Music Reviews

The mystery is why this 1959 Riverside recording wasn't released until 1964, and even then, according to Craft Recordings, only in the U.K. True, Riverside was essentially a jazz label, but then why record Hooker in the first place unadorned if not to release it? Hooker had been recording electric blues for Vee-Jay but Riverside wanted acoustic and in fact released in 1960 The Country Blues of John Lee Hooker recorded at the same sessions that produced this... Read More

For the initiated this project has mostly existed as a collection of poorly bootlegged video clips on YouTube. That is, unless, you ponied up for the 2010 archive release of Band On The Run, which included a polished DVD version of this 1974 documentary. But now Macca, ready to embark on yet another age-defying batch of live dates, has made these sessions official.So across two LPs (or two CDs), One Hand Clapping finally comes out of the bootleg protection program... Read More

Musicians from Handel to Jackson Browne to Philip Glass to The Beach Boys, to name but a few, have had water on their minds, which is not the same as having water on the brain. True, Glass only got as far as the beach, but that's close enough. Add bassist/composer Stephan Crump to the list. He's recorded two albums with the Rosetta Trio, an unusual grouping of bass and two guitars. Here, he's composed a sixty seven minute long suite for an... Read More

David Bowie’s self-produced 1974 album Diamond Dogs is undoubtedly the worst of his run from Hunky Dory through Scary Monsters (Pin Ups doesn’t count). As a messy exit from his glam period, it compiles ambitious ideas with less than ideal execution, yet in a sense, it still seems unfairly maligned.Everyone knows the story by now: Bowie, on stage at the Hammersmith Odeon in 1973, “killed” Ziggy Stardust and thus freed himself for whatever came next. Ready for even... Read More

If you’re looking for 35 minutes of riveting calm, this is the album for you. And if “riveting calm” strikes you as oxymoronic, well, the album fits that in several ways. It consists of duets between trumpeter Wadada Leo Smith and pianist Amina Claudine Myers, both 82 years old but as youthful in spirit as anyone around. They’re veterans of the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians (AACM), known for its avant-garde jazz artists, but Myers has long... Read More

Until 1972, David Robert Jones’ career was a classic case of trial and flaw. After fronting various R&B groups in the mid-1960s with no success and avoiding confusion with the Monkees’ Davy Jones, he changed his last name to Bowie and embarked on a career under his new name. Testing various musical grounds to see what worked, his early output ranged from a music hall-tinged eponymous debut album to a novelty single about a laughing gnome. Bowie hit paydirt in 1969... Read More

Bill Minkowski's excellent annotation sets the stage. For various reasons both musical and otherwise Jaco and Joe Zawinul had a falling out and Jaco chose to devote more time to his Word of Mouth big band project (referred to a few times in the notes here as the "World of Mouth" big band). There's more detail in the annotation but the main result of the falling out was that Weather Report went one way and Pastorious (and drummer Peter Erskine) went... Read More

The "Ben Webster Quintet" was really Webster plus the Oscar Peterson Trio of Peterson, Herb Ellis and Ray Brown—a grouping Peterson once said was "the most stimulating"—plus Stan Levey on drums. It was a busy time for the Peterson Trio, which had played the previous day with Louis Armstrong in a session that probably resulted in Louis Armstrong Meets Oscar Peterson, though for some reason that wasn't released until 1959. The next day the trio... Read More

Let’s get it out of the way: Dhani Harrison sounds a lot like his father George, except that he doesn’t sound like him at all. That’s a very "Beatley" way to begin the conversation, which lives within Dhani Harrison’s musicianship: the musical roots of his father are everywhere to be found, however Dhani has his own voice and musical vision.Though Dhani has a new album and project coming, his last solo release - Innerstanding (Hot Records/BMG) - released in... Read More

