Rolling Jazz Thread 2019

Agreeing With Others Dept.:

Resavoir, Jaimie Branch, Kris Davis, and The Comet Is Coming are all really good. So's the new Yazz Ahmed, which came out Friday.

new Tomeka Reid Quartet w/Mary Halvorson is good as well.

Oh, I'll look for that.

me too!
Haven't taken in his lines yet, but I like the way the sound of Saul Williams's voice fits, no bombast or mumblecore, also like Branch's voice on https://intlanthem.bandcamp.com/album/fly-or-die-ii-bird-dogs-of-paradise--but on both albums, there are some words in there, so if you don't want any, you're out of luck. "A luuuv song, for assholes, and clowns," a lullaby. Will check other recent mentions on here; so far y'all have steered me right.

Yazz has a bit of spoken word on a track, but it's about two minutes long and not too distracting.

And I love the Comet Is Coming EP as much as the album. Also has a non-corny spoken word track!

did someone already link Ben Flock's Mask Of The Muse on here? it might have been a burning ambulance review linked on here. it's probably a bit trad for some but it's so dreamy and lush I'm total sucker for it.

erroneous apostrophe there it is Flocks!

I wrote about it for Stereogum in August. It is nice.

Ben Flocks, Mask Of The Muse (West Cliff)
This is a fascinatingly weird, not-quite-retro album by an up-and-coming saxophonist. Flocks, along with guitarist and producer Art Chersky, keyboardist Frank LoCrasto (who’s worked with Jeremy Pelt), bassist Martin Nevin, and drummer Evan Hughes, tackle a collection of songs that aren’t standards, but are old, and associated with singers ranging from Billie Holiday and Frank Sinatra to Sam Cooke, Roy Orbison and Patti Page. The arrangements are a little bit soul jazz, a little bit hard bop, and a little bit lounge-act, but there’s also an edge of weirdness to them, like something out of a David Lynch movie. The consistency of the mood is what makes the album really special; it’s like you’re hearing it in a dream. The band’s version of Sam Cooke’s “Smoke Rings” features gentle guitar and organ, and a slow-dance beat, over which Flocks’ tenor floats like he’s playing a 1950s prom.

The Yazz Ahmed is nice, but I'm not totally convinced by it. Apart from the second half of 2857, that is absolutely amazing! It's not like there's only room for one middle eastern inspired jazz album, but I did prefer Maurice Loucas 'Elephantine' from this year.

more great community-workshop-angry-spoken-word jazz: the Irreversible Entanglements album from a couple of years ago

Yeah, unperson turned me onto that upthread, when I was omg at Moor Mother on Art Ensemble of Chicago's We Are On The Edge---her Analog Fluids of Sonic Black Holes is out Nov.8

I interviewed Peter Brötzmann today - he's got a new solo album coming out in November that's almost all standards(!) - he does "I Surrender, Dear" and "Lover Come Back To Me" and "Con Alma" and "Nice Work If You Can Get It," among others. It's pretty awesome. At the end of our conversation I asked him if he'd consider making an album like this with a rhythm section; I suggested William Parker and Hamid Drake, and he countered saying either them or Eric Revis and Nasheet Waits, with whom he's also worked. We also talked about the time he played with Ginger Baker. He said they didn't get along too well until they finished the second bottle of whiskey.

I interviewed Marilyn Crispell for Down Beat.

saw Makaya McCraven on Friday, what a wonderful show, great ensemble, Jeff Parker on guitar, harpist who really added a lot, McCraven is a monster drummer and also had a a laptop that he played quotes about music, revolution, etc from historical figures, jazz ppl

so glad I went

I've never seen McCraven as a leader, but I'd love to. I saw him play with trumpeter Marquis Hill at Winter Jazzfest 2018 and he really is just astonishing behind the kit. He drove that band hard.

