Tzadik: Search & Destroy

There really is a Jewish conspiracy!

(joke)

But Zorn's sax playing really does suck.

I also hate the pompous uniform design of Tzadik releases. Who's the *genius* that thinks it's "avant-garde" to place light-coloured font over metallic paper on the 'New Japan' series, thus rendering the entire thing completely unreadable?

Oh, and 'New Japan' is a silly, lazy moniker as well.

This is excellent. Sometimes it's jazz in a fairly straight ahead way, sometimes it's more modern classical (usually with a downton NYC sort of feel), with melodies and harmonies that often seem like they would work in pop. I hear things that remind me of Steve Reich, Joan LaBarbara (although mostly her vocal technique is pretty standard), maybe Bjork? Even Shiina Ringo, though I don't want to say it, because I'm sure any resemblance there is strictly coincidental. There's also someone else (I think) doing Persian classical vocals in a couple places. I certainly find it more interesting than most of Zorn's own Jewish tinge recordings. The biggest drawback (for me) might turn out to be that it tends to be a very theatrical sort of recording, which I find tends to wear out more quickly for me. The lyrics are all from the Songs of Songs (sung in the Hebrew) and I think the theatrical tone of the music comess out of the way the original text is written as a dialogue. But it's very good and after a few listens, I'm still feeling I need to listen several times to get a better handle on it, which isn't to say it's inaccessible, just fairly rich.

not destroy so much as, well, just kinda uneven: the two milford graves solo records. both have their moments, particularly "transcendence" on grand unification. but too much of the material sounds unfocused, nowhere near the impact of his esp-disk with sunny morgan.

So are any of these Radical Jewish Culture series discs I keep seeing any good?

Yes. Let me just add that I love Tzadik. Whenever I don't have anything to listen to I look up what's at Tzadik. The tribute to Marc Bolan is one of the best tribute albums I've ever heard.

Erik Friedlander's installment of the Book of Angels is on my to-buy list.

the New Klezmer Trio discs are great...

this thread is too large to read all, but...

- George Lewis- Voyager
- Barbez- Force of Light (saw them last week and was blown away)
- any of the Painkiller records
- Yosunao Tone- Songs for Wounded CD
- any of the Zeena Parkins records

and there are so many more good ones that i can't think of off the top of my head.

Otomo Yoshihide New Jazz Ensemble Dreams is a good one - kind of noir-lounge jazz with plaintive vocals by Japanese singers Phew and Togawa Jun - with some interesting touches, like the sine waves provided by Sachiko M - covering tunes by Asa-Chang & Junray and Jim O'Rourke.

hmm, i'll have to check out that one. i had an intense love affair with asa-chang & jun-ray a few years ago.

So has anyone heard the new Book of Angels? Mycale? It looks super amazing, it has Ayelet Rose Gottlieb and Basya Schecter (ie: Pharoah's Daughter) singing on it. I don't see any instruments on the personal list, so it might all be vocal, which is awesome. Too bad no Jewlia Eisenberg, tho :(

Saw Zorn tonight, bitchin show.

what kind of thing is he doing these days? The last time I saw him was a show at Tonic w/Ribot, Medeski, and ben perowsky and it unexpectedly turned out to be almost entirely straight gutbucket preachy soul jazz. I guess i have a hard time even imagining what Zorn 2010 plays out like

he seems to be enjoying his faux-naive easy-listening jazz these days (via his dreamers project), but it comes across as a bit too cynical to have he same charm as, say, vince guaraldi or bill wells.

it's probably the first phase of zorn's career to have zero appeal for me, tbh.

http://nyufasp.com/2012/10/watch-live-stream-of-save-the-village-starting-at-730pm/

anton brühin and koichi makigami's "electric eel" is a long time favourite. jaw harps & buzzing & gibbering. gets cosmic.
sajjanu's "pechiku!!" is tangled anti-rock slapstick beefhearty twang action with thee most intermittent rockingest stop start interludes if they go on a riff for 10 seconds it seems like an eternity, and it always seems like the best riff you never heard. goofy cross-eyed genius. monster tension release dialogue in this.

http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_250/MI0003/481/MI0003481561.jpg

gorgeous

holy crap this track "pale of settlement" is insanely good. total klezmer-riff blizzards

search: jacques coursil, minimal brass. fucking astounding.