Within a marathon 12-hour recording session at London’s Regent Sound on October 16, 1969, four young men from Birmingham recorded one of the most influential debut albums ever. There were barely any overdubs and not an abundance of takes, just four guys playing their live set together in a room with enough time to make it to the pub for last orders and head to Switzerland to play a gig (true story!). Black Sabbath figured they were adding an edgier twist to the... Read More

One would think The Lemon Twigs were captured in a time capsule from the ‘60s and brought into the 21st century. Consisting of brothers Brian and Michael D’Addario, the duo craft retro-sounding rock with influences derivative of baroque, indie, glam, and power pop. It is ludicrous for any modern artist with an obvious trace of influence from decades past to be dubbed as “passé.” The Lemon Twigs manage to take every cliche of the genres they explore into one giant... Read More

In September 1968, The Doors embarked on a European tour, performing two sets per night (twelve shows total) over fourteen days across five countries. Things were off to a solid start with two consecutive nights at London’s legendary Roundhouse, followed by a stop in Frankfurt. Matters got hairy in Amsterdam when Jim Morrison went on a drug binge and was hospitalized, leaving the group to carry the shows out as a trio. Morrison recouped well enough for Copenhagen two... Read More

In October 1957, Sonny Rollins was booked for a two month gig at New York City jazz club, The Village Vanguard. Though widely regarded as the most innovative and important saxophonist in jazz, Rollins was, in his own words, "so disillusioned with myself that I was afraid to hear myself." At the Vanguard, he was leading his own band for the first time and searching for a way to play jazz that was freer and more expressive than the bebop style of harmonic... Read More

For a quick musical pick me up you can't beat War. The group was born during Vietnam war time and now with this release and others, has another lease on jazz-funk life during more war time. Has there ever been a time without it? The story behind the group is at least as interesting as the music is invigorating, so much fun and on top of it all, super-well recorded.If you're of a certain age you remember these catchy as crabs cowbell infected tunes blaring... Read More

Anton Bruckner’s (1824-1896) Symphony No. 4 in E-flat Major, premiered in 1881, is the composer’s most popular “early” symphony, with numbers 7, 8, and the incomplete 9 being the usual headline works. It was also his first major success as a composer, before which Bruckner's renown was mostly as an organist and counterpoint instructor. Bruckner dedicated this work to Austro-Hungarian royal, Prince Konstantin, who was a major financier of cultural life in Vienna... Read More

Even for Tom Waits, The Black Rider is eccentric if not downright weird. He was already making odd records, but at least Bone Machine or Swordfishtrombones have identifiable rhythmic structures and some coherent melodies. Here, you’ve got intentionally grating train whistles and William S. Burroughs guiding you through what sounds like an early 20th century rendering of hell. More than any other Waits album, The Black Rider must be heard as a full record to even make sense; otherwise, it sounds like some raving lunatic is about to attack you.

Harry Belock blew a huge wad of cash on Everest Records, trying to "surpass" Capitol Records both in recording technology, and in quality of repertory. But, to quote John Maynard Keynes, the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent. So, here's a priceless moment in time, forever frozen in amber; or rather, frozen on 35mm magnetic film.

Collaborations by Aerosmith/Run DMC and Anthrax/Public Enemy bridged the gap between rock and rap. By the early 2000s, Linkin Park became the poster boys of the nu-metal movement. The muscle of Chester Bennington’s passionate vocals and Brad Delson’s crunchy guitar riffs juxtaposed Mike Shinoda’s rapping and Joe Hahn’s sampling/scratching, with bassist Dave Farrell and drummer Rob Bourdon gluing it all together. To say this fusion was a mild success is an... Read More

As part of its 60th anniversary celebration, Nonesuch Records is reissuing several of its albums on vinyl for the first time, among them one of the greatest recordings by the Kronos Quartet, which happens to be marking its 50th year as an ensemble.The album is Black Angels, the label’s 6th Kronos album, released in 1990 and still among the most jarring and important in the entire Nonesuch catalogue and in the Kronos discography.Nonesuch and Kronos made a perfect... Read More