by S. Victor Aaron Cello virtuoso Erik Friedlander must have found a second wind at 50 years old because yesterday he released his second album of all new material as many months. The album, incidentally, is called Fifty: 50 Miniatures For Improvising Quintet and in Friedlander’s typically atypical fashion, itRead More

by Mark Saleski In our society, it seems like there’s a constant battle between idealism and cynicism. A person will take a stand on a particular issue, and no matter how quietly they do it, there is always an opposing force with the can of hot tar at the ready.Read More

When we last visited the music of the brilliant bassist and composer William Parker three years ago, he was putting his poetry to his music on Corn Meal Dance. Yesterday, he introduced a new album that again revolves around poetry but this time it’s based on the poetic music ofRead More

by Mark Saleski Bill Frisell has often been referred to as the mad scientist of the guitar. His good friend Gary Larson goes the idea one better, that Frisell has a team of mad scientists living inside of his brain. The notion is a funny one, because the stereotype ofRead More

by Mark Saleski A friend of mine, who is just beginning to dip his toe into the pool of jazz, asked me if I thought he was “ready” for Bitches Brew. That’s a tricky question, no matter who is doing the asking. The generic answer, suitable for use in nearlyRead More

Sometimes, we need reminding that Chicago was once a rock/jazz/blues/R&B/whack jazz band masquerading as a mainstream rock band.

by S. Victor Aaron As I write this, two very talented bands from Italy specializing in the jazz of the whack variety are traversing the fruited plains looking to collect fans from the USA. The trio Neo and the quartet Tribraco are criss-crossing the country from August 23 to OctoberRead More

Note: This is a slightly abridged version of the inaugural article in the long-running “Whack Jazz” series, first appearing on July 11, 2006 on a forerunner site to the Something Else! webzine. Machine Gun remains to me the gold standard for all thrash-jazz records, one that all other such albumsRead More

Mother Nature just staged a terrorist act on our ass! — Warren Smith, “Dyes And Lyes” About five years ago, woodwinds and flute specialist Andrew Lamb convened a recording session with his longtime musical partner Warren Smith (drums, percussion) and the bass/cello master Tom Abbs for some free form musicalRead 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