by S. Victor Aaron Not the bass player for Aerosmith, but a musician named “Tom Hamilton” with a more ambitious calling. For more than forty years, the nonpop New Music composer and performer Hamilton has treated music as a laboratory for experimentation, and a pioneer of using electronics for anarchistic,Read More

by S. Victor Aaron When I heard Joe Higham’s wonderfully diverse world fusion treat Where Are We Now? last year, I became suspicious that the Low Countries might be a magnet for out-the-box thinking for jazz players. Listening to Eric Vloeimans and his Gatecrash’s new release Heavensabove! just confirmed thoseRead More

photo: Valerie Trucchia by S. Victor Aaron Since starting up this site about four years ago, we’ve taken a look at a Japanese whack jazzer only once, but the fact of the matter is, the Land of the Rising Sun is a haven for music that’s unconventional, unpredictable and thrivingRead More

by S. Victor Aaron Birthday parties are almost always such fun events and nowadays, they all get captured on video. When someone marks their eightieth birthday, that’s a real cause for celebration. And when the birthday boy celebrates it by ripping it up making some great music, that’s just icingRead More

by S. Victor Aaron German woodwind wunderkind Gebhard Ullmann and New York-based trombone titlist Steve Swell may come from opposing sides of the Atlantic, but when the two get together to make music, they’re in the same house of whack jazz. There are some 70 led or co-led albums betweenRead More

Drumming ace Allison Miller might not be a household name yet but, boy, she sure is linked to a whole host of them.

The hottest band in the land just might be the Drive-By Truckers by S. Victor Aaron Funny how it seems I have plenty of time to listen to new music and precious little to write about. There’s about 9GBs of albums in my iPod rotation and I’m familiar with aRead More

by S. Victor Aaron The other day for the first time I heard a song by a certain female vocalist who had just won a Grammy (or maybe 6 or 7 Grammies, for all I know). The only thing I really remember about the song is that her voice wasRead More

Photo: Juan-Carlos Hernandez by S. Victor Aaron In my humble opinion, it’s not the improvised (aka “whack”) jazz that seems toughest to compose and render, nor is it the more mellifluous but intricate modern jazz. Rather, it’s the the kind of jazz that successfully combines both approaches. To me, it’sRead More

by S. Victor Aaron They say that writing about music is like dancing about architecture, and if that’s true, then writing about whack jazz can be more like swimming about psychiatry. Often, you can’t describe a melodic or rhythmic structure because there are none. Saying so-and-so sounds like some otherRead More