ass. Maybe my favorite moment on this track is Oh’s rich bass solo and the surprising, no-bullshit but also unshowy comping from Iyer and Sorey behind her.
  • Soundwalk Collective featuring Patti Smith, “Pasolini” – As someone who’s as much a film nerd at heart – at least they took up equal headspace in my adolescence – and who’s off and on written poetry since I was a teenager, both Patti Smith and the subject of the piece, Pasolini, loom very large in my psyche. I also love Soundwalk Collective’s playing with time, geography, specifics. So Correspondences Vol. 1 hit me right where I live. This is a gorgeous, mysterious piece.
  • Nduduzo Makhathini, “Water Spirits: Izinkonjana” – South African pianist/composer Nduduzo Makhathini’s second Blue Note album uNomkhubulwane is a gorgeous, meditative work immaculately played by his trio of Zwelakhe-Duma Bell le Pere and Francisco Mela. The little shifts in this piece, the way a bluesy run gives way to bright crispness and then they conjure clouds in the water, keep me coming back.
  • Six Organs of Admittance and Shackleton, “Spring Will Return/Oliver’s Letter” – I didn’t have this collaboration between freak-folk/noise-rock chameleon Ben Chesney (as Six Organs of Admittance) and dubstep pioneer Shackleton (I think I bought everything on Skull Disco for at least a few years) but this droning, atmospheric track captures both artists’ mature powers and finds new textures where they intersect. Meditative like the last piece but not at all like the last piece.
  • Cassie Kinoshi’s seed., “iii sun through my window” – Saxophonist/composer from the incredible London scene and her seed collective’s record Gratitude. This track conjures a pastoral lushness with an underlying tension that I find gripping and intoxicating.
  • J. Pavone String Ensemble, “Embers Slumber” – I first saw Jessica Pavone at the exact same time I first saw Mary Halvorson, when Gerard Cox brought their long-running duo to town, and have been a fan ever since. The shadowy, rapturous Reverse Bloom features a trio of Abby Swidler on viola and violin, Aimée Niemann on violin, and Pavone on viola and compositions. This closing track alternates between heartbeat pizzicato and long, arco lines curling like smoke. The exquisite pace lets every element burst and then fade, letting the decay play off one another like the shadows in a Twombly mobile.
  • SML, “Three Over Steel” – SML set the bar high – in a year full of contenders – for smart, surprising groove music. This quintet of Anna Butterss on bass – on this track sometimes so heavy and thick it feels like a tuba in the best way – Jeremiah Chiu on synths, Josh Johnson on sax (those overlapping curlicues resist being easily grasped but also rebel against not being an earworm), the always subtle and response Booker Stardrum on drums and percussion, and Greg Uhlman on guitar. This track is a party starter in the world I want to live in.
  • Dave Guy, “Footwork” – As with many things, I have Andrew Patton to thank for hipping me to Ruby, a record led by longtime Daptone – more recently of The Roots – trumpeter Dave Guy. This Latin-flavored piece feels like the first rays of sunshine on a cobblestone street, with Guy’s sing-along trumpet leading a dance over lush beds of percussion.
  • Adam O’Farrill, “Dodging Roses” – Another favorite trumpet player, Adam O’Farrill, continues to top himself with the addictive HUESO, featuring a tight quartet of frequent collaborators including his brother Zack, bassist Walter Stinson – I’ve been blown away by that rhythm section hookup live and on record before, but they’ve never sounded better – and saxophonist Xavier Del Castillo. Crystalline writing given added life by the personalities of these players and a tribute to the kind of telepathy you hear at the absolute highest levels of this kind of small-group jazz.
  • Happy Apple, “Turquoise Jewelry” – Another stunner from this band led by drummer Dave King (The Bad Plus, Fellwalker) with bassist Erik Fratzke and saxophonist/keyboardist Michael Lewis. I love the stop-start and the subtlety of this one.
  • Caroline Davis and Wendy Eisenberg, “Accept When” – Saxophonist/synth player Caroline Davis put out multiple records that killed me this year, but this duo with guitarist Wendy Eisenberg vibrated strings in my heart I didn’t know existed, or had maybe forgotten about. That stretch toward the midpoint when their unison voices sing “Synchronicity” over and over, and then the instruments take over with this subtle, picked melody from Eisenberg and long tones from Davis, tentative at first and then stretching further and further out… good lord. One of my musical moments of the year.
  • Erik Friedlander, “Shrimping (Mod 9)” – Erik Friedlander is one of my favorite cellists in any contexts, but there’s something special about his writing when he applies it to a specific thematic context. His instrumental dissection of MMA, Dirty Boxing, with a sympathetic quartet of Uri Caine on piano, Mark Helias on bass, and Ches Smith on drums, is my favorite record in years. This bouncy but restrained track is a prime example of what I loved about the record.
  • Dirty Three, “Love Changes Everything II” – A new Dirty Three record is always a cause for celebration in my world, and the magnificent Love Changes Everything is my favorite since She Has No Strings, Apollo, maybe my favorite since Whatever You Love, You Are. I have countless records in my collection all three of these Australian players are on – none of them bad – but that unmistakable language when they get together is to be savored.
  • Marquis Hill featuring Samora Pinderhughes, “Balladesque (Nothing to Lose)” – Chicago-native trumpeter Marquis Hill assembled a dream team including Makaya McCraven, Jeff Parker, Caroline Davis, Josh Johnson, and Juan Pastor, to tackle six of his compositions and tunes by fellow Chicagoans on his Composers Collective: Beyond the JukeBox record. The vocals by Samora Pinderhughes on this one are the icing on the cake.
  • Patricia Brennan, “Los Otros Yo” – Vibes and marimba wizard Patricia Brennan wrote many of my favorite tunes this year and assembled an astonishing band to tackle them – including her bandmate in Halvorson’s Amaryllis, Adam O’Farrill, alongside Jon Irabagon and Mark Shim on reeds, and Marcus Gilmore on drums. This track grabbed me from that horn fanfare on the intro and never let me go.
  • Alabaster DePlume, “Honeycomb” – London-based poet and saxophonist Alabaster DePlume floored me with a beautiful EP this year, Cremisan: Prologue To a Blade that leads off with this gorgeous, melancholy duet for reeds and piano.
  • Max Richter, “The Poetry of Earth (Geophony)” – In a Landscape distilled the particular pleasures I get from Max Richter’s compositions, a series of pastoral watercolors that have enough tension to stay consistently interesting. One of my records of the year for both self-soothing and trying to go deeper.
  • Pat Thomas, “The Oud of Ziryab” – I loved London pianist Pat Thomas’s work with free jazz titans like Derek Bailey, but this was my first exposure to his solo piano conception and every track on The Solar Model of Ibn Al-Shatir knocked me for a loop.
  • Matt Wilson, “Good Trouble”- One of the shows I was sorriest to miss this year was the Jazz Arts Group bringing drummer/composer/bandleaders Matt Wilson back to the Lincoln with his killer band promoting the record this is the title track (composed with sax player Jeff Lederer) of a tribute to the late Senator John Lewis and, more broadly, a hard-swinging tribute to community in all its stripes.
  • Asher Gamedze and the Black Lungs, “Elaboration” – Another drummer/composer on the rise, South Africa’s Asher Gamedze assembled an octet and worked with one of my heroes, poet Fred Moten, on a spoken word meets fire music masterpiece I’m still unpacking, Constitution. This mostly words and drums duet of a track is maybe the purest distillation but it’s an unskippable record.
  • Immanuel Wilkins, “MOSHPIT” – Saxophonist/composer Immanuel Wilkins released a magnum opus Blues Blood this year and it’s another landmark flag-planting from an artist who’s better every time I see him – last time was Winter Jazzfest 2022, be damn sure I’m going to see this live at Big Ears in the spring.
  • Kronos Quartet featuring Jlin, “Maji” – The long-running lineup of the Kronos Quartet took a well-deserved victory lap this year before two seats switched members, including their spectacular Sun Ra tribute Outer Spaceways Incorporated. This track finds them collaborating with Chicago electronic artist Jlin – the only artist I’ve seen get a standing ovation in the middle of their set at Big Ears this year – on an infectious tune that samples Sun Ra’s “Hidden Spheres.”
  • Love Higher, “Crush” – Another recent favorite electronic artist of mine, Love Higher splits her time between Columbus and New York and is moving the dance floor culture in both scenes, with her own work, curating series like Errant Forms, and even acting in the Cameron Granger film that formed the spine of one of my favorite art shows this year. The EP this is the title track from is one of my favorite dance records in a while.
  • J. Rawls, “Fresco” – Sticking with the Columbus theme for a moment, legend J. Rawls released a stellar record Bump the Floor. The light, staccato house-echoing flavor of this was infectious.
  • Nubya Garcia, “The Seer” – My favorite of the current London saxophonists bringing contemporary flavors to a rock-solid grasp of the jazz tradition, Nubya Garcia’s Odyssey is the best synthesis yet of her varied interests, all filtered through her molten-gold, unmistakable sax tone.
  • Matt Mitchell, “Angled Langour” – Another crushing piano trio record – Zealous Angles – captures Mitchell’s working trio with Chris Tordini on bass and Dan Weiss on drums, and it has all the heaviness you’d expect from those three names but also, as on this track, reminds us how much intensity and delicateness they can balance, how many Kandor-style worlds they can build in these bubbles of restraint. Beautiful.
  • Marta Sanchez, “3:30 AM” – This Marta Sanchez record – also featuring Tordini in the bass chair alongside Savannah Harris on drums – felt like it had a similar powerful and restrained quality, an intense rhythm engine pushing right into the red, that I loved on its own but while playing with the list really felt nice between these other two pieces. A standout on a record – Perpetual Void – with no shortage of standouts.
  • Oneida, “Gunboats” – Opening with a heavy-motorik drum beat and squealing feedback, “Gunboats” instantly landed in the classic rager category for me of a band that has more of those deep rocking expansive jams that hold my interest all the way through than anybody still working I can name. This closed the snarling, searching Expansive Air on a fist-pumping note.
  • Kris Davis Trio, “Knotweed” – I was lucky to see this trio the week the record came out, and it made my shows of the year list. Maybe my single favorite pianist of my generation with the best rhythm section she’s had – Robert Hurst and Johnathan Blake – tearing into her excellent compositions. Probably the hardest time I had picking a single track to represent on this playlist.
  • Tyshawn Sorey, “Your Good Lies” – I’ve been lucky enough to see Sorey’s current trio of Columbus native Aaron Diehl on piano and Harish Raghavan on bass twice in the last year, and they only grow into their power and rapport with one another. The Susceptible Now, the new record of standards, is the finest document yet of this working unit and this tightly arranged expansion of the Vividry song might be its crowning achievement.
  • Brian Charette, “6:30 in the Morning” – Brian Charette, with a pulse-pounding quartet of Cory Weeds on tenor, Dave Sikula on guitar, and John Lee on drums paid tribute to B3 legend Jack McDuff in high style on You Don’t Know Jack! and they conjure the lighter Latin flavor of this McDuff composition beautifully.
  • James Carter, “Prince Lasha” – I don’t know why it took this long for a solo baritone saxophone record from James Carter, but it felt like answering (a very specific subset of) my prayers when it happened. An essential document from probably the finest practitioner of the instrument working today.
  • Nicole Connelly, “Sky Piece” – The presence of drummer Kate Gentile got me to check out Stamp in Time, and the writing and playing of trombonist Nicole Connelly (with Zachary Swanson rounding out the trio, along with Andrew Hadro guesting on bari on this track) kept me enthralled. The floating, plaintive quality here is always held together and held aloft by a tensile strength, with one of my favorite tones on trombone I’ve heard in a while.
  • Ibrahim Maalouf, “Timeless” – Lebanese trumpeter Ibrahim Maalouf was one of my favorite discoveries at an early (for me) Winter Jazz Fest, and I’ve been enraptured by his sound and writing ever since. Trumpets of Michel-Ange is a stunning cross-cultural achievement highlighting the quarter-tone trumpet Maalouf’s father created and on this track including guests like the kora master Toumani Diabaté.
  • Sarah Davachi, “Night Horns” – Sarah Davachi’s The Head As Form’d In The Crier’s Choir is another gob-smacking triumph, conjuring a diversity of moods from different instruments and combinations and a real mastery of all of them. This closing track, for pipe organ (also played by Davachi), is one of my favorite pieces to get lost in, always finding new threads.
  • Painkiller, “Samsara III” – John Zorn reformed Painkiller with the original trio of Bill Laswell and Mick Harris, Harris of course doing samples and electronics instead of acoustic drums these days, and I was overjoyed to find the acid-fried intensity and chemistry are both not only intact but deepened.
  • Kali Malone, “No Sun To Burn (for brass)” – I liked Kali Malone on records. Still, I became a massive fan seeing her live at the end of the night in one of the churches at Big Ears two years ago. All Life Long captures that power and the evolution of her compositional language better than any record before. This version of “No Sun to Burn” for a brass quintet – it also appears on the record in an organ arrangement – feels like the fog burning off a lake in the still morning.
  • Walter Smith III, “24” – For his second Blue Note record, saxophonist Walter Smith III assembled a hard-to-top quartet of Jason Moran, Eric Harland, and Reuben Rogers (the aptly titled Three Of Us Are From Houston and Reuben Is Not) and they make a meal of Smith’s originals including this one, that feels tailor made for the sense of deeply serious play all of these musicians bring to the table, as well as a great Sam Rivers tune.
  • JD Allen, “Know Rose” – Another tenor sax player at the top of his game, JD Allen, leans into denser, moodier territory on The Dark, The Light, The Grey, and The Colorful, and this sinewy, smoky ballad is right in his sweet spot. That tone needs to be luxuriated in.
  • Tallā Rouge, “Shapes in Collective Space” – Tallā Rouge’s first record of compositions for viola duo, Shapes in Collective Space, finds whole universes in that range and a wildly expressive palate with these two players, Aria Cheregosha and Lauren Spaulding. It’s here because those tones at the beginning felt there was a shared feeling with the Allen piece right before and the Beethoven-ish sunrise elements of the Richard/Zahn piece after.
  • Dawn Richard and Spencer Zahn, “Traditions” – The single piece I knew had to be somewhere on a year end playlist but I struggled the most with figuring out if it was here or songs. This second collaboration between R&B powerhouse singer-songwriter Dawn Richard and avant-jam bassist/composer Spencer Zahn expanded on their language and opened up even more of their world to me. This tone poem – with minimal, sharply carved lyrics that imply whole lives intersecting – is one of the most moving things I heard all year. “On game day, my brother wears his Saints shoes. Must be a Frank thing, ’cause when I wear ’em, shit, they lose.”
  • Carolyn Enger, “Orizzonte” – Pianist Carolyn Enger built Resonating Earth specifically to be a meditative, transportive work, and she chose the right composers for the job, especially Missy Mazzoli who put together this shadows-over-the-world miniature.
  • MTB, “Angola” – This reteaming of the frontline of Brad Mehldau, Mark Turner, and Peter Bernstein (the MTB of the name) with the rhythm section of Larry Grenadier and Bill Stewart is a delight start to finish, with beautiful interplay that comes from walking the same roads as all five of these players have. This lighthearted but deep romp through Wayne Shorter’s “Angola” was a highlight for me.
  • Dalia Stasevska and the BBC Symphony Orchestra, “Symphony No. II: The Faithful Friend: The Lover Friend’s Love for the Beloved” – Conductor Dalia Stasevska’s Dalia’s Mixtape bursts with ideas, colors, and gave me the most hope for the health of symphonic music of anything I’ve heard in years, including great new pieces from the likes of Anna Meredith, but I had to give it to this movement from a previously lost (I think) Julius Eastman symphony that moved me to tears on first hearing it.
  • Brian Harnetty, “The Workbench” – One of Columbus’s finest composers, Brian Harnetty put out this stand-alone piece written in honor of his father and it’s both a moving tribute and an example of Harnetty working at the top of his game.
  • Lara Downes, “America” – Pianist Lara Downes’ This Land is a stunning grappling with what this country we share means, full of both beauty and truth. My highlight was this Noah Luna arrangement of Simon and Garfunkle’s “America,” that opens the song up while keeping everything that’s good about it, played exquisitely.
  • Shabaka, “As The Planets And The Stars Collapse” – One of my highlights of this year’s Big Ears – and an appearance as part of A Night at the East in WJF – was Shabaka’s new flute conception; I worried I was so deep into his tenor player bag that I’d have a hard time getting on board, but the first few notes put those fears to rest and the richly developed record keeps unfolding and revealing both its truths and more mysteries to me.

Categories
Best Of Playlist record reviews

Playlist – 2022 Spaces

In contrast to the last playlist, these are compositions and performances I didn’t think fit as neatly into the categorization of songs. Usually – but not always – instrumental, usually – but not always – a little longer, a little more sprawling.

https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/3d5c5631-c345-46e8-8584-b749c9631177

  • Medicine Singers featuring Jaimie Branch, “Sanctuary” – I was a big fan of Yonatan Gat’s band Monotonix live, but they never quite gelled for me on record, but I’ve been extremely excited to see the various paths, curiosities, and enthusiasms he’s followed since breaking out on his own. My favorite is his collaboration with the Native American group Eastern Medicine singers on this stunning self-titled album. The record is full of guests, but every guest seems well-chosen, none more so than Jaimie Branch here, who adds a questing, majestic trumpet that feels like coming home to a place that doesn’t look quite the same.
  • Terri Lyne Carrington featuring Ambrose Akinmusire, “Rounds” – Drummer-composer-bandleader Terri Lyne Carrington’s New Standards project is one of the most important pieces of work enhancing jazz in years, with 100 great new compositions by women. The accompanying record, New Standards Vol. 1 finds Carrington assembling a crack rhythm section of herself, Kris Davis on piano, Linda May Han Oh on bass, Matthew Stevens on guitar, and a series of guests. This album-closing, spiky house fire written by one of my favorite pianists (and the artist we went to see the first time Anne and I went to the Village Vanguard together), Marilyn Crispell, features a jaw-dropping, dangling off the edge of the world trumpet solo from Ambrose Akinmusire.
  • Mary Halvorson, “Amaryllis” – Mary Halvorson made two of her strongest statements yet in 2022, with the mirrored records Amaryllis and Belladonna. I greatly admired the work with the Mivos Quartet on the latter – and it’s one of the things I’m most looking forward to seeing at Big Ears – but I couldn’t get several of the pieces with her crushing new sextet of Patricia Brennan on vibes, Nick Dunston on bass, Tomas Fujiwara on drums, Jacob Garchik on trombone, and Adam O’Farrill on trumpet out of my head, especially this title track on the other album. It’s a call to arms of raging beauty and a successful attempt to transcribe the beauty of the world, that moment where Halvorson’s comping mutates right behind O’Farrill’s blistering solo then takes off in another direction knocks me out.’
  • Loraine James, “Building Something Beautiful For Me (Holy Presence of Joan d’Arc)” – The posthumous renaissance of Julius Eastman continues to be a source of joy. This year brought a couple of artifacts of his own compositions and a breathtaking record of homages and refiguring from London-based composer/producer Loraine James. This title track uses the first piece of Eastman’s work I loved, the vocal intro and massed cellos of The Holy Presence of Joan d’Arc, and stretches the tones, playing with the colors so new light shines right through.
  • Brian Harnetty, “Let There Be a Moving Mosaic of This Rich Material” – Brian Harnetty is one of Columbus’s finest composers in a field where the bar is high. Over the last several years, his work with archives, especially with the past of Kentucky and Ohio, has provided a rich field he’s dug deep and made the best use of. His new record, Words and Silences, is a masterful look at the monk and writer Thomas Merton, using Merton’s own words and Harnetty’s settings to craft a mosaic look at the great man’s life. It’s a remarkable paean to stillness, attention, to getting off the merry-go-round of modern life and stopping to hear ourselves. Like all of Harnetty’s work, the insistence on meeting the materials where they are doesn’t negate the artist’s intention or vision, it opens it wide.
