Archive for September, 2008

Vinyl

Dave Holland Sextet – Pass It On (2008)

A couple of years ago, I posed the question: is the Dave Holland Quintet the best jazz group working today? Today, the Dave Holland Quintet has been supplanted by the Dave Holland Sextet, and with last week’s unfurling of the Sextet’s first record Pass It On, we get to assessRead More

Cannonball Adderley, ‘Walk Tall’ (1969): One Track Mind

Cannonball Adderley, ‘Walk Tall’ (1969): One Track Mind

Urged on by a buoyant audience, Cannonball Adderley’s “Walk Tall” becomes both a call to action and a celebration of spirit.

Vinyl

David Gilmour – Live at Gdansk (2008)

Missing in the eternal argument embodied in their 1970s lyric — Which one’s Pink? — was my idea that it was neither Roger Waters nor David Gilmour. Maybe there would have been no Pink Floyd, not really, without Richard Wright. That’s what I hear in “Live at Gdansk” with GilmourRead More

Vinyl

R.L. Burnside – ‘First Recordings’ (2003)

R.L. Burnside’s ‘First Recordings’ was the result of a neighbor’s recommendation: “I know who that be.”

Vinyl

Quickies: Shaun Barrowes, Keith Emerson, Lindsey Buckingham, Jay D'Amico Trio

It’s been since the beginning of August since we’ve last done a “Quickies” here, so we’re long overdue for another one. There’s been a bevy of music put out during these last eight weeks that our full-fledged reviews don’t begin to cover, and a lot of it noteworthy. Gosh, IRead More

Vinyl

Charlie Haden – ‘Rambling Boy’ (2008)

We think of him as a famous jazz guy. But those who knew Charlie Haden as a child remember him as a bluegrass prodigy in a traveling musical group of relatives.

Vinyl

One Track Mind: Marc Ribot "Caravan" (1992)

Marc Ribot is near the front of a phalanx of whack jazz axe slingers that includes Fred Frith, Henry Kaiser, and of course, good ol’ Bill Frisell. As way out his anything-goes approach goes on his solo records, he’s plenty versatile enough to play for guys as diverse as JohnRead More

Vinyl

Tal Ross – Aka Detrimental Vasoline: Giant Shirley (2008)

It was only a few years ago that I was lamenting the fleeting guitar talent in George Clinton’s early Funkadelic band who reached incredible heights as Clinton’s lead axeman on funk classics like Free Your Mind … And Your Ass Will Follow and Maggot Brain. Besides Eddie Hazel, there wasRead More

Vinyl

Michael Bates – Clockwise (2008)

Sometimes you know if a CD is going to be good even before you cue it up and start listening to it. The first thing I that caught my eye when I opened up Michael Bates’ Clockwise CD was the note that it was taped live on a two-track recorder.Read More

Vinyl

Gonzalo Rubalcaba – Suite 4 y 20 (1993)

NICK DERISO: While Rubalcaba was making troubling (if not downright boneheaded) political decisions, he was also proving to be an inspiring (and sometimes downright thrilling) young pianist. Not long after Rubalcaba said the crippling Communist regime in his native Cuba wasn’t all that bad, after all — much to theRead More