The Round-Up

Here is some very good new music.

Alexi Tuomarila – Kingdom (Edition Records)

This new release from Alexi Tuomarila dishes out some seriously vivid imagery.  Melodies are like live wires and rhythms are the snap of their sparks, and all of it crackles with ceaseless energy.  The pianist’s 2013 release Seven Hills was pretty damn good in its own right, but with this new recording, his trio with bassist Mats Eilertsen and drummer Olavi Louhivuori really sound to be gelling.  There’s a presence to this music that transcends the depth of its beauty.  And one other thing… when it comes to bassists and their solos, not many are able to generate a wealth of riches from an economy of sound quite like Mats Eilertsen.  A wonderful recording.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Rasmus Oppenhagen Krogh – Distill (Centrifuga)

There’s an appealing instability to the melodies of Distill, as if they might come apart at the seams at any moment, or, perhaps, that they are merely dreams of melodies that fade away with wakefulness.  The quartet of guitarist Rasmus Oppenhagen Krogh, bassist Anders Christensen, drummer Oliver Louis Brostrøm Laumann and trumpeter Kasper Tranberg maintain a tranquil ambiance for the duration of the recording, so the album doesn’t really suffer from the absence of any truly striking moments of beauty, because the atmospherics instill the kind of moody serenity to just kick back and bliss out to.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Heisenberg Uncertainty Players – We Tear Down Our Coliseums (Self-Produced)

Chicago-area composer John Dorhauer has been on my radar for a little while now, as has the music from his Heisenberg Uncertainty Players, so I’m pleased to finally make the introductions here in today’s column.  This live performance just this year at Elmhurst College’s Mill Theater of his baseball stadium themed project displays plenty of the quirkiness to be found in his compositions, and it’s the kind of thing that leads to all kinds of fun.  But what I adore most about this current recording is how he threads the most lovely melodic tones through the thick warmth of the big band pieces.  Opening track “Royals” gets right to evidencing that point, but it’s the powerfully concise beauty of “Plasma” that catches the ear, hook line and sinker.  Be sure to check out the artist link below… it leads to some nifty photo art of the stadiums that inspired the music.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Almeida Amado Franco – The Attic (Self-Produced)

This live trio session doesn’t hold back any punches.  Bassist Gonçalo Almeida, tenor saxophonist Rodrigo Amado and drummer Marco Franco throw a series of hooks on “Shadow,” work side-to-side on “Hole,” lay on the inside on “Spring,” work the body on “Board,” and let it all go for the final bell on “Nail,” and every punch is thrown like they mean it.  When the trio settles into a boozy melodicism at the 5-minute mark of the opening track, and the bass arco and tenor sax solo mix like ice and fire, damn, it’s a thing of beauty.  Some solid free jazz ferocity, and yet more cool music coming out of Portugal.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Woody Black 4 – Curiosity (Unit Records)

It’s as delightful as watching shadows and sunlight dance upon a wood floor.  The clarinets and bass clarinets of the Wood Black 4 can sure deliver a pretty melody, but the joy is listening to them under construction.  The rhythm as the shaping force is nifty as hell, but the aftereffects drifting down as lovely harmonies is what clinches the album’s success.  Oscar Antoli, Stephan Dickbauer, Daniel Moser and Leonhard Skorupa crafted an album that possesses the solemn tones for early mornings and the liveliness for a late-night listen.

Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp – Amazon

Here is some very good new music.

Hayden Prosser – Tether (Whirlwind Recordings)

There’s an odd grace to the new one from bassist Hayden Prosser.  Its motion has a strangely regimented feel, as if it were mirroring the patterns of a Scrabble board construction or a high-speed game of Go.  That alone generates some real intrigue, but what nudges Tether up to borderline addictive is how the melodies filter through.  It’s more fluid that one might expect, yet the melodies conform to their environment, so sometimes they get stretched thin on “Overturn” and sometimes they get twisted into alien shapes on “Undo” and sometimes they just scatter in all directions on “Rounds,” and then there’s a track like “All,” where the melody is both flame and melting candle wax at the same time.  Tenor saxophonist Philipp Gropper, pianist Elias Stemeseder and drummer Max Santner join Prosser on this session.  My fascination with this recording continues to grow with each return visit.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

CSPS – On the Face Place (Skydeck Music)