  • Bill Frisell, “Waltz for Hal Willner” – As I said in an earlier Parting Gifts playlist, Hal Willner’s tribute records were world-shattering to me, bringing together Leonard Cohen, Diamanda Galas, Harry Partch instruments in the service of Charles Mingus compositions, everything on Night Music… it all stunned me. And I’m so glad I got to see Willner once doing a piece with recordings accompanied by a small band, including Bill Frisell, where the affection between the two was radiating throughout the Stone. I love everything on Frisell’s new record, Four, pairing him with pianist Gerald Clayton, drummer Johnathan Blake, and Greg Tardy on clarinet and saxophone, but I kept coming back to this beautiful, elegiac waltz.
  • Kalia Vandever, “Passing Through” – Composer and trombonist Kalia Vandever assembled a nuanced, powerful sextet for an album of some of the best jazz compositions anyone’s writing now, Regrowth. Her striking trombone voice is front and center with gripping accompaniment from Immanuel Wilkins on alto, Lee Meadvin on guitar, Paul Cornish on piano (check his dancing solo that rises right out of a gorgeously gnarled stretch from Vandever), Nick Dunston on bass, and Connor Parks on drums.
  • Mark Lomax Trio, “Better Get Hit in Your Soul” – Another of the finest Columbus composers is also one of our best drummers and bandleaders, Dr. Mark Lomax II. For Charles Mingus’s centennial, Lomax and his longtime collaborators Dean Hulett on bass and Eddie Bayard on tenor team up for loving, well-crafted versions of a number of Mingus’s finest compositions. This is one of my favorite pieces on Trio Plays Mingus, with a long, melodic bass intro that flowers into a soulful masterclass in group interplay about a minute in. Three of our greatest players digging into material they’ve been working with as long as they’ve been playing music, with nothing to prove but always the questing spirit for finding something new, of surpassing their own expectations. This rises and rises but never leaves the soulful, earthy qualities of the original piece behind; you could sing every solo in this if you had the knack.
  • Tigran Hamasyan featuring Mark Turner, “All The Things You Are” – Armenian pianist Tigran Hamasyan first caught my attention for his intricate compositions so his album-length detour into standards, StandArt with a sympathetic rhythm section of Matt Brewer and Justin Brown, and guests was a delightful surprise. This gorgeous version of one of my favorite standards features the great tenor player Mark Turner and the lines Hamasyan and Turner weave around one another leave me breathless.
  • Moor Mother featuring Nicole Mitchell, “ARMS SAVE” – Moor Mother’s Jazz Codes plays with and jousts the jazz influences that have always been present in her un-classifiable work. This track, a highlight in a record full of them, featuring multi-reedist and composer Nicole Mitchell, uses the classic poetic device of sliding sentence fragments around, watching them spark against each other, in the night-sky-tapestry of reeds and a subtle beat. “I’m so hot, but no fans, but at the stake of all your demands, guess my presence never been felt.”
  • Mali Obomsawin, “Blood Quantum (Nəwewəčəskawikαpáwihtawα)” – Bassist and bandleader Obomsawin’s Sweet Tooth is one of my favorite debuts in a long while and this 11-minute album closer merges an Obomsawin composition with a contemporary Native American chant written by Obomsawin, Lokotah Sanborn and Carol Dana of the Penobscot Nation with arranging assistance from Lancelot Knight of Muskoday First Nation, and it’s a stunning, defiant, swinging meshing of jazz playing with horns from Allison Burik, Noah Campbell, and the record’s co-producer Taylor Ho Bynum, and a rhythm section including drummer Savannah Harris and guitarist Miriam Elhajli and the music of Obomsawin’s (and the nation’s) heritage.
  • Tarbaby featuring Oliver Lake, “Purple” – The collective trio Tarbaby – pianist Orrin Evans, bassist Eric Revis, and drummer Nasheet Waits – is one of my favorite groups in contemporary jazz, for many years at this point, and some of my favorite work of theirs also brings in the saxophone giant Oliver Lake. This simmering free ballad featuring trumpeter Josh Lawrence is a perfect example of form meeting intention and lighting the flame of beauty.
  • Jacob Garchik, “Bricolage” – Garchik’s new record “Assembly” fits together pieces of improvisations with a killing quintet of Sam Newsome on soprano, Jacob Sacks on piano, Thomas Morgan on bass, and Dan Weiss on drums, into new compositions in a really beautiful way that feels like it builds on his last few records, Ye Olde and Clear Line and playing with some ideas from his film scores while also staying in touch with his lineage as a jazz trombone player.
  • Bobby Previte, “GAMBLE” – One of my great joys this year was getting together in the same place with my childhood friend Mike Gamble and his wife, filmmaker Devin Febboriello, after a break of several years. So it was an extra joy to get to tell him how much I loved his work on Bobby Previte’s Nine Tributes for Electric Band and ask him if it was intimidating to be the guitarist on a record that pays tribute to so many other amazing players that Previte had worked with, from Sonny Sharrock to Charlie Hunter to Nels Cline. And, of course, with the humility I’d expect, the answer was, “Oh man, of course.” But it says something that not only did Previte – who’s played with everybody – call him for this task, but one of the tributes is dedicated to Gamble. And it’s a crushing piece, a key example of an artist being truly seen by another.
  • Sonic Youth, “In & Out” – I loved the collection of Sonic Youth compilation rarities and outtakes this year, In/Out/In, varying from fully formed works to rehearsal space jams. The wordless vocals on this and sly krautrock rhythms kept giving me joy in the months since its release.
  • Angelica Sanchez Trio, “Before Sleep/The Sleeping Lady and The Giant that Watches Over Her” – One of the great pianists working in jazz today, Sanchez assembled an all-star rhythm section of Billy Hart and Michael Formanek for this formidable trio album. The newly composed “Before Sleep” section blends so perfectly into the Ellington piece it feels like they were made for one another.
  • Lara Downes, “Magnetic Rag” – I was late to the party with Lara Downes, discovering her with last year’s series of work by black American composers, but I made up for the newness of that fandom with enthusiasm, so I was ready for her Scott Joplin record Reflections. This piece is a prime example of how a subtle arrangement by Stephen Buck and her light but decisive touch on the piano can remind us of the gorgeous accessibility, and the big riffs in these 100+ year-old songs, reminding us that Joplin helped define where American music was going and that the artistry of Downes is helping keep it alive.
  • Sweet Teeth, “City of Fern” – Sweet Teeth is a band I love in town because I can never quite get my finger on what they’re doing before they’re onto the next thing, but it’s always good. Brothers Stew (guitar, electronics, vocals) and Sam (cello) Johnson have seemingly voracious appetites for sounds, genres, and approaches. With Body Weather, they made a record as good as the times I’ve had seeing them live. This song sets up a deceptively placid surface and subverts those expectations over and over again for its seven-minute run time. “Ghost walk through a city of fern. All those bell shaped flowers try to sing.”
  • Charles Mingus, “Fables of Faubus” – Much as I love Mingus, I balked at the price of The Lost Album from Ronnie Scott’s on Record Store Day so I had to find it electronically after multiple people told me I was an idiot. This joyous and rightfully enraged romp through one of his classics is a key example of why this document is important and how his songs still glow 50 years after being recorded. A particularly good showcase for Jon Faddis on trumpet – whose other work did not wow me like he does here – and John Forster on piano about whom I knew nothing.
  • Wild Up, “Stay On It” – The Wild Up ensemble presents this favorite of mine of the Julius Eastman compositions, arranged by Christopher Rountree and Chris Kallmeyer, that captures all of its joy, its ebullient intensity, its encouragement to keep going.
  • Ethan Iverson, “For Ellen Raskin” – Iverson made his best, most consistent solo record with his Blue Note debut Every Note is True, making excellent use of a spectacular rhythm section of Jack DeJohnette on drums and Larry Grenadier on bass. I can’t count how many records I have with those gentlemen on them, but I can promise there’s not a bad one. And having three melodicists but who also know and love the simplicity of comping, of finding that pocket in a rhythm section, makes every tune on here shine. For me, this is one of the best melodies Iverson’s ever written, begging to be untangled, played with, and admired.
  • Fred Hersch, “Pastorale” – Speaking of melodicists, pianist Fred Hersch has been setting that bar high for decades, and his Breath by Breath, with a rhythm section of Drew Gress and Joachen Rueckert and the Crosby Street String Quartet, is another glowing example. An example of being perfectly lovely without being syrupy or contrived.
  • Mal Waldron, “You Don’t Know What Love Is” – I got into Mal Waldron after reading he was Billie Holliday’s last accompanist around the same time my late high school/early college self got extremely into Steve Lacy, who collaborated with Waldron for many years. I remember being in Portland and seeing a whole section of mostly solo Mal Waldron discs, getting two, and being blown away by both. Everything record of his I’ve ever found had something to teach me, and this year’s Searching in Grenoble from 1978 is a prime example. In excellent sound, in a transitional moment in his life, and it all comes out in a series of stormy pieces like this dissection of a favorite standard of mine, played with the thump of a martini shaker hitting the bar, then delicately as playing curls of smoke.
  • Peter Brotzmann/Milford Graves/William Parker, “Side B” – This year’s Historic Music Past Tense Future is a remarkable document of an explosive meeting between three artists who worked with each other over the years, all growing out of ’60s free jazz. Brotzmann always plays best with people with strong senses of rhythm and the storytelling drums of Graves bring out something different in his playing from the soulful pulse of Hamid Drake or the crunching surprise of Han Bennink. And Parker’s bass, that knew both so well, is a magic meeting place. This reminds me how lucky I was to live when all three of them walked the Earth and to make time to see Parker soon and Brotzmann whenever he next hits the states.
  • Anadol, “Gizli Duygular” – Anadol, the electronic music project of Turkish artist Gözen Atila has a sense of going inside oneself – the record Felicita is a favorite thing to write to – but there’s always a sense of play, the kind of joyful curiosity every meditation teacher always told me I should approach meditating with and the kind of joyful curiosity I try to approach writing and anything I absorb culturally (but often fall short of).
  • Immanuel Wilkins, “Fugitive Ritual, Selah” – Rising star saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins’ latest record for Blue Note, The 7th Hand, is a triumph, a connected suite where each piece makes its own impression. This composition features the core quartet of Micah Thomas on piano, Kweku Sumbry on drums, and Rolling Stones member Daryl Johns on bass, with subtle but gripping interplay and a melody that stuck with me as soon as I heard it.
