At the Mountains of Madness: Tzadik Records catalog now streaming

I'm guessing they just missed it or it's under some random name

It's not possible to search Tidal by label at all. I remember the label search function on Spotify being a pain to use, but I wonder what it would turn up.

That's how I found a lot of this stuff but have not seen that particular one

I'm also digging Charles Curtis and Aleck Karis's 2004 recording of Morton Feldman's Patterns In A Chromatic Field. Spotify is currently crediting it to just Morton Feldman and John Zorn, so hopefully that gets fixed at some point. Compared to other recordings I've heard, this one is relatively dry (close-mic'd) and high-energy. Just beautiful, will surely be going back to it a lot as I explore other Tzadik stuff.

I imported this disc to iTunes and the track was labeled as 'Mental pertubation" by the database.

First up is The Days Run Away by Peter Garland, a quiet haunting minimal work for solo piano, kind of like Satie if nothing ever happened, ambient and pretty.

This is a great cd and it has been sequenced masterfully. It flows great and the last two short pieces are almost like an encore.

I wonder who plays what sounds like bass clarinet on the penultimate track on the Medeski Martin & Wood record, not credited and that one's a gem.

At this point I'm starting to wonder if there are *any* outright duds among these 900 albums.

Doubtful, probably just styles you're not interested in. I've bailed out of a couple that were too heavy on free jazz skronk or super minimal long-form electroacoustic drone (like the Jim O'Rourke record).

Now playing the first New Masada Quartet studio record and it's predictably great.

that's pretty much what I'm doing as well, cutting anything that is too abrasive or too abstract and meandering, but that is turning out to be a smaller portion of these albums than I would have expected

The Days Run Away by Peter Garland

This is lovely stuff. The title track shows how far just a couple of chords can take you. Don't know why, reminds me of some ECM stuff.

Agreed! I was really into about half of this Zoh Amba record, a very young saxophonist with Joey Baron and Zorn in the group. The less screechy parts have some really entrancing mantra-like free playing, her tone kind of reminds me of Alabaster DePlume (that shaky vibrato) but much bigger. It's an especially good-sounding record too.

I've also remembered that my favorite kind of Masada tune is the one based around an endless bass vamp (like the opening track here), wish there were more of those. But 'rubato Masada' and 'insanely fast walking bassline madness' have their merits too.

xp

One thing that's a little surprising is that I haven't seen a single musician post on social media to say "hey you can finally listen to this album." I wonder if some of them even know? But a lot of jazz musicians aren't particularly active on instagram etc, except to post tour dates or whatever.

Shh, don't tell them, maybe Zorn doesn't know.

I do a "tzadik catalog now streaming" search every day to see what, if anything, the music press is saying about this, and yesterday saw some Instagram promotion from Toby Driver about his/Kayo Dot's releases.

Zion 80 - Book of Angels vol 22: Afrobeat x Masada tunes is a cute idea, but I don't really like it came out (as in, how they're playing it and how it sounds, lol).

The Taborn/McBride/Sorey album is deep and great (although the ride cymbal sound is super distracting to me, TS is playing all this shit but you literally only hear the click of the stick on the cymbal, with almost no actual cymbal sound).

Ok I think I'm a little Tzadik-ed out for the moment, at least as far as spelunking on my own.

Here are my playlists if anyone's interested:
https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0aLUT87Nr5gnfVHF19lonF?si=0f26c09a13574f23

https://open.spotify.com/playlist/0sXTfsMSzmaCL5HhYgof2c?si=4a77f78609774db9

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/05/arts/music/tzadik-music-streaming.html

I really wish there were an easy (instant) way to know who was playing on most of this stuff. "Quatrain," for example, is afaict credited to Zorn, not just on Spotify but on the Tzadik site itself, so you have to dig deeper to even know it is a guitar duo album featuring Gyan Riley and Julian Lage.

Working on a list of my own for this month's Stereogum column, more focused on the jazz-oriented releases (lots of Wadada, the Anthony Braxton/William Parker/Milford Graves disc, etc., etc.).

I went back and listened to Zubi Zuva, the a cappella group led by the Ruins guy. I’m tempted to vote dud on this one. A cappella zeuhl is not a terrible idea and the enthusiasm is sweet but these guys don’t really have the vocal chops to pull it off.

https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/05/arts/music/tzadik-music-streaming.html

― Josh in Chicago, Thursday, October 5, 2023 6:18 PM

Anybody got a gift link to spare for this one?

One sec ...

This should work:

https://archive.ph/S5VYU

Not much there, really mostly just a recommendation of 10 places to start, which is to say, 10 random records out of hundreds, but maybe a good representation? You be the judge!

zubi zuva is great, with vocal chops it would sounds awful

I really wanted to like it, since I love most of Yoshida's projects, but apart from a few moments, its kind of tiring to listen to for me.

Been a really long time, but I'm listening to (the original) "Bar Kokhba" right now. Still great! I love how Zorn has written/recorded/released stuff at the far edges of extremity, and yet, has also been responsible for stuff I could safely gift my in-laws.

I listened to Otomo Yoshihide's New Jazz Ensemble album Dreams the other day. I think that one's a keeper. It kind of spans the two extremes of noise and approachability. On some tracks you could imagine a Japanese chanteuse serenading a sparse crowd of pickled salary men in a smoky cabaret club, with the buzzing of the sine-wave generator almost mistakable for the buzz of an ungrounded microphone. But then on other tracks, all hell breaks loose with full-on skronk and screaming.

Zohara - Scorched Lips is very good, a moody take on Jewish music full of very original compositions and top-notch musicianship. Zahava Seewald has a fantastic voice.

Does anyone know if any of those Bagatelles box sets are up for streaming, or the Beri'ah book box?

I don't think the bagatelles are there. The book beri'ah ones are but split into the individual discs.

I enjoyed Misha Mengelberg's Senne Sing Song yesterday. It's pretty laid-back for a Tzadik joint. It doesn't really break a lot of new ground for Mengelberg. Nine of his compositions, many if not all of which he has recorded before, in his Monkish post-bop style, though it gets a bit freer on the solos, in a congenial trio with frequent Zorn collaborators Greg Cohen and Ben Perowsky. Very pleasant.

Listening to Eyvind Kang - The Yelm Sessions. Very nice cinematic orchestral pieces.

Bummer that the Hemophiliac record isn't available, it's way up there for me as far as successful examples of Mori/Zorn/Patton doing their thing, never understood why it is always been such a hard thing to locate/listen to?

there is a Hemophiliac live album from the 50th birthday series on there

Yeah and I'm sure it's cool (I haven't gotten to it yet) but the original https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hemophiliac_(album) which was always a super-limited deal is great

Also, o.nate otm about the Mengelberg joint, maybe not an essential record but a fun listen, esp to hear him in context with Cohen and Perowsky

Wrote about this for Stereogum and picked a dozen titles for people to check out.

Nice read, this interview with Mathieu Amalric on his ongoing Zorn docus.

Anyone read the Arcana books? Would love a recommendation on where to start.

I bought the first volume back when it came out (2000?), and not only did I never read it, I only recently learned there have been several more volumes! I just picked flipped through it, though, and it seemed interesting, if pretty academic.

I bought the first volume back when it came out (2000?), and not only did I never read it, I only recently learned there have been several more volumes! I just picked flipped through it, though, and it seemed interesting, if pretty academic.

Some (but not all) of the contributing artists are in fact academics, so that makes sense. (BTW some contributions are interviews or conversationts, they're not all essays).

I've read all but two volumes (vols. 10 and 5) and my answer would be: pick one that has artists you're interested in. Some writing is indeed academic, with lots of sheet music to explain a point of the writer in question. There are very good contributions found in each volume, and less interesting/serious one to level that. Some personal highlights: Vol. 2 has a conversation with Jim O'Rourke (and someone else I can't remember) on Zorn's film work. Pat Metheny did a great essay on "Bright Size Life" in another one. I remember a very funny contribution by Derek Bailey. The deadpan Marc Ribot essay in the first volume (reprinted in his "Unstrung" book). A great interview with Barbara Hannigan (on adapting Berg's "Lulu" opera).

Bottom line: I'm happy Zorn financed and created this series, as I've discovered some great records from the selected discography section in each volume. Some of the writing is excellent, but as a whole, the quality of the individual volumes is very uneven.

(I think the first volume is a little different than the rest as it also includes pieces that were already published somewhere else (such as the Peter Garland travelogue). Also, I think the series as a whole has been an inspiration to William Parker "Conversation" book series on Rogue Art.)

There's a John Zorn public group on Faceache, and aside from the wealth of dumb posts, a lot of JZ/Tzadik Spotify playlists have been posted, carving out little subdivisions like sub-2:00 Masada pieces, Dreamers, Brian Marsella Trio, etc.

https://www.facebook.com/groups/336545431430782

shouldn't surprise me, but people seem real intense there

lol yeah, I had unfollowed the group for years until streaming started last month. I'll probably unfollow again since nobody posts Tidal playlists.

Jordan, put on your coffee playlist, the opening "Quatrain" is lovely stuff. Not your fault, but I wish it was credited to the artists on it.

Cool! I haven't gone back to any Tzadik catalog stuff in the last few weeks, but now I'll have to get in the habit of checking for their new releases.

New Lage/Frisell/Gyan Riley guitar trio record (under "John Zorn - Nothing Is As Real As Nothing") going straight to the Tzadik coffee playlist.

It's a good one

Great Jewish Music: Serge Gainsbourg now up on Tidal, so I assume it's on all the streamers.

folks over at the free jazz blog did a two-part overview late last year that highlights some tzadik releases post-deluge:

https://www.freejazzblog.org/2023/11/the-tzadik-stream-is-flood-part-1-of-2.html

I was considering heading to New York to see Electric Masada this May, and then I realized it's Memorial Day weekend, which suddenly turns it into a big expensive pain in the ass.