It’s just plain fun following after the melodies on this enjoyable session from the CSPS Ensemble.  This straight-ahead set of tunes has a little bit of old-school influence and a handful more of new school.  There’s an incisive lyricism applied by the wind instruments when they each dig into a solo, but in that way simple words can lead to complex meanings, saxophonists Kiril Kuzmanov and Dave Wilson, and trumpeter Trajče Velkov develop their opening statements into thrilling expressions.  Bassist Kiril Tufekčievski and percussionist Ratko Dautovski maintain a conversational chatter throughout.  Guitarist Bojan Petkov bounces back and forth between both groups, sometimes adding texture to the tempos and sometimes setting off some brilliant melodic fireworks of his own.  The ensemble name comes from the point of origin of the ensemble members: Chicago and Skopje, Probistip, and Stip, Macedonia.  This is one of those recordings that subtly grew on me, and one day it struck me just how much I had been enjoying it all this time.  Go check it out.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Amazon

Orbital Quintet – Vol. 1 (Self-Produced)

Sort of a dual personality to this debut from Oakland’s Orbital Quintet.  Half of the album’s tracks work in some bop and swing, sticking to a straight-ahead sound.  The album’s other half is an updated space-jazz fusion, of ambient melodies that melt into a latticework of diffuse tempos.  At no time do these two sounds ever come together, and it doesn’t sound like that option was ever on the table.  The quintet seems quite content presenting two sides to their story, and for me personally, my favorite of the two sounds was whichever one was currently drifting out from my speakers.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Marcus Elliot Quartet – Sonic Refuge (Self-Produced)

Plenty to like about this collection of live tracks compiled from four years of performing at the Detroit jazz club Cliff Bell’s.  Saxophonist Marcus Elliot, pianist Michael Malis, bassist Ben Rolston and drummer Stephen Boegehold work a nice post-bop vein, dispensing equal amounts of heat, edge and introspection.  While each musician has plenty to say with their respective solos, it’s those moments when the quartet comes together as one and develop an idea where a soloist left off that count as the album’s stronger moments.  And that’s probably as it should be for a group that’s been playing together for as long as they.  Good stuff.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Ensemble Novo – Look to the Sky (Self-Produced)

Gotta say I found this bossa session pretty charming.  A Philly crew that includes vibraphonist Behn Gillece, guitarist Ryan McNeely, saxophonist Tom Moon, percussionist Jim Hamilton and bassist Mark Przybylowski adopt an easy-going gait for the album’s entirety.  Even a track like “Cravo e Canela,” which shifts into a brisk pace, has a casual demeanor to how it dishes out the rhythm and a pretty melody.  The whole affair sounds like long-time collaborators got together in a home studio and decided just to spend the night having fun playing some bossa and samba, and somebody hit a record button before they got things underway.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Here is some very good new music.

The Heliocentrics – A World of Masks (Soundway Records)

There’s a relentless quality to the music of psychedelic jazz ensemble The Heliocentrics, and it’s why music that grooves like it was born for the dance hall forges connections that lead to cerebral overdrive.  Instruments organic and electric weave a tapestry rich with detailed imagery, and trip hop beats and wavering melodicism skew the final manifestation of modern jazz architecture, a misshapen masterpiece willfully shaking off attempts at categorization.  The space age music often sounds like a stowaway on a Sun Ra emergency liftoff, but the pulsing drones and darker wavelengths hint at the grounded, doped up dreams of a Spacemen 3 instrumental.  The Heliocentrics like their collaborations with vocal artists, and hooking up with Barbora Patkova‘s mesmerizing delivery on their newest release continues a successful run.  Patkova can belt it out when needed, but when she matches the ensemble’s intensity with restraint, her voice resonates like a summer sun.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Brian (Shankar) Adler – Radioactive Landscapes (Circavision Productions)

Brian Adler has been quietly releasing some intriguing little albums in 2017.  Their duration implies EPs, but the fullness of their vision indicates something greater.  This quirky set with vibraphonist Matt Moran, pianist Santiago Leibson, guitarist Jonathan Goldberger and bassist Rob Jost never really settles into a decisive sound, and instead flutters about endlessly.  The result is a work thick with imagery, laid open to the wildest interpretations.  Adler’s use of varied percussion, from drum sets to tablas to metal sculptures adds more textures, as does his occasional use of studio effects.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Alexander Hawkins – Unit[e] (Self-Produced)

Perhaps the most compelling quality of the music of Alexander Hawkins is how wide open it feels even though it’s dense as hell via composition and ensemble instrumentation.  The pianist and composer doesn’t ever do anything normal, even avant-garde, which often comes off as quite embraceable under Hawkins’ direction.  This sprawling set is comprised of two different recording sessions and two different ensembles.  The first is a sextet, and it has flavors of traditional jazz mixed in with the modern fare.  The second recording session doubles the ensemble size and speaks to freer expressions of jazz language.  It also has some pretty thrilling live electronics matching wits with an ensemble heavy on the wind instruments and generous with the strings.  Violinist Dylan Bates, saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings, trumpeter Laura Jurd and clarinetist Alex Ward are just some of the all-stars making this all happen.  So good.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

