What sets ‘Morning Phase’ apart from ‘Sea Change’ was a huge expansion of Beck’s emotional palette. There’s not just grief, but hope as well.

OK, so the sounds delivered by the project you see below don’t exactly reach the heights (or lows, depending on your listening proclivities) of a WTF! But in the case of artist Bartholomaus Traubeck, it was his idea that turned my head. You May Also Like: No related posts.

I remember thinking that “Paradise,” written from the point of view of a suicide bomber, was simultaneously haunting and touching. You May Also Like: No related posts.

There are many reasons to look wistfully back at this ensemble, thinking of how great it would have been to see them perform live. That list is tops out with “Open.” You May Also Like: Pat Metheny, May 16, 2019: Shows I’ll Never Forget How ‘Wish’ Scuffed Up Joshua Redman’sRead More

So there was this study which determined that there is a small fraction of the populace that derives no emotion from listening to music. The condition is called “anhedonia” and about five percent of the population is affected. For these people, music does not make them happy, they have noRead More

The few times I’ve ever offered up any of my WTF?! Wednesday material to co-workers, the response invariably involves a crinkled up face and a head shake. This is often followed by a comment along the lines of “That…is not music.” You May Also Like: Dave Seidel (Mystery Bear) –Read More

You ever wonder what Tom Waits does with his spare time? I bet he gets up in the morning, has coffee and a plate of bacon and eggs with rye toast, and then heads out with the newspaper under his arm to make a pass through the local yard salesRead More

Over the course of Pat Metheny’s long and erudite career, I’ve considered his non-Metheny Group side projects as mostly separate, with little or no musical/stylist overlap. You May Also Like: Pat Metheny, May 16, 2019: Shows I’ll Never Forget Pat Metheny, “You Are” from ‘From This Place’ (2019): One TrackRead More

There are points during nearly all concerts where the emotions and internal language of the music can take over to express something that’s out of the grasp of mere words. You May Also Like: Reevaluating Bruce Springsteen’s ‘The Wild, the Innocent and the E Street Shuffle’

So I was poking my way through an odd discussion about classic rock on one of those Internet-type forum things. It started out with the question of whether Bruce Springsteen’s popularity — ticket and album sales-wise — had been hurt because he isn’t considered to be “classic rock.” You MayRead More