^ this. Brilliant record, one of the best of the decade (and it comes after a 37-year recording hiatus!)

Metheny does Masada on its way ...

lotta tzadik reviews on freejazz-stef lately:

http://www.freejazzblog.org/

http://c3.cduniverse.ws/resized/250x500/music/145/8892145.jpg
Anthony Coleman - The End of Summer.
Listened to this a lot lately, very somber and sad music about loss, very beautifully performed and with lots of Morton Feldman and Scelsi influences, but Coleman's compositions have their own voice. Very much recommended.

http://c3.cduniverse.ws/resized/250x500/music/845/8837845.jpg
Phantom Orchard Orchestra - Trouble in Paradise
The duo of Zeena Parkins and Ikue Mori, augmented with five players (two of them are Parkins' sisters). Stand-out track is the 10-minute 'Red, Blue and Green', which sounds as a through-composed piece rather than improvised as most of the other material.

http://c3.cduniverse.ws/resized/250x500/music/317/7900317.jpg
Rob Burger - City of Strangers
Sounds like a Tin Hat album and as good as one.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZipYpex68tg/UZs78-OuFAI/AAAAAAAANlU/ehsLEG4mGgI/s200/cover.jpg
Pat Metheny - Book of Angels Volume 20: Tap
This will come as a surprise to PM's fans, but less so for those who know the BoA series, for whom this is just another cd in the series. There's nothing wrong with this cd, but I wish this was a group affair like his latest Quartet-cd, rather than an immensely overdubbed recording where Metheny plays almost every instrument (except for the drums).

http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_250/MI0000/422/MI0000422055.jpg?partner=allrovi.com
Morton Feldman - Patterns in a Chromatic Field
Feldman goes jump-cut style! Ok, less radical than Zorn's own compositions, but still...new ideas are introduced and abandoned every few minutes, and the mood is always changing. Challenging music, and long...the disc is over 80 minutes but very enjoyable (ok I'm a Feldman fan, so I'm happy with everything he did).

http://www.israbox.com/uploads/posts/2013-03/1364677772_front.jpg
John Zorn - Filmworks XXV: City of Slaughter
As mentioned above, Zorn's latest Filmworks-cd, consisting of only solo piano music. Interesting not only for Zorn's own piano playing, but also for a beautiful version of 'Beyond the Infinite' by Rob Burger.

Is that Metheny very new? I've never seen it before, but I haven't checked in with Tzadik for a while. Thanks for the updates.

yes, the Metheny-cd was released this month.

i love the city of slaughter - also of new stuff i really like the carlebach/fela kuti crossover zion80 album from jon madoff, and i'm greatly anticipating the metal album from deveykus coming out soonish

I have to review the Metheny disc for Jazziz, even though from what I've heard it is not in any way a jazz album.

PM's fans will know not to be too surprised by anything, surely.

Anyway, "Metheny plays Zorn" is basically the ultimate bait for me. (I LOVE The Gnostic Preludes feat Frisell and expect this will be every bit as good.) The iTunes clips sound promising. This is definitely going to be my next purchase.

have to review the Metheny disc for Jazziz, even though from what I've heard it is not in any way a jazz album.

Predictably, I love it, except for the last track. I can see it becoming my favourite album from this year. (Colin Stetson's the other contender right now.)

i'm working on one of the Zorn @ 60 shows; he's doing a "purely improvisational" session with Ryuichi Sakamoto in October.

Is he doing as big a series of shows as the @50 series?

yeah, internationally.
http://www.lincolncenterfestival.org/zorn-60/
https://www.barbican.org.uk/music/event-detail.asp?ID=14834
http://www.lepoissonrouge.com/event_attributes/zorn60/
http://fimav.qc.ca/en/edition/john-zorn-60/