  • Elvin Jones, “13 Avenue B” – Elvin Jones is very well recorded but there aren’t a lot of examples of him this early as a bandleader after leaving the classic Coltrane quartet. This smoking 1967 set from Pookie’s Pub in SoHo. This piece of classic hard bop features a prime example of his hook-up with bassist Wilbur Little, familiar from Jones’ late ’60s studio dates as a leader but also fiery playing from Joe Farrell, best known for his Return to Forever work, and pianist Billy Greene.
  • Taru Alexander, “Kojo Time” – Drummer and bandleader Taru Alexander’s Echoes of the Masters pays tribute to his inspirations, including his father Roland Alexander. This impassioned romp through a Roland Alexander classic highlights saxophonist Antoine Roney as the entire quintet does a spectacular job with the piece.
  • JD Allen, “This World is a Mean World” – JD Allen, with maybe my favorite tone of any working tenor player, continues his deep dive into blues and the roots of American music with Americana Vol. 2, using the same empathetic rhythm section of Gregg August and Rudy Royston, adding guitar virtuoso Charlie Hunter to the mix to powerful effect.
  • John Scofield, “Junco Partner” – Maybe the first jazz guitarist I was a fan of, John Scofield’s first solo guitar record, self-titled, is a mix of strong originals and classics. This version of the blues traditional – which I learned from the Clash then went back to the Dr. John, the Professor Longhair, the Louis Jordan – highlights Scofield’s blues background and the smoothness of the ideas flowing out of him.
  • Johnny Gandelsman, “Barbary Coast, 1955” – Violinist Johnny Gandelsman went to many of our great American composers for his rapturous and sometimes heartbreaking This is America. For this piece, for five-string violin, Terry Riley wrote a gorgeous homage to a seedy strip of San Francisco in the ’50s.
  • Antoine Fatout, “Roger’s Riff” – Columbus drummer Antoine Fatout has been making noise as a sideman – I first heard him with great guitarist Brett Burleson – and with his own Trio Fa2. This debut record teams him with two of Columbus’s treasures we sometimes share with the world – Roger Hines on bass, best known for a long stretch in Ray Charles’ band, and guitarist Stan Smith (Moacir Santos, Madrugada, Descendre) – for a swinging, melodic record. This is a favorite of mine but there isn’t a bad tune on the album.
  • Oren Ambarchi, “IV” – Oren Ambarchi’s Shebang is one of my favorite recent examples of composition by accumulation. The guitarist brings in collaborators, including drummer Joe Talia, Necks pianist Chris Abrahams, pedal steel player BJ Cole, 12 string guitarist Julia Reidy, and lets them do what they do in cells, slowly drawing it together into this final, jubilant movement.
  • Isaiah Ceccarelli, “Toute Clarte m’est obscure: V. Aubade” – I fucking love an aubade, though I knew the poetic form before I discovered the musical. This fifth movement of Ceccarelli’s Toute Clarte m’est obscure composition centers on Ellen Weiser’s voice that, along with Katelyn Clark’s organ, feels like the sun rising on your face.
  • Mike Baggetta/Jim Keltner/Mike Watt, “Everywhen We Go” – This title track of the new album from this terrific collaboration has a cool spaghetti western feeling, set up as much by Keltner’s crisp drum rolls and edge-of-the-cymbal work as Baggett’s echoing twang and Watt’s melodic heartbeat bass.
  • James Brandon Lewis, “An Anguish Departed” – Saxophonist James Brandon Lewis seems to pop up everywhere these days. This quartet is probably my favorite of the working bands, with Aruán Ortiz on piano, Brad Jones on bass, and Chad Taylor on drums, and Molecular Systematic Music Live captures them at the height of their powers. This mournful throb of a song features wrenching solos from Lewis and Ortiz.
  • Jeremy Pelt, “Still Standing” – Trumpeter Jeremy Pelt follows last year’s conceptual tribute masterpiece with a record of mostly originals, including this one, cinematic in nature as befits the title, and about getting down and playing. The tight band here includes Chien Chien Lu on vibes (check out that buoyant solo), Vicente Archer on bass, Allan Mednard on drums (throughout, his comping is a wonder), Victor Gould on piano, and Brittany Anjou on synth around Pelt’s razor-sharp trumpet sound.
  • Walter Smith III and Matthew Stevens, “Hornets” – In Common III, the latest in a series of collaboratively led records by saxophonist Smith and guitarist Stevens, with an all-time rhythm section of Kris Davis, Dave Holland, and Terri Lyne Carrington, is a perfect example of how tight and beauitful this kind of small group jazz playing can be. One of my favorite things in jazz is hearing how the group comes out of a solo and there are so many excellent examples in this concise five minute piece, particularly after riveting solos from Stevens and Davis, back to that infectious chorus with meaty transitions.
  • Dezron Douglas, “Coyoacán” – Dezron Douglas leads a killer band including George Burton on piano, Joe Dyson Jr on drums, and Emilio Modeste on sax, through a series of terrific compositions on his new Atalayan. This smoldering tune is a highlight on an album full of highlights.
  • Julian Lage, “Heart is a Drum” – Guitarist Julian Lage continues to refine his approach and expand his field of vision with every outing. On View With a Room, his most developed album yet, he re-teams with tight rhythm section Jorge Roeder and Dave King and adds influence turned peer Bill Frisell into the mix for ten great originals. This one grabbed me by the lapels almost immediately.
  • Kali Malone, “Living Torch I” – Composer Kali Malone trades in the pipe organ she’s best known for on Living Torch for a series of synthesizers in a trio format with trombonist Mats Äleklint and bass clarinetist Isak Hedtjärn. With that instrumentation, long, painterly tones are almost expected but Malone and the other two players use those in a way that’s as surprising and fresh as it feels natural and organic. These two pieces are like watching the shadows change as the sun rises over a canopy of trees.
  • Sarah Davachi, “Harmonies in Bronze” – One of my favorite contemporary composers, Sarah Davachi didn’t disappoint on the 2022 record Two Sisters. This pipe organ solo builds slowly and, appropriate to its name, takes on sculptural qualities. The entire record is stunning but this piece makes me want to simultaneously unpack it and just sit back and watch the light drip out of it.
  • Makaya McCraven, “Seventh String” – I had a harder time finding a way into McCraven’s sprawling In These Times, and I suspect seeing more of the material live (after the tastes we got in the excellent Wexner Center show) will snap it into focus. That said, I immediately loved a handful of songs, including this stormy slow jam.
  • Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith, “Have You Felt Lately?” – This opening track from LA based composer Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith uses elastic tones, sudden shifts in rhythm, and treated vocals to build a doorway to an entire universe, shimmering and shifting.
  • Dirty Bird, “The Question” – This loping house track kicks off producer Dirty Bird’s excellent Wagenmuzik album. The chopped, moaning vocal “Is it real?” repeats and folds over on itself around the hard but distant drums, like the soundtrack to a montage at sunset over a dirty street, day melting into night, one world rubbing up against the next.
  • Anna Butterss, “La Danza” – Anna Butterss, known as a bassist but playing everything on this standout track from her excellent Activities record, creates a soundworld that’s full of details and nuance but here never rising above a steady throb, a slow dance in the waning moonlight.
  • Tyshawn Sorey Trio, “Autumn Leaves” – I’ve seen Tyshawn Sorey a lot over the years in many contexts, mostly focused around his compositions or avant-garde improvisation (I still cherish seeing him in the trio with Ingrid Laubrock and Kris Davis at the late, lamented Cornelia Street Cafe). So it was a little bit of a surprise to see this record of standards with pianist (and Columbus native) Aaron Diehl and bassist Matt Brewer come out, but once I heard it it felt like the most natural thing in the world. Standards I’ve heard a million times, like this one, in versions that hold up to any I’ve heard by any of the greats.
  • RedmanMehldauMcBrideBlade, “Rejoice” – The second reunion record of this quartet that was so influential to me and so many others in the ’90s, LongGone, did not disappoint. This bouncing Joshua Redman composition gives he and Mehldau plenty of space to stretch and I’m especially in love with the almost taunting call and response inside McBride’s playing.
  • Tony Monaco, “Lush Life” – One of Columbus’s keyboard treasuers, maestro of the B-3 Tony Monaco, made his best record in years, Four Brothers, teaming up with saxophonist Eddie Bayard, guitarist Kevin Turner, and drummer Willie Barthel III. Here they take on maybe my favorite standard of all time, digging deep on a classic slow-burn rendition.
  • Charles Lloyd with Zakir Hussain and Julian Lage, “Tales of Rumi” – I enjoyed all three of the Charles Lloyd Trios records but I think my favorite was this collaboration with tabla master Zakir Hussain and virtuoso guitarist Julian Lage. The three approach the situation as equals and the equal weight on each instrument shines and lets the difference in tonal quality shine through this winding, snaking piece. As usual with these, I try to end with a prayer. Thank you all for reading and listening.
Categories
Playlist record reviews

Playlist – October 2022

Last monthly playlist since December I’ll dedicate to my three best-of playlists (also glad there’s less paid writing in Dec because I churn out a lot of year-end words in those bloated gratitude exercises). Between working on this and writing it, I went to New York for the best trip – and the one that felt the most like a “real” NYC trip – since COVID first struck and my and Anne’s first trip to Mexico City (which I loved), but also got to enjoy my favorite season in town. It’s been a particularly good autumn at the end of a roller coaster year. To a holiday season filled with more joy than guilt. Onward, my friends.

https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/1174690c-c1f0-4ebb-aa95-02bb2d8e6343

  • Vieux Farka Touré and Khruangbin, “Diarabi” – I’ve really enjoyed all Khruangbin’s collaborations lately but Ali, their collaboration with Touré on a collection of his father’s classic songs, takes that love to another level. I’ve talked about seeing the elder Touré early in college and that being a huge gateway for me to other sounds and other connections across the world of music, and in a similar way, this re-imagining always keeps the vital core of the song but doesn’t treat it like a museum piece. Every track here is perfect, and we’ve got a reminder here of the covers album as an act of love.