A Tree Grows – A Tree Grows (Rufftone Records)

There’s something very appealing about how subdued things get on this set from keyboardist Emanuel Ruffler, saxophonist Tivon Pennicott, bassist Rashaan Carter, drummer Russell Carter and trumpeter Duane Eubanks.  Working the beats or digging into a groove doesn’t generate a sweat, and when they instead turn their attention solely to the crafting of melody, the focus is on the detailing and not on some huge statement.  There’s some exuberance displayed on “Wau Wau Water” and “Youngblood,” but more often than not, the tunes bubble along contentedly.  Even the songs themselves seem to exist without any grand motivation to spur them forward; each track behaves as an isolated idea or concept that’s given brief life to express itself before moving onto the next.  In many ways, this recording is a bird-of-a-feather with Jeff Parker’s The New Breed, an album that always was pleasantly subdued in the way it expressed a nicely varied personality.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Akku Quintet – Aeon (Morpheus Records)

Akku Quintet has a talent for finding that sweet spot where improvisation gives ambient music an authoritative voice, and where a peaceful drone logically builds to a fiery crescendo.  It isn’t until the second half of their new album that they reach that crescendo.  They open Aeon with a variation on pop music, where catchy hooks don’t necessarily lead to the expected destination.  It’s that kind of thing that keeps the album interesting, though it might also be attributed to the long, winding roads that guide the melody as far as it will go without forever breaking the bonds connecting it to its original articulation.  The personnel have changed a bit over the years, but the core of drummer Manuel Pasquinelli, keyboardist Maja Nydegger and guitarist Markus Ischer all contributed to Akku Quintet’s excellent 2013 release Stages of Sleep, which I still find time to sneak into my listening queue from time to time (go read about it).

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp | Amazon

Here’s some new music I like.  I wanted to give these albums a mention, no matter how brief.  Let’s begin…

Leah Paul – We Will Do The Worrying (Skirl Records)

I first got turned onto the music of flautist Leah Paul back in 2012 with her excellent release Bike Lane.  On a cold winter day, her music sang with a voice of Springtime and it felt like she’d discovered a way to encode sunshine into the DNA of MP3 files.  Her newest release shows her infatuation with string trios (thankfully) hasn’t diminished, but she expands the sonic textures by inviting on board clarinetist Chris Speed, vibraphonist Nick Mancini and vocals from Afton Hefley.  The crisp intonations of vibraphone is particularly resonant with all the thick harmonies blanketing each piece.  And though not wordless, there’s a harmonic quality to the vocals that’s strangely reminiscent of the ambient soundscapes of vocalist Julianna Barwick.  And, seriously, you need to give Bike Lane a listen (check it out on Bandcamp).

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Sly5thAve – Composite (Tru Thoughts)

I’m a sucker for ingenious reinterpretations of pop songs, and this new EP from jack-of-all-trades Sylvester Uzoma Onyejiaka II (aka Sly5thAve) is certainly that.  Re-arranging and orchestrating songs by Frank Ocean, Rihanna, Gabriel Garzón-Montano, Lil Wayne and Drake, Onyejiaka II reveals facets and potential in the originals as if documenting a day-by-day recreation of each song’s alternate life in a parallel universe.  His production work in the studio is pretty damn marvelous, but the contributions of the ClubCassa Chamber Orchestra gives the music its heart and soul.  Worth noting that he’s also collaborated on a similar project for Herbie Hancock’s Headhunters work, so if you like this, now you know where your next step should take you.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Bruno Heinen & Camerata Alma Viva – Changing of the Seasons (Babel Label)

This isn’t just another reinterpretation of Vivaldi’s Four Seasons. It’s a hypothesis on how the original would have sounded were Vivaldi alive & kicking in the modern day.  Bruno Heinen joins up with the Camerata Alma Viva ensemble for the lovely jazz-classical work.  And while it’s a fascinating endeavor when viewed in the context of the original compositions, enjoyment of this recording doesn’t hinge on a familiarity with the album’s inspiration.  There’s a pleasant synthesis between the pianist’s jazz improvisations and the large ensemble’s warm harmonics and melodic acrobatics.  Heinen has a thing for thematic challenges such as these, and one other example, his release Twinkle, Twinkle received a slot on this site’s Best of 2012 list.

Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp – Amazon

Stuart Popejoy – Pleonid (Leo Records)

It’s seriously fascinating how this recording sounds both completely improvised and mathematically coordinated all at the same time.  It’s not so much a jazz-classical crossover work as music that embodies the spirit of the motivations that drives those forms of expression.  This one-hour continuous work from composer-bassist Stuart Popejoy, violinist Sarah Bernstein, vibraphonist Kenny Wolleson, alto saxophonist Avram Fefer and trombonist Steve Swell never stops surprising, feels nearly endless, then is over far too soon.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Here’s some new music I like.  I wanted to give these albums a mention, no matter how brief.  Let’s begin…

RMV Trio – Desde la lluvia (CHT Records)

The more I listen to this trio set from pianist Yago Vázquez, bassist Pablo Menares and drummer Rodrigo Recabarren, the more I’m taken by the seamless method in which the trio shifts between South American and NYC articulations.  Regardless the direction they take, the trio offers up resonant melodies that sparkle and shine bright and effortlessly fall into place with the particular rhythmic approach of the moment.  These modulations often happen within the span of a single song, which amplifies the marvel of the subtle transformations that much more.  Carlos Lobo adds a solid spoken word contribution with some García Lorca poetry, and that’s just one example of the lovely nuance of this under-the-radar recording.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Dominic Lash Quartet – Extremophile (Iluso Records)

Everything about the sophomore recording of bassist Dominic Lash gives the impression of being stuck in between.  There’s the sense that midway through a transformation from one type of jazz expression to another, the quartet looked around at the environment of its transitory state and said, yeah, we’ll just hang out here from now on.  It’s why no one particular school of jazz ever takes precedence over its counterparts and none ever sound fully fleshed out.  This isn’t a case of something old and something new coexisting peaceably… this fascinating album presents facets never fully realized and, consequently, always full of intrigue and leaving the ear guessing.  The flirtation with the blues in “Mr. S.B.” and the vague post-bop of “Fumeux Fume” are equally misshapen as the guitar splatters of “Puddle Ripple,” the animal whines of “Pálpito” and the rock ‘n drone of “Slailing.”  The album is in a perpetual state of change, frozen in time.  Pretty damn cool, that.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp

Eskelin Weber Griener – Sensations of Tone (Intakt Records)

I’ve always found the music of Ellery Eskelin particularly enchanting.  But this isn’t your typical fairy tale enchantment, because the saxophonist typically immerses himself in sounds more akin to the poison apple… nutritious, refreshing, and prone to rewiring your brain in accordance with devious schematics.  The nutritious part of that equation is that he often roots himself to the blues, even in the midst of heavy avant-garde expressionism.  It’s why this trio set with bassist Christian Weber and drummer Michael Griener makes logical sense as a project theme.  They alternate between traditional and free music forms, and often let the contradictory approaches commingle.  And when the result is a state of unison, no matter how unsteady it may be, seeing the connecting points between the different schools of thought is more than a bit revealing.  Also, just in terms of musicianship, it’s a pleasure to hear these guys just go to town.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

Chip Wickham – La Sombra (Lovemonk)

There’s an intriguing blend of spiritual jazz tone and hard bop groove on the debut release of Chip Wickham.  The saxophonist-flautist is a veteran of the scenes, all scenes, as the decades see him contributing to the work of everybody from Matthew Halsall to Badly Drawn Boy.  Originally part of the Manchester scene and then to Madrid and now in Doha, Qatar, the geographical changes are emblematic of the nuance with which Wickham’s quartet alters its style from piece to piece without causing a sea change in sound.  When Wickham modulates his flute to mirror the icy tones of vibraphone, the music resonates like crazy.  Same can be said when he switches over to sax and matches the galloping strides of piano.  At year end, when the various Best Of lists hit the streets, there’s gonna be a writer or two that includes La Sombra in their top ten.  That inclusion won’t be considered a reach.

Artist site | Listen | Buy:  Bandcamp – Amazon

My Name is Nobody – My Name is Nobody (Self-Produced)

An easy-to-like session from drummer Ben Vanderwal, pianist Tom O’Halloran and guitarist Lucky Oceans.  It’s that last instrument that sketches out the personality of the recording, via Oceans’ pedal steel and National guitars, as well as a number of guests bringing in other varietals of the stringed instrument.  There’s also some mild electronics and production applied tastefully… modifications that would fall under the category of atmospherics.  Sometimes the music is a vague sort of folk-jazz and other times it hits a mainstream tone.  There’s a few tracks that lead to the observation that perhaps a little editing would’ve been greatly helpful to the album overall, but that criticism is outnumbered by some very enjoyable tunes.  A nice view of music coming from the Perth, Australia scene.

Artist site | Listen | Buy: Bandcamp