Photo by Myles Boisen by S. Victor Aaron Imagine a conversation with three other people where topic…a theme if you will…is selected and all four of you are to converse on that topic at certain points in time. And then at other times, a random topic is chosen, but everyoneRead More

by Something Else Reviews Composer/producer Ryan Truesdell on Wednesday launched the Gil Evans Centennial Project at GilEvansProject.com. There’s news: Truesdell, the first person outside of the Evans family to have full access to his musical archives, has uncovered a series of rare compositions, from before and after Evans’ celebrated collaborationsRead More

by Mark Saleski While many “serious” jazz fans will turn up their precious noses at the jazzification of pop tunes, we here at SomethingElse! steadfastly believe that life is too short to be keeping that bow tie so tight. Sure, we love us some Miles and ‘Trane, but that doesn’tRead More

Photo by Lindsey Verrill, from Melissa Engelman’s MySpace page by Nick DeRiso Austin-based singer-songwriter Melissa Engleman explores life with a tough vulnerability on the urban folk set At the Hotel Café, often displaying a fortitude so quiet as to deceive. She gets knocked to the ground, while brilliantly fusing alt-country,Read More

Was thinking about the aptly titled Buffalo Springfield Again, and this brilliant grungy mess, after hearing news that the band would reform for a tour later in the year. Recorded in 1967 for the second of what would be a brief three-album tenure for Buffalo Springfield, Neil Young’s “Mr. Soul”Read More

by S. Victor Aaron Eva Cassidy had only one record released in her lifetime, a live document at a local club in her native area of Washington, D.C. She only sang covers, most of them overly familiar, finding them within the realms of jazz, Tin Pan Alley, folk, pop, gospelRead More

Photo of Ingrid Jensen from http://www.ingridjensen.com by S. Victor Aaron Nordic Connect is a grouping of musicians from Canada (Ingrid Jensen, trumpet; Ingrid’s sister Christine Jensen, alto and soprano saxes), U.S.A. (Ingrid’s husband Jon Wikan, drums), and Sweden (Maggie Olin (piano, Fender Rhodes; Mattias Welin, acoustic bass). The name pointsRead More

by Mark Saleski One of the markers of high-level instrumental interplay is the perception of intimacy. We see this again & again in review language — that the musicians seemed as though they were “of one mind,” that their communication was “telepathic.” There are plenty of recorded examples that comeRead More

George Shearing, the sightless bebop-influenced pianist best known for the 1952 jazz standard “Lullaby of Birdland,” died today of congestive heart failure at age 91. Here’s a look back at a favorite Shearing release, done alongside singer Nancy Wilson … by Nick DeRiso One of the smartest things Nancy WilsonRead More

by Something Else Reviews It’s true, as Randy Newman once impishly sang, they were six fine English boys who knew each other in Birmingham. After that, things got tricky for the Electric Light Orchestra. Despite an impressive string of 1970s hits, they became an easy target. People knocked the strings.Read More