  • Monophonics featuring Kelly Finnigan, “The Shape of My Teardrops” – Long one of my favorite psych-soul bands, San Francisco’s Monophonics, team up with vocalist/lyricist Kelly Finnigan for a concept album built around the artfully crumbling Sage Motel. This track puts them in that silky, saloon tempo they ride so well, drenched in strings and echoing background vocals. “Somebody’s crying over you.”
  • Brian Harnetty, “Thinking Out Loud in a Hermitage” – One of the brightest lights of Columbus composers, Harnetty has done some of his best work interacting with archives. I was sorry Anne and I were out of town for the live debut of this work. His new one, Words and Silences, takes on the American monk and scholar Thomas Merton, using recordings of his own voice. Not “takes on” in terms of grappling with but trying to understand, trying to see Merton as he is and as he presented himself. The arrangements around the vocals often have a cycling, hypnotic feeling, not getting lost in the details but letting them shine just like the diary entries, but those details are all massively important; the clarinet on this track breaks my heart open to let the light in. It’s the best, most fully realized work yet from someone I don’t think has ever made a bad record.
  • Gustav Lundgren Trio, “My Dear Country” – This bucolic title track off Swedish jazz guitarist Lundgren’s latest record teams him with drummer Karl-Henrik Ousbäck (who’s worked with Lage Lund and Ambrose Akinmusire, among others) and bassist Pär-Ola Landin whose melodic lines add some additional gravity and nuance to the gorgeous subtlety of the tune and Ousbäck’s textured drumming (those dancing cymbals around the three-minute mark) changes the complexion of the song’s atmosphere as well as adding propulsion.
  • Bruce Barth Trio, “In Memoriam – for George Floyd & so many others” – Pianist Bruce Barth’s gorgeous new record Dedication features bassist Vicente Archer (a key component of the last couple of great Jeremy Pelt and Orrin Evans records) and drummer Montez Coleman who I think I first heard with Roy Hargrove and it’s a perfect meshing between piano and rhythm section. Befitting the title, the record features beautiful tributes to fellow pianists McCoy Tyner and Tommy Flanagan but I kept coming back to this heartbreaking elegy to black men killed by police brutality.
  • Oren Ambarchi, “IV” – I’ve been a fan of Oren Ambarchi since finding his work with the eai crowd like Otomo Yoshihide and Sachiko M in the early ’00s and, not long after, his crucial contributions to several Sunn O))) records and side projects. His new one, Shebang, is his most immediately accessible and overall satisfying album to date. The four numbered tracks add layers and textures, climaxing in this burst of shimmering color, featuring Jim O’Rourke’s synths, BJ Cole’s pedal steel, Chris Abrahams’ piano, and Julia Reidy’s 12-string.
  • Tigran Hamasyan featuring Mark Turner, “All The Things You Are” – Pianist Hamasyan delivered his first record of standards with the stunning StandArt, and this take on one of the quintessential standards gave me chills all the way down. At times pulsing, floating in space, like the square in a Rothko painting or a Steve Reich piece, always coming back to that perfect melody, dancing with tenor saxophonist Mark Turner.
  • Meg Baird, “Will You Follow Me Home?” – I got into Meg Baird through her time in the Philly free-folk band Espers and have remained a rabid fan through multiple solo records, her time in Heron Oblivion (who were my absolute favorite part of the little Columbus psych fest Melted a few years ago), and various other collaborations. This advance track off her upcoming solo disc Furling is everything I love about her work, that stunning, pure-water voice front and center with backings that have a warm-light ’70s quality but with enough weirdness, enough gaps around the edges to keep it interesting.
  • Melissa Stylianou featuring Gene Bertoncini and Ike Sturm, “It Might As Well Be Spring” – One of my favorite contemporary jazz singers, I got into Stylianou through her work in the vocal trio Duchess (seeing them at the 55 Bar at a happy hour show, sitting down the bar from half a dozen big-name band leaders, is still a memory I treasure). She tears into one of my favorite standards – in a more straight-ahead take than the Hamayasan earlier – with a legend of jazz guitar, Gene Bertoncini, and the warm, swinging bass of Ike Strum.
  • George Strait, “Willy the Wandering Gypsy and Me” – This song was one of my gateway drugs to Billy Joe Shaver, in the version by Tom T. Hall, and so it’s no surprise that this take on it by one of the great gods of the Olympus of Texas Music on the stacked-front-to-back-with-gold tribute album Live Forever would have been one of my standouts. The layers of George Strait in his Lion in Winter phase covering a song by one of his influences and doing a song that influence wrote as a young man trying to place himself in that great lineage of Texas singer-songwriters give this some additional juice for me, but it’s also just a stellar read on one of the great ballads. “Well, I reckon we’re gonna ramble till hell freezes over.”
  • Terence Etc, “In Contemplation of Clair’s Scent” – The hurtling, echoing but tightly controlled drums on this infectious track tied it together with the Andy/Sherwood collab of the previous track. I knew Terence Nance as a filmmaker, but this supernova of an album, VORTEX, was my first exposure to him as a singer and songwriter. The grooves are refreshing and surprising, the lyrics finely chiseled but also elliptical. I have no idea what this will be like live – if there are even any plans for it – but if it comes within 200 miles of me, I’ll have a ticket and be in the front.
  • Electric Shit featuring Walter Daniels, “La Bondad Y La Maldad” – This dovetails to help sum up a year of great but expensive and exhausting travel. While researching the fantastic Mexico trip Anne did most of the planning for, I discovered a show Electric Shit was headlining. Looking into them, I found their release from this year teamed the Ecatepec band with gnarled Austin harmonica master Walter Daniels (who co-led those South Filthy records I love and was so glad to finally see them live this year in Memphis) on a tribute record to the Atlanta band The Subsonics for this raging Spanish cover of “Good Half – Bad Half.”
  • Bad Manor, “Hallowed Ground” – This closing track from the black metal band Bad Manor’s delightful debut full-length The Haunting welds a sinister groove to lacerating guitars and a barbed howl, and hits a similar throw-on-your-old-leather-jacket-and-thrash-in-a-dark-room sweet spot for me as the last track.
  • Horace Andy, “Come After Midnight” – I liked reggae legend Horace Andy’s earlier record this year, Midnight Rocker, but I love producer Adrian Sherwood’s rework of Midnight Scorchers, especially this moody, seductive lead-off track. Summoning up a late-night dispatch with the loneliness and urgency of a broadcast from a dying star.
  • Lustre, “Faith” – I’m late to the party on this ambient/atmospheric black metal band, but sole member Henrik Sunding was in a band I liked quite a bit, Hypothermia. And their new record, A Thirst for Summer Rain enraptured me from the first few notes, especially this lovely instrumental that sprays acidic guitars over beds of synths.
  • The Delines, “My Blood Bleeds The Darkest Blue” – I love the Delines just as much as I loved lead singer Amy Boone’s (Damnations TX) and principal songwriter Willy Vlautin’s (Richmond Fontaine) previous bands, which I didn’t think was possible, my ardor for those earlier groups was so strong. But every record has grown that passion for this band, and the new single The Lost Duets actually has their voices directly interacting with one another, so it took me to the moon. The splashes of trumpet and organ stabs like dust swirling in the afternoon sunlight are among the details that make this tune feel like a hand-chiseled window into a world we shouldn’t see.
  • Oakwalker, “Future Lover” – This Memphis band features the lush multi-tracked vocals of Victoria Dowdy (who also plays rhythm guitar) and co-writer/co-leader Ethan Baker’s violin with a swinging rhythm section of Graham Winchester on drums (who’s the secret weapon of what feels like most of Memphis these days, including Jack Oblivian and the Sheiks, The Turnstyles, Devil Train, and the stellar reunited Compulsive Gamblers Anne and I saw this year) and Tyler Marberry. This walked a similar line through the landscape of the bloodied but unbowed as the previous track, tipping a bit more toward hope for the future.
  • Plains, “Problem With It” – I’ve been a big fan of Katie Crutchfield’s Waxahatchee since Cerulean Salt but this collaboration, I Walked With You a Ways, was my first exposure to Jess Williamson. Another almost impossible choice of a song, but this loping rootsy tune about holding the people in our lives – and ourselves – to the right standard, scratched an itch down deep in me. That electric guitar solo – not sure if it’s Brad Cook or Alex Farrar – is in my personal hall of fame for concise solos that sum up the complicated emotions of the melody and lyric. “I drive fast on high alert past the Jet Pep and the Baptist church. On the county line, I’ll be a songbird softly heard, my loose change falling out. Got a heartbreak burn, take the quickest route on this four-lane highway. I’ll trace it in the clouds.”
  • First Aid Kit, “Out of My Head” – This second single from the Swedish folk duo’s stellar record Palomino weaves hints of shadowy drone through a nimble dance beat and sticky harmonies. “All my dreaming, all my trials – where they’ll lead, does it matter now?”
  • Dawn Richard and Spencer Zahn, “Umber” – I’m still getting over Second Line, last year’s record that helped cement Dawn Richard among my favorite current R&B singers (and the incendiary set at Big Ears this year), so this collaboration with friendly acquaintance Spencer Zahn (his band Father Figure crashed on my floor but I didn’t formally meet him until the next year’s Winter Jazzfest) was right up my alley. Zahn’s textured chamber jazz arrangements meld with Richard’s dynamic, nuanced voice and lyrics in a way that makes almost too much sense. Every track on Pigments is winning, but the shifting of foreground and background on this one kept calling to me when I tried to choose one.
  • Urban Elegance, “Midnight Flowers” – This homegrown collaboration unites Columbus heavyweights producer/electronic musician Storm9000 with bassist/former guitar maker to the stars Phil Maneri and harpist Trista Hill. It’s not only a great example of community in my town; I believe this collab was sparked by a meeting at my friend Scott Woods’ invaluable Streetlight Guild space.
  • Batts, “All That I Need” – Nightline, her sophomore record with project Batts was my first exposure to Melbourne singer-songwriter Tanya Batts, and it took my breath away. The crunching rhythm section, Brendan Tsui and Lachlan O’Kane augmented by slipper synths, rubs against the soft-focus light around the powerful vocal. “How you feeling, babe? Has it hit you yet? I can see the whole wide world. Let’s never forget how we feel right now.”
