The story of Quartets, the new ECM box set covering five of Charles Lloyd’s albums, isn’t a sweeping career retrospective; it would take at least twenty discs to sufficiently do that for this tenor saxophonist whose become a lion in jazz over a fifty year span. Instead, this is aboutRead More

Walter Becker and Donald Fagen have complementing talents — that’s a major reason of what made their partnership such a success — but there’s some overlap too, and one of the things they are both big on is making their songs groove. You May Also Like: Walter Becker, “Medical ScienceRead More

Anthony Branker plays no instruments on his latest record Uppity. Actually, he’s never performed on any of his six releases, so I can’t discuss what a great instrumentalist or vocalist he is. You May Also Like: When Miles Davis Finally Looked Back on ‘Miles and Quincy: Live at Montreux’

By the time Paul Motian had passed away in November of 2011, he had established a legacy that reaches far beyond a couple of historical evenings at the Village Vanguard in late June of 1961. But becoming known as something much more than Bill Evans’ drummer within arguably jazz’s greatestRead More

Bobby Selvaggio heads up two different kinds of bands, but he solved a potential dilemma of which band to record for an album by simply including sessions by both combos on the same record. You May Also Like: Casey Golden Trio – Miniature (EP) (2016) Jamie Saft, Steve Swallow andRead More

One of the most diversely talented pianists of today can make just about any kind of record he wants, and make it good. So why did Craig Taborn choose to make an acoustic jazz trio record with bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Gerald Cleaver for his second ECM project? YouRead More

Seven years after their last release, acid-jazz pioneers The Brand New Heavies signal a return to original form with “Sunlight.” You May Also Like: The Cretins, “Haven’t Got a Clue” (2019): One Track Mind David Philips, “Home” from Winter (2017): Something Else! sneak peek

Rich Halley is a DIY guy in the jazz world, just as he’s a free spirit in his personal life. Last summer, he took his son Carson and a nephew out hiking the entire range of the Wallowa Mountains in eastern Oregon. You May Also Like: Rich Halley 5 –Read More

<<< BACKWARD (“Fall Of ’92”) ||| ONWARD (“Medical Science”) >>> *** STEELY DAN SUNDAY INDEX *** With vicious and vulgar prose, it’s easy to figure out why “Fall of ’92” failed to get included on 11 Tracks of Whack. I’m not really sure what barred “Lies I Can Believe” fromRead More

Mi Casa Es En Fuego, which means, “my house is on fire” in Spanish, is an appropriate name to call a set of music that’s often aflame, and even in the quieter moments, the embers are still glowing, ready to re-ignite the house again. You May Also Like: Ballister –Read More