Michelle V. Agins/The New York Times Maybe it hasn’t been talked about that much, but in spite of all the advances in the mastery the instrument led by Sonny Rollins and John Coltrane, the development and evolution of the jazz saxophone didn’t end with those guys. Many of the saxRead More

Densely layered, with an elegant construction, Black Dub doesn’t start out all that much differently from your average recording by uber-hip producer Daniel Lanois. Then something welcomely dangerous, almost feral, happens. Lanois — famous for his work with U2, Bob Dylan and Peter Gabriel, among others — is the firstRead More

by Nick DeRiso News this week that Buddy Guy had been Grammy nominated for best contemporary blues album had me revisiting the scalding blisses of Living Proof. I loved it from the first solo, this sharp outburst of gnarled sexuality on “74 Years Young”: “There ain’t nothing I haven’t done,”Read More

by S. Victor Aaron I’ve always had a hard time distinguishing West Coast jazz from East Coast jazz by ear. I mean. I know it’s supposed to be a more smoothed-out “cooler” variant of the vigorous, sometimes jarring jazz that comes out of NYC and I know that guys likeRead More

By Nick DeRiso At once neo-renaissance, new age and something akin to blissed-out bluegrass, Erwilian’s holiday-themed concert recording Midwinter’s Night neatly sidesteps the pre-conceived notion of sickly sweet Yuletide fare. Midwinter’s Night, instead, is a concert souvenir from warm night of remembrance, affection and camaraderie – sparked by these friendly-as-familyRead More

by Nick DeRiso The Orb’s signature sound — gorgeous but not quite ambient, hypnotic but typically not much more rhythmic than a chill-out room — always seemed to cry out for the guitar stylings of Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour. The band copped to the underlying influence on its debut album,Read More

Photo: Raj Naik by Pico Millions of people know him as an affable, guitar-wielding long-time bandleader of the most popular late night show in television history. Now that Kevin Eubanks has left his eighteen year stint as Jay Leno’s  musician sidekick on The Tonight Show, it’s time to become acquaintedRead More

by Nick DeRiso An album about dreams reclaimed, Murray Flint’s The Journey traces his own road back from painfully debilitating tendonitis. After nearly a decade away from the guitar, the Olympia, Wash., resident discovered a finger-style approach long associated with Merle Travis. This technique simultaneously sounds more complex, since theRead More

by S. Victor Aaron Here we are at Volume 6, and while there’s still a few dozen CD’s that are worthy of mention sitting on my shelves or lying somewhere on the floor, this is likely going to be the last installment of “Pico’s 2010 Stacks.” A post-Thanksgiving version coveringRead More

by Mark Saleski It is perhaps too easy to dismiss the work of celebrities. In the case of Bruce Springsteen, there has been much vitriol expressed over his “supposed” blue collar leanings, as if success can (no…must) wipe out your roots. If you look back at this documentary on theRead More