  • Illogic, “Passion Fruit” – Illogic was the first rapper in Columbus I was a big fan of, seeing him on stages around campus and making great records with killing producers like Blueprint, DJ PRZM, and Blockhead in the early ’00s. I lost track of his work for a few years but his new record The Transition not only finds him growing into maturity without being boring, it also finds him coming into his own as a beatmaker with warm, classic tracks that speak to today as much as they conjure nostalgia.
  • Scratcha DVA with Tribal Brothers, DJ Polo, and Nasty Jack, “Pull Up – Rhubarb and Custard Vocal” – I’ve been a big fan of British electronic musician Scratcha DVA since I first heard his work a few years ago and I’m pretty sure the person lending some excellent rhymes to this is Nasty Jack but I couldn’t find any additional information about this track. The sliding clatter of the beat and those low tones speaks to me, a Saturday night rager but also with some wistfulness shot through it.
  • Micah Schnabel, “Dirtbag” – Schnabel’s solo work has gotten deeper and knottier, more complex but lit by a brilliant blue flame. He plants a flag against the encroaching wave of homogenization and for the pleasures of community, of being there for the people you love and letting that include yourself. And he ties that to a pulsating groove (anchored here by Jason Winner on drums and Micah on bass) and a singalong chorus that reminds me of my pal Angela saying “Everything of theirs is an anthem,” over a decade ago. “You can ridicule my resume. I did not ask how you get paid. So tell me, how do you get paid?”
  • Labretta Suede and the Motel 6, “Teenagers Gettin’ High” – This New Zealand-bred but Dallas-based retro rock group are putting out one fizzy, swinging stomp after another, and this burst of greasy energy might be my favorite yet.
  • Los Carnash, “Borracho” – Another band I discovered doing research for the Mexico City trip and I think they were the one band we managed to see at the Sonido Necrotico show. A pummeling drummer and a charismatic screamer of a frontman power these short bursts of metal-flecked punk (but on the opposite end of the spectrum from metalcore) power.
  • Damjonboi, “Top Shelf” – Rising Detroit rapper and producer Damjonboi works an appealingly easy going flow, sliding between and around a menacing beat that laces electronic handclaps and stuttered hi-hats with piano stabs and slashing strings.
  • Mali Obomsawin, “Blood Quantum (Nəwewəčəskawikαpáwihtawα)” – Bassist, percussionist, and vocalist Mali Obomsawin, of the First Nation at Odanak, made a powerful statement of purpose, using jazz, the chants of her people (those she grew up with and the contemporary chants like the one underpinning this piece, co-written with Lokotah Sanborn and Carol Dana of the Penobscot Nation, and every other form available). A paean to the beauty and hopefulness in defiance, with a crushing rhythm section that finds Obomsawin partnered with drummer Savannah Harris and guitarist Miriam Elhaji and a brilliant horn section of Allison Burik on alto sax and bass clarinet, Noah Campbell on saxophones, and co-producer Taylor Ho Bynum on cornet and flugelhorn.
  • Jake Blount featuring Demeanor, “Give Up The World” – Jake Blount’s at the fore of the much-needed corrective movement of artists reclaiming the banjo and old time music, tying it to its African roots and telling stories that speak to the here and now in a way that’s both beautiful and refreshing. This year’s The New Faith, is his finest statement yet. On this track, Blount teams with rapper Demeanor (Rhiannon Giddens’ nephew), bassist Mali Oobomsawin, and guitarist/violinist/coproducer Brian Slattery for a record that’s as catchy as it is sharp. “We must leave this world behind.”
  • Julianna Riolino, “Isn’t It a Pity” – Toronto-based singer-songwriter Riolino works with more contemporary roots forms, ’70s Laurel Canyon and ’60s pop soul (that marvelous carnival/cocktail party organ from Thomas Hammerton, Anthony Ronaldi’s bari sax and the shattering, rising guitar solo from I suspect Daniel Romano but could be producer Aaron Goldstein) around her voice like that first bolt of light coming onto the frost-covered window with a great cup of coffee, and witty lyrics with a strong point of view but room for everything else in the world. “A wily old cadaver, a velvet swinging hammer, a windmill of a force is what keeps us both apart.”
  • Rhianna, “Lift Me Up” – Generally I’m on record as preferring the dance numbers – even, or especially, the minor key tension-filled ones – of Rhianna’s catalog, but she his this breathtaking ballad so far out of the park I keep playing it over and over again, slack-jawed. “Burning in a hopeless dream. Hold me when you go to sleep.”
  • Shy Martin, “Wish I Didn’t Know You” – Swedish singer-songwriter Shy Martin splits the difference of the last couple tracks in this spiderweb of a track, seemingly fragile but detailed and incredibly strong.
  • Sunny War, “No Reason” – Bringing the tempo up a little with this more direct anthem – that still doesn’t skimp on the complications of the world singer-songwriter Sunny War aims to reflect. One of the acts I was sorriest to miss at this year’s Nelsonville Music Festival and I’m kicking myself even harder with every song she puts out. “Don’t know you well but I can bet you did some things that you regret.”
  • Nora O’Connor, “Follow Me” – Nora O’Connor’s one of those voices I think of whenever I think of the Chicago country scene, one of the not-in-my-town scenes I gravitated toward first, from her work with The Blacks, Neko Case, Kelly Hogan, the Flat Five, Robbie Fulks, and Mavis Staples. But I get even more excited when there’s new solo work under her own name. “Follow Me” doesn’t disappoint; it’s an easygoing stroll through a sunset when you don’t necessarily know where you’re headed.
  • Seth Avett, “The Poet Game” – Another stroll through memories and an understanding of the way they point toward the future, as Avett brother Seth takes on one of my all time favorite songs as part of a tribute EP to one of the great songwriters, Seth Avett sings Greg Brown. It doesn’t reveal anything new about the song but the little pauses, the way he finds a middle ground between the phrasing of the original and his style of singing, works for me on every level. “I had a friend who drank too much and played too much guitar, and we sure got along. Reel-to-reels rolled across the country near and far, with letters, poems, and songs. But these days he don’t talk to me and he won’t tell me why; I miss him every time I hear his name. I don’t know what he’s doing or why our friendship died while we play the poet game.”
  • Alela Diane, “Dream a River” – From that first line, “I just returned to say goodbye,” over the circling acoustic guitar riff, this song stood out to be on Alela Diane’s consistently excellent Looking Glass album and when those strings come in, I’m transported. “I hear her silver bracelets down the hall. That, and the lingering cry of a song. Everything’s exactly as we left it but where’s the sun come through?”
  • Loraine James, “The Perception of Me (Crazy Nigger)” – The surge in interest in Julius Eastman, a tragically overlooked composer of the downtown scene in ’70s and ’80s New York, has been a blessing to chamber music lovers and to me personally. Phantom Limb’s stellar work assembling and releasing his work also extends into projects like this where electronic composer/producer Loraine James uses some of his most iconic pieces as a jumping off point. This revisioning takes the original piece, which I first heard on Unjust Malaise for four pianos, and removes the percussive part of the hypnotic movements, stretching it out, pulling it back, and working it for different types of keyboard while retaining both its beautiful and its raging, powerful defiance.
  • Mavis Staples, “If It Be Your Will” – I always end with something that feels to me like a prayer and this is both one of the best examples of that form in a pop song, Leonard Cohen’s original closer from Various Positions, given a definitive reading by one of the great American voices. Blue Note’s stellar all-around tribute record to Cohen, Here It Is finds Larry Klein assembling an all-star core band of Bill Frisell (whose chiming guitar comping is crucial to the atmosphere throughout), the rhythm section of Kevin Hays on piano, Scott Colley on bass, and Nate Smith on drums (who fit together so perfectly, especially the drifting clouds of Smith’s brushwork here), longtime Frisell collaborator Greg Leisz on pedal steel, and Immanuel Wilkins on saxophone (following, teasing out the textures in Staples’ read on the song). It’s a perfect track on one of the few great-all-the-way-through tribute albums. Thank you all, as always, for taking this trip with me.
Categories
Playlist record reviews

Playlist – August 2022

Almost as late as last month with some internet issues and work travel, but happy to finally be submitting this in Memphis as I also compile some notes at the midway point of a really stellar Gonerfest. Love to you all, and thank you all for listening and reading. Enjoy these first days of fall as we all dance on the cusp.

https://tidal.com/browse/playlist/d01499fd-af20-41e5-b09d-03e48f0dc74a

  • Call Me Rita, “Measure Twice, Cut Once” – This barn burner is my favorite track yet out of artist Vanessa Jean Speckman’s rock and roll project Call Me Rita, assembling a who’s who of Columbus rootsy rock superheroes in the service of a ferocious, all out rocker. Drummer Jason Winner and Todd May on bass and backing vocals power this train with Jay Gasper’s lead guitar and surprising, delightful bursts of synth skidding over Micah Schnabel’s slashing rhythm and backing vocals. “The creditors keep calling me. How much more can I bleed? I’m taking my autonomy.”
  • Lee Bains + The Glory Fires, “Post-Life” – I liked the Dexateens and I was really impressed with Lee Bains’ solo band when I saw them at Woodlands a couple years before the pandemic but it didn’t prepare me for how much I love their new record Old-Time Folks and how utterly blown away I was seeing them at Rumba a few weeks ago. An electrifying dance through the fire that reminded me of everything I love about a four piece rock and roll band: controlled fury, deep grooves, and more than a little hip shaking, with shout outs to the SCLC and the incisive puncturing of old lies and snake oil pitches as the icing on the cake. “It’ll rip your soul from your cooking, the home place from your voice, and the thunder from your songs. It’ll sell you back the bootlegs, stare at you with dead, flickering eyes, like it didn’t do nothing wrong.”
  • Bobby Previte, “HUNTER (remix)” – Drummer/composer Bobby Previte is riding a new wave of creativity and productivity lately and my favorite of the recent records is Nine Tributes (For Electric Band) with each track paying tribute to a guitarist he’s played with over the years. The centerpiece of this band, taking on the daunting challenge of inhabiting/paying tribute to these guitarists without doing an impression and exceeding my wildest expectations, is my friend since childhood, guitarist Mike Gamble, with the quartet filled out by Akron native Kurt Kotheimer who sounds like he was born to play with Previte, an extremely simpatico hookup; and interesting textures from keyboardist/reeds player Michael Kammers. I had a hard time picking a track off this, but I kept coming back to this loving take on Charlie Hunter’s approach. The band captures the ebuillance and greasy swing that’s made Hunter so beloved without giving up any of themselves in that take.
  • shark, “Torpedos in Leather” – My pal Ginny Riot is as good a barometer as quality as I’ve found in Columbus and we all know I have a few. While I was first introduced to her through her acoustic work, when I heard she was playing drums in a new outfit, shark, it shot to the top of my list to checkout. Within a song and a half of Anne and I seeing them at Rumba, they were my new favorite Columbus band and looking around the room I knew enough people dancing that I wasn’t alone. This track, with Ginny’s drumming and vocals in a sea of surging, grinding guitars from Hugh Man and Professor Zac Glickman is a snarling reminder of everything I come to rock and roll for, reminding me of The Cramps and the Gun Club and Twin Guns and Daddy Long Legs, but it’s own thing.
  • Ibibio Sound Machine, “Protection From Evil” – London’s Ibibio Sound Machine gripped me by the collar immediately and they’ve only gotten better. Eno Williams’ voice and powerhouse seven-piece band get an added assist from Hot Chip’s Joe Goddard and Al Doyle on additional keyboards and NYC techno legend Peter Matson on drum programming on this party track for the ages. I’m looking forward to finally seeing them live with Anne in New York in October.
  • Bad Bunny, “Tití Me Preguntó” – My pal (and former coworker) Mary turned me onto the new Bad Bunny record. His work before Un Verano Sin Ti I enjoyed select singles from but didn’t delve into a whole album but this hit at exactly the right time. The way he slides over the dembow rhythm on this track, the synthetic handclaps and sewing-machine drums sparking against the quavering synth, and his voice sliding from singing to rapping. It’s collared shirt dance club music, late enough on a hot night the breeze is reminding you this season won’t last forever.
  • Tonton Pal, “Furu” – A similar dance club track that makes me want to sweat but in a full suit. The flow of this Senegalese rapper has a give and take that makes everything feel alive, just a little improvisational.
  • Amber Mark, “On & On” – Another artst who’s earlier work didn’t grab me but either my ears got a little more open or the songs got a little sharper or both, because when I finally sat down with Amber Mark’s Three Dimensions Deep, she rose to the ranks of my favorite R&B singers. This song works an unhurried rhythm that’s part cat and mouse and part liquid anticipation, draped in sharp, glittering strings; the perfect showcase for the laser-precise longing she captures in her voice. A new 3 a.m. classic. “I’ve never been more confused; my confidence won’t come through. Lost so much it’s hard to tell what’s fake and what’s myself.”
  • Allison Russell featuring Brandi Carlile, “You’re Not Alone” – The creator of one of my favorite records of last year returns with this dazzling rework from a song Russell originally brought to the underappreciated (sadly, including by me) Our Native Daughters supergroup recast as a duet with Brandi Carlile. The kind of reminder we all need that we’re interconnected and we’re more than our pain and our damage. Those voices alone would put my heart in a vice grip, the surprising, tumbling arrangement for strings by Sista Strings, sends it into outer space. “Wish that I could keep you from sorrow and harm; none of us is here for long, but you’re not alone.”
  • Cole Swindell, “She Had me at Heads Carolina” – As contemporary country music has appropriated recent-past hip-hop and R&B tropes with greater and lesser degrees of artfulness, we’re seeing more sophisticated blending. This caught my eye on a bar jukebox on a sunny afternoon – and I loved everything about it. In a sober light the next day, I was still delighted. First, I love those first couple of Jo Dee Messina records, those songs felt like a cool breeze off coming over a frequently arid landscape – especially “Heads Carolina, Tails California,” her first single, written by Tim Nichols and Mark Sanders – so it hit the nostalgia bullseye it seems like Swindell’s aiming for with the end of his chorus, “She’s a ’90s country fan, like I am.” But the interpolation of the original melody – with the clever use of autotune’s uncanny sheen – and the sampling of Messina’s original as a harmony and texture underlines the way memory and nostalgia draw a lot of us like moths to that flame and the transitory, ephemeral nature of it. “I bought her a round and we talked till the lights came on. I still see that girl every time I hear that song.”
  • Country Rio featuring Tony Grvis, Dusty & Stones, Ervis Guerrero, Daniel Estampida, Orozco, Hunter Leite, and Chisum Cattle, “Neon Life” – The Mexican band Country Rio brings in an international supporting cast for this posse cut soaked in grim determination, including African country duo Dusty & Stones, Texas compatriots Chisum Cattle, and Argentinian Daniel Estampida Orozco. The steady march, led by a rolling banjo line, underlines the underlying grief and loneliness of the life they’re singing about but the mix of voices reminds us of the community and warmth that are found there if you’re willing to open yourself up to it.
  • Ruby Amanfu, “Make It Better” – Shining light on another facet of Nashville, Ghana-born Ruby Amanfu gets deeper and more interesting on every record I hear. This song feels like the end of summer for me, that search for comfort in someone but with an edge, a chill seeping in around the edges.
  • Ashley Paul featuring Otto Wilberg and Yoni Silver, “Shivers” – I met Ashley Paul through the above-mentioned Mike Gamble when we were all in college and, even then, her approach to the saxophone caught me off guard. That appreciation has deepened over the years, as she’s dug deeper into interests in installations and the human voice. There’s a rich, velvety melancholy throughout her stunning new record, I Am Fog, featuring Paul on voice, percussion, sax, and clarinet, backed by Wilberg’s bass and voice and Yoni Silver’s bass clarinet and viola. Had a hard time choosing a track from this, but I kept being drawn to “Shivers” like a moth to a flame.
  • Tarbaby featuring Oliver Lake, “House of Leaves” – I think I first saw the great reeds player Oliver Lake a few years before the meeting I describe in the previous blurb, in High School at our Jazz and Rib Fest, and when I was 21 with the World Saxophone Quartet. Both sets took the top of my head off and I started buying records just based on Lake’s presence, which, of course, introduced me to more artists than I could name. I think I found the collective trio Tarbaby because I’d already been turned around by drummer Nasheet Waits’ volcanic work with Jason Moran and was tentatively getting into pianist Orrin Evans and bassist Eric Revis (both of whom I’m a massive fan of), but my favorite work of the trio adds the voice of Oliver Lake. Dance of the Evil Toys is an extension and expansion of their beautiful collaboration. This sinewy track exemplifies the joys of the record, Lake’s snaking saxophone line cracking and scorching the delicate color fields of the rest of the group.
  • Mark Turner Quartet, “Return From The Stars” – Another favorite saxophonist who hit my radar more recently, Mark Turner has been setting my world – at least – on fire. His newest ECM record, inspired by the writing of Stanislaw Lem (another favorite of mine going back to high school), of which this is the title track, features remarkable interplay with his melodic foil, trumpeter Jason Palmer (those gleaming, braided lines in the introduction knock me all the way out) and the subtle, empathetic rhythm section of bassist Joe Martin and drummer Jonathan Pinson.
  • Jacob Garchik, “Collage” – One of my favorite trombone players, Garchik’s writing caught my attention with his work with the Kronos Quartet and especially his trombone choir The Heavens. The new record, Assembly, pairs him with soprano sax master Sam Newsome and rhythm section of pianist Jacob Sacks, bassist Thomas Morgan, and drummer Dan Weiss. The collisions and disjunctions in these tunes, especially the one I chose, are as important as the beauty of the melodies and the moments of sublime synchronicity. It almost amplifies Garchik’s leanings toward the cinematic – check out his recent Guy Madden film scores – with a depth of field in the way the instruments fall together.
  • Thick, “Tell Myself” – This grimy trio out of the New York diy scene straddles the line between class of 77 punk and shimmery powerpop in exactly the right amounts. An irrepressible rhythm section meant to cause a riot in the middle of a dance party or vice versa with Shari Page on drums (that break at the end makes me want to leap out of my skin) and Kate Black on bass, buoying and jostling Nikki Sisti’s guitar with everyone singing. It doesn’t get much better than this, one of the bands I’m most looking forward to seeing live. “Used to talk about getting old; can’t believe all the lies we told then.”
  • Dead Horses, “Days Grow Longer” – This gorgeous, frayed lament speckled with faith and hope that things can get better, is one of the highlights from Brady Street, the new full length from Milwaukee’s Dead Horses, principally a partnership between Sarah Vos and Daniel Wolff.  “I miss LA and the twin cities and the open road laid bare in front of me. East and west across the continent, baptized by dissidents. Days grow longer now, we’ll move on, move on somehow.”
  • Rachel Sumner, “Strangers Again” – I spent a lot of time in Boston for a few years when my pal Mike Gamble was going to college then and fell in love with the singer-songwriter scene, at the time hovering around the pillars of Dar Williams and Bill Morrissey. Rachel Sumner carries that torch – or at least what I thought that torch looked like as a kid – on the beautiful Rachel Sumner and Traveling Light. This Gillian Welch/David Rawlings cover gets a bone-deep, empathetic, full-throated read, highlighted by Alex Formento’s pedal steel and Kate Wallace’s fiddle.
  • Matt Nathanson, “Beginners” – Another song that hit my radar because of Lori McKenna, who co-wrote it with Hilary Lindsey and Nathanson. The name was familiar to me because of a long-ago friend, Ann Dotzauer, who was a huge fan of Matt Nathanson in college or right after (she called him Matty Nay but I’m not sure if that was an accepted fan umbrella or something she coined). I had a record that didn’t completely click with me but it was nice revisiting those memories as I dug into his new one, Boston Accent. Butch Walker continues to prove himself the ideal producer for this kind of laid back singer-songwriter, giving the sound world enough definition and teeth, but (as a great songwriter himself) without changing the fundamental character of the song. That sliding, “Walk on the Wild Side”-ish bass caught my ears immediately and the rest of this burnished, acoustic slow jam about the seductive charms of memory and how close it is to death, reminded me of Kim Richey songs I loved in my 20s and burrowed right under my skin. “Used to get lost in the songs that I used to sing, used to get caught in the rush. Used to burn bright, used to fill the sky. I used to never get enough.”