His show in Montreal this summer was one of the best I’ve seen in years. Jealous of Parker & harp though

I'm assuming it was Brandee Younger on harp; they've been working together for a while now. I saw her open for Tony Allen, in a duet with bassist Dezron Douglas.

looks like you are right! here's some more info, was a commission piece

Makaya McCraven: In These Times, with opener Astralblak


World Premiere/Walker Commission

“McCraven, a Chicago-based drummer, producer and beat maker, has quietly become one of the best arguments for jazz’s vitality.” —New York Times

Bridging generations of adventurous music with his improvisational genius and ecstatic beatwork, drummer and bandleader Makaya McCraven performs a timely Walker co-commissioned musical suite—his most ambitious work to date. A “beat scientist” who has galvanized audiences and garnered critical acclaim across the globe while helping to introduce jazz and improvisation to the next generation, McCraven is joined by trumpeter Marquis Hill, guitarist Jeff Parker (Tortoise), bassist Jeremiah Hunt, saxophonist Greg Ward, pianist Greg Spero, violinist Macie Stewart, cellist Lia Kohl,harpist Brandee Younger (Moses Sumney), and improvisational video artist Kim Alpert. Music is community in this multimedia performance that includes strings and a video collage made from archival footage of black activists and influential music innovators.

That's a hell of a band. I just wrote about Marquis Hill's new record for Bandcamp, and Greg Ward's latest is great too.

what's the greg ward one called?

Hill and Ward's solo turns were fantastic

The Ward album is called Stomping Off From Greenwood; it came out way back in January.

oh I know that one, thought he'd released another!

Late to the party but Anna Webber's Clockwise is indeed superb.

yep!

aoty!

I should probably go see the Tomeka Reid Quartet w/Mary Halvorson, huh

(I mean I probably won't because I'm busy and bad at going to things, but I should)

Listening to the album now and it's sick
(https://cuneiformrecords.bandcamp.com/album/old-new)

Damn I might have to actually go

going to this tonight if anyone wants to say hi
https://roulette.org/event/mary-halvorson-john-dieterich-a-tangle-of-stars/

yeah that new Tomeka Reid/Mary Halv album is ace

Oh hey, new Bad Plus album! Sounds very Bad Plus-y so far, which is cool. More Bad Plus-y than the last one.

that about covers it, yes! and in a good way.

I love the matana roberts album

The live in the studio band version of this new Bria Skonberg album coming out tomorrow sounds great. Featuring the “protean” Doug Wamble on guitar, whose playing I have enjoyed but who seems to have never been mentioned here.

I tried that Skonberg album but couldn't get past the vocals. You've got a trumpet right there - shut up and blow.

Went to the ECM 50th anniversary concert tonight. Got to see Wadada Leo Smith in duo with Vijay Iyer, then in trio with Bill Frisell and Andrew Cyrille. It ruled.

whaddaya know, bria skonberg looks EXACTLY like you'd think a bria skonberg looks

Bria is one of the nicest and hard working people I know. what she looks like is not what "a" bria skonberg looks like, but what bria skonberg looks like.

really digging this album by Steph Richards, NYC avant-garde/experimental trumpet player.

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a1716966144_16.jpg

https://stephrichards.bandcamp.com/album/take-the-neon-lights

https://sunnysidezone.com/album/utica-box

cool dan weiss album here, not the brilliant quintet featured on Starebaby but still excellent. I think there is another with mitchell/taborn coming early next year.

bremer/mccoy is a Danish duo (keys/tape loops and bass) apparently distributed on Luaka Bop in the states - all their stuff is good, new album is great, here's a single:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KJxZ8fefX5k

Listening to the record now and I don't know that it has much to do with jazz beyond instrumentation, but it's quite lovely (especially the Rhodes). It's just this side of the piano music that you would hear someone playing in a hospital or the better airports, but that's somehow not a bad thing.

Just got to a bass solo though, jazz/10

"jazz på svenka" vibes

definitely

freaking out all alone in my bedroom

https://f4.bcbits.com/img/a2307103682_16.jpg

https://familyvineyard.bandcamp.com/album/live-at-willimantic-records

it's pretty good !

recorded in 2018. i hadn't heard of lao dan:

This is the American debut release from Lao Dan, China’s emerging free player on bamboo flute, suona and alto saxophone. Dan’s voice is starkly unique, even among the blurred lines of international Improv/Jazz. He’s steeped in native traditions yet eagerly obliterates those boundaries with ecstatic intensity and haunting melodies. His dense reedy, drones and jagged melodic shrieks are described as a “Whitmanian yawp,” by Marc Medwin in the liner notes.

having a nice late morning sunday session with this groovy dark stretched-out drone stuff, RIYL "he loved him madly"

loren connors & daniel carter "the departing of a dream, vol. vii"

https://familyvineyard.bandcamp.com/album/the-departing-of-a-dream-vol-vii