by Pico It used to be, all good jazz originated out of New Orleans, then Chicago, then New York. And a lot of it still does these days. Eventually, Western Europe became the place of origin for a lot of great jazz for several generations, now, and even Eastern EuropeRead More

Before there was Sonic Youth, before there was Radiohead, Material, The Flaming Lips or the Animal Collective, there was Curlew. Founded by saxophonist/composer George Cartwright in 1979, Curlew soon became an incubator for just about every important name in the the New York downtown experimental music scene that thrived inRead More

By Mark Saleski Have you ever been minding your own business when an old experience, one you hadn’t thought about in years, just pops into your mind? That happened to me the other night, and I have no idea why. I had been up late reading, had just returned fromRead More

“All eyes on the judges, who tabulate the score…” So where are we on this whole American Idol saga, anyway? I heard that Simon Cowell and Ellen Degeneres had vacated their judges’ chairs (this was the first I’ve heard of Degeneres even being on the show). And Kara DioGuardi wasRead More

by Pico The American Afrobeat movement hadn’t bubbled up from the underground all that long ago, but maybe it isn’t too soon to look back at what have been the key releases from this revival. At least that’s what Ropeadope Records thinks in re-releasing this week Who Is This AmericaRead More

By Mark Saleski Odd instruments in jazz: pedal steel guitar, theremin, the Samchillian (You’ll have to trust me on this one. Its “formal” name is the “Samchillian Tip Tip Tip Cheeepeee.” Don’t believe me? Look it up), the harmonica, the human voice (if you’re Shooby Taylor or Mike Patton), theRead More

by Nick DeRiso Led Zeppelin wasn’t always this thundering, then nimble, amalgamation. The band’s first album had, on its surface, only a copycat kind of appeal. Recorded over just 30 hours, these songs were presented in the same way Zeppelin would have done them on stage at the time —Read More

by Pico Like the proverbial fine wine, James Moody only gets mellower and better with age. A seasoned saxophone and flute veteran who was in Dizzy Gillespie’s original big band of the later 1940’s and most famously the author of everyone’s favorite vocalese jazz tune “Moody’s Mood For Love,” (withRead More

By Mark Saleski This story travels a bizarre triangle from Portland, Maine to San Diego, California to Houston, Texas. To be honest, there’s nothing particularly exciting about either the story or the music, but it illustrates just how big the world of art is…and that there are plenty of waysRead More

by S. Victor Aaron Like many of the greatest American musicians, Miles Davis has had a comeback—he’s had four or five of them, actually—but only one where he came back from not playing at all. It was also his least successful one in the short run. The 1975-1981 retirement wasRead More