  • Deejay Telio, “Bon Appétit” – This track from Angolan rapper Deejay Telio feels to me like it’s dancing on  the same sensual remembering axis as the Sumner and the Nathanson and that’s a mood that feels explicitly tailored for the end of the summer. The little guitar hooks and slippery mix of synthetic and organic percussion layer up to build that mood without every distracting from Telio’s voice.
  • Jesse Baylin, “That’s the Way” – I hear a little of that same twang of hope and desire in this perfectly crafted neo-honky tonk side from Jesse Baylin that could have fit perfectly in the early ’80s tug of war between sparkling shirts and fritzy neon signs with a rollicking piano lick getting it rolling and a whirlwind of hand claps and tambourine, around a stellar vocal, smooth but with an undeniable kick you’ll be finding flavors in for days. “Blows a kiss and it knocks me down – my heart skips a beat when it comes around. It tastes like freedom in a cherry crush. Gives me a reason, gives me all that stuff.”
  • Keith Jarrett, “Part III” – I never want to make too much of someone’s work immediately prior to a health crisis and understood in retrospect. But I will say, the examples of Keith Jarrett’s last tour before the massive strokes that have stopped his piano playing (maybe for good) show what an astonishing level he was performing at. I’m just starting to live with it but I might love Bordeaux Concert more than the earlier two, Budapest Concert and Munich 2016. This excerpt – thank you, ECM – drives home one of my favorite parts of a Jarrett show, especially solo: the sense of going along with the current, being bounced by the waves, then finding yourself in this space where you notice every note, you see melodies formed out of air into perfect crystals, that form into a structure within the structure and then disappear again. This is a lovely reminder of what a keen melodist Jarrett is, without sacrificing any of the more complex, intricate harmonies, what a lifetime of love for the piano and the history of piano music can drive you to if you’re lucky enough to stay engaged (and have a lot of other luck besides).
  • Harlan T. Bobo, “Must Be in Memphis” – Another beautiful look back, soaked in love for music and the world, though that’s about as far as I’m going to go with my comparison between Harlan T. Bobo, crown prince of the Memphis garage-rock scene currently living in France, and one of the great virtuosos of my lifetime. After hearing Bobo’s left hand had damage from lupus, I doubted I’d ever get another of his great, wry records bursting with big arrangements that were the result of deep friendships. And when I heard the new one, Porch Songs, was an intimate solo acoustic venture, my outsized joy at new Harlan T. Bobo songs was tempered with “Well, it’s what he had to do…” But Porch Songs undid all those biases with 13 of the best songs he’s ever written, reminding me he’s still the champion of seeing all the sides of frequently fucked up life and finding a way to make that picture beautiful without hiding or obscuring any of it. I hope I get to see one of his less frequent shows – Anne and I still talk about that Gonerfest set that calmed a rowdy crowd into attentiveness. “We crashed a big party, we drank all their whiskey, we wrote most of this song in the pool. I stripped off my breeches and I sat on the hostess; hell, no one around here cares what you do. I learned that this guitar could float but my guitarist, he don’t. We could drink underwater, it’s true. I’m feeling my best but acting my worst. Lord, I must be in Memphis tonight.”
  • Duke Deuce featuring Quavo and GloRilla, “Just Say That (Remix)” – Rising Memphis rapper Duke Deuce teams up with fellow Bluff City native GloRilla and Quavo from Migos for this piano driven adrenaline journey ready to burn the liars and imitators out of the system.
  • The Comet is Coming, “Code” – I saw The Comet is Coming a few years ago at a Winter Jazzfest and it was my first taste of Shabaka Hutchings live. A fireball of a power trio – Hutching’s saxophone backed with Betamax Killer (Maxwell Hawlett) on drums and Danalogue the Conquerying (Dan Leavens) on keys – this advance single from their upcoming Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam is another powerful groove, loaded with nuance and surprise.
  • Kokoroko, “Soul Searching” – Great friend Andrew Patton turned me onto Could We Be More, the debut full length by this London-based afrobeat and highlife band and it’s another example of him never steering me wrong. The eight piece band takes a lighter touch and incorporates some breezier textures into this four minute instrumental, with Ayo Salawu’s drums and Onome Edgeworth’s percussion dancing like light on the river of Duane Atherley’s bass line, lifted toward the sky on the intertwining lines of Sheila Maurice-Grey’s trumpet, Cassie Kinoshi’s sax, and Richie Seivwright’s trombone.
  • Meridian Brothers and El Grupo Renacimiento, “Poema del salsero resentido” – Bogota-based Eblis Álvarez’s Meridian Brothers project, known for fusions of electronic music and rock, collaborates with an imaginary salsa band for this eponymous record. He uses a New York-based form from the past to cast a light on very contemporary concerns and preoccupations in a way that honors the groove and subverts it at the same time, in a way that reminds me of a lot of Quantic’s best work.
  • Pillow Boy, “Once I Became One of Those” – Brad Swiniarski’s long been a stealth – or at least “in the know” – candidate for best songwriter in Columbus. Working in bands and, often, behind the drum kit live, he never got the immediate accolades of more self-aggrandizing candidates, but his songs for acts like Bob City and The Means have given me as much joy as anyone to walk the streets of the town I love so much (even when it pisses me off). This record I think (because I couldn’t find a lot of detail) is a frayed disco tune, its undeniable groove riddled with scorch marks and dents, and an excoriating dissection of the interior life of a character.
  • Closet Mix, “My Appeal to Heaven” – Another of my favorite songwriters in Columbus, Paul Nini, though he’s better known than Brad with years of leading the great band Log, putting out records under his own name, and getting the “Ladies and Gentlemen, Mr. Paul Nini” shout out on Great Plains’ enduring classic “Letter to a Fanzine.” His newest project Closet Mix, with his brother Chris Nini on keys, Keith Novicki on guitar, and Dan Della Flora on drums, doesn’t record much but everything they’ve put out so far is a gem. This mix of jangle and mystery is aided by some excellent horn work from my pal Fred Gablick (long of Honk Wail and Moan) on reeds and New Basics Brass Band leader Tim Perdue on trumpet and writing the arrangement.
  • Julia Wolfe & Sō Percussion, “Forbidden Love” – Julia Wolfe might be my favorite current composer working in classical forms. Her triumvirate – with David Lang and Michael Gordon – Bang on a Can, was hugely influential on dilettante me in college when I was finding all this new chamber music that didn’t make sense but deeply resonated with me. And a New Amsterdam records showcase during CMJ at Le Poisson Rouge where I got to see one of her pieces in person, fully aware it was her, Lad for nine bagpipes (in this case, one live and the rest on tracks) was one of those physically almost overpower moments where I said “I’ve never heard anything like this” at the same time it’s making all these connections in my head – to Rothko, to Ayler, to Richard Serra – and I went looking for any record with her name on it. For the decade since that show, the strategy has continued to pay dividends, with Anthracite Fields, Steel Hammer, Fire in My Mouth. And this new, beguiling piece, pairs her with one fo my favorite percussion groups but assigns them the traditional string quartet format of two violins, viola, and cello, for an expansive meditation on an American mythology that humanizes it in a way I find incredibly moving.
  • Bonnie Raitt, “Down The Hall” – That flurry of warm strings and tones that end the Wolfe seemed to relate – at least in my head – to this striking closing track from Bonnie Raitt’s terrific record Just Like That… This song tells the story of an inmate trying to be with his fellow prisoners as they’re dying in a sort of atonement, with a power, understated vocal by Raitt backed only by her crystalline acoustic guitar and Glenn Patscha’s B-3. “I sit and wait outside his stall, to help him when he’s done. Whatever shame we might have felt, well, that’s all come undone.”
  • Armen Donelian, “Fresh Start” – This gorgeous title track from a new trio record matching pianist Donelian with bassist Jay Anderson and drummer Dennis Mackrel had a similar sense of story telling to me as the previous two tracks, and a warmth that seemed to resonate against its predecessors and here and the couple of songs that come after it. Donelian’s touch alone is breathtaking but the sympathy of the trio together is what keeps me coming back.
  • Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, “I Just Came Home to Count the Memories” – And talking about “gorgeous,” John Anderson’s early ’80s recording of this Glenn Ray tune set a bar for that when I was a child and, expectedly, Welch and Rawlings find every nuance in the loneliness of the text and the implicit hope in the way the character is still breathing and still choosing to stop by, the unspoken confirmation that they’ve got a future ahead along with the painful past they’re staring down right now. “That little Johnson boy from down the road was asking if the kids could come and play. Lord, I wish I could have told them yes, but I just said ‘I guess, son, not today.'”
  • Jim Lauderdale, “Lightning Love” – I like everything Jim Lauderdale does but most of my favorite work of his finds him playing with classic country music tone and texture and his new record Game Changer is rich with exactly that sweet spot of his writing and supple vocals.  Tommy Detamore’s pedal steel provides almost orchestral accompaniment around a tight rhythm section. “Holding on to what we’ve got that’s sent from up above. Sunshine, wild skies, deep in your eyes – lightning love struck us.”
  • Nicki Bluhm, “Feel” – Nicki Bluhm, best known for her work with the mostly-acoustic Grumblers, opens up her sound and reminds me of her alacrity for singing all kinds of material on her new one Avondale Drive. The horn (courtesy of the great Karl Denson)-and-organ dappled subtle groove on this soul song, and her transitions from clipped, rhythm phrasing into an open-hearted croon, made it an immediate favorite of mine. “Sometimes I wonder can I ever change?”
  • Julia Jacklin, “Love, Try Not to Let Go” – Another track in a subtle soul vein that also fits my macro-tendency to end with a song I can think of as a benediction or a prayer. Laurie Torres’ drums and the piano line (either Jacklin herself or Ben Whiteley) encompass a whole world of hope and drifting, and the low-key vocal on the verses to the hyper-controlled burst of the chorus, keep me coming back. “The echo of that party the night I lost my voice; the silence that surrounds it no longer feels like a choice. I need you to believe me, when I say I find it hard to keep myself from floating away.”