When I listened to the all-time-great bassist Rufus Reid’s brand new CD Hues Of A Different Blue for the first couple of times, it kind of threw me for a loop. Last year’s release Out Front, an SER “Best of 2010: Mainstream and Modern Jazz” selection, was the perfect bass-ledRead More
Vibraphonist Gary Burton’s entire career as a musician has been about thinking outside the box and exploring new frontiers in jazz music. You May Also Like: Pat Metheny, “You Are” from ‘From This Place’ (2019): One Track Mind Julian Lage – ‘Squint’ (2021)
by Tom Johnson Following her fantastic 2000 release Red Dirt Girl, this found the angelic-voiced Emmylou Harris continuing down the path she started with Daniel Lanois on the equally fantastic but slightly more stunning 1995 album Wrecking Ball, and that’s just fine with me. Once a country-goddess, Harris has incorporatedRead More
In many ways, the initial cuts on Journey’s Eclipse recall the wide-open heavy fusion of the the band’s original Gregg Rolie-era records, a period when guitarist Neal Schon pulled and stretched his muse. At the same time, singer Arnel Pineda possesses a second-act Steve Perry-sounding penchant for soaring expectancy. YouRead More
by Mark Saleski First off, I just have to say that this album, recorded at WGBH’s Fraser Performance Studio in Boston, sounds gorgeous. Many modern recordings, even in the quieter jazz realm, are tainted by the overuse of compression. Not so here. The inner detail of Winard Harper’s cymbal workRead More
On this special edition of Something Else! Reviews’ One Track Mind, we hand the reins over to jazz pianist Michael Wolff. You May Also Like: Warren Zevon’s ‘Lawyers, Guns and Money,’ ‘Stand In the Fire’ + Others: Gimme Five Warren Zevon’s ‘Jeannie Needs a Shooter,’ ‘Piano Fighter’ + Others: GimmeRead More
Endlessly engaging, Michael Wolff was praised by the New York Times for “near impeccable good taste, technical facility and lyrical inventiveness.”
by Tom Johnson Elvis Costello makes yet another shift in his career, this time to take on the persona of a jazz crooner backed by an orchestra arranged and conducted by his own bad self. Does it work? Depends on your view of Elvis: If, in your world, he’s theRead More
by Mark Saleski I do like my jazz with some funk, and Chris Green delivers. The opening track “Good Riddance!” cooks right along as does “Coffee ‘n Scotch,” built on a simple ostinato that gets moved around in sly ways as the funk slips into and back out of straightRead More