Music is Good news

Aug 23 2012

Splashgirl – “Pressure”

My review of Splashgirl‘s Pressure has been pubbed over at the Music is Good site.  After the lead-in, you can follow the link to read the rest of the article.

*****

The Nordic Jazz sound has situated itself solidly at a distance from Jazz’s epicenter… introspective, austere, with drifting melodies, and rhythms that often eschew swing for drama.  And as musicians from that fold push the envelope ever outward, it gets to where, perhaps, the music stops being Jazz at all.  In the face of whether an album is of value, this genre philosophizing is a small matter.

What is of more compelling, though ancillary interest, is that by pushing the borders of Jazz outward, musicians who typically play other types of music are testing the waters of Jazz.  Some, like Splashgirl, have actually built a foundation in one of the slight areas of fuzziness where genres cross over.

Combining element of a Jazz piano trio, ambient electronica, and alt-classical new-schoolers like Nils Frahm, with Pressure, Splashgirl has created an intoxicating brand of music that may be tough to categorize, but… (read the rest of the article, HERE, at Music is Good)

Released in 2011 on the Hubro Music label.

Jazz from Norway.

Available at eMusic.  Available at Amazon: CD | MP3 | Vinyl

By • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2011 Releases • 0 • Tags: ,

Apr 30 2012

Colin Vallon – “Rruga”

My review of Colin Vallon‘s Rruga has been pubbed over at Music is Good.  After the lead-in paragraph, you can follow the link to read the read of the article at MiG.

*****

The ECM catalog is filled with piano trio albums of austerity and minimalism.  For a piano trio to approach an album with a Doing More With Less minimalism is a daring venture, because the high risk is a drowsy album that ends up sounding flimsy and thin or, worse perhaps, lounge music for the late night dinner set.  It’s not an easy thing to do, the peaceful piano trio recording.

The choice of notes has to be impeccable, since there ain’t gonna be as many to offer the listener.  Honor has to be paid to the silence, and used as effectively as the sound made from the black and whites.  Bass and drums have to be more than just tools of accompaniment, but in the framework of the quiet piano trio, they need to be sure to only use their Inside Voices.  And then there’s the compositions themselves… (read the rest of the article, HERE, at Music is Good).

Your album personnel:  Colin Vallon (piano), Patrice Moret (double bass), and Samuel Rohrer (drums).

Released on the ECM Records label in 2011, and one of the year’s best.

Jazz from the Bern, Switzerland scene.

By • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2012 Releases • 0 • Tags: ,

Mar 19 2012

Peter Broderick – “Float”

Yes, sometimes I write about stuff other than Jazz.

My review of ambient/folk/alt-classical artist Peter Broderick‘s Float has been pubbed at Music is Good.  After the lead-in paragraph, follow the link to read the rest of the review, as well as listen to embedded audio, external links, and more.

*****

The music of multi-instrumentalist Peter Broderick should be much busier.  Bouncing from guitar to strings to keyboards to horns (to name a few), and shifting from folk to classical to indie pop to ambient drone (to name a few), the expectation is that the end result would be music with so many moving parts that its main appeal would be as a spectacle of incomprehension.  But the thing of it is, he finds a way to fuse all of these disparate elements into a cohesive cloud of serenity.  And those disparate elements?  They’re all there, but masked in subtlety and hinted at just enough for the ear to pick up on them without ever feeling overwhelmed.  This is beautiful music, with a densely packed emotional center.

Let’s talk about that music… (read the rest of the article, HERE, at Music is Good.)

By • Beyond Jazz Reviews • 0 • Tags: ,

Mar 12 2012

Anders Koppel – “Everything Is Subject to Change”

My reviews of Anders Koppel‘s Everything is Subject to Change has been published on Music is Good.  You can read the opening paragraph here, then follow the link below to the rest of the article on the MiG site.

*****

Marking Anders Koppel’s first solo Hammond organ release, Everything Is Subject to Change is an intriguing mix of atmospherics and organics. Pianist Kenny Werner and saxophonist Benjamin Koppel imbue the music with an austere elegance, whereas Anders Koppel’s organ and Jacob Andersen’s percussion brings an earthy element to the music. The balance between the two makes for an album that equally engages head and heart.

Read the rest of the review, here, on Music is Good.

Album released on the Cowbell Music label.  Jazz from Denmark.

Album available on Amazon: MP3

By • Jazz Recommendations, Jazz Recommendations - 2012 Releases • 2 • Tags: