Multiple Reviews
Two Great Composers From Decades Apart
by John Eyles
Although the Another Timbre label was originally set up in 2007 to release recordings of improvised music--its very first release was The Contest of Pleasures by John Butcher, Axel Dorner and Xavier Charles--it did not take long for it to be releasing recordings of modern compositions... The label's tenth release, Lost Daylight, was played by John Tilbury on piano and comprised five compositions by Terry Jennings and one by the late John Cage. It was not long until the label ...
Continue ReadingHat Hut Records at Fifty
by John Eyles
The three albums below are some of the ezz-thetics and First Visit album releases that arrived in 2025 adorned with a sticker featuring a large 50 on it plus the explanation, “celebrating 50 years of Hat Hut records." Rewinding fifty years, we find that Hat Hut was founded by Werner X. Uehlinger in 1975, the first Hat Hut release being Black Magic Man by a Joe McPhee quartet which had been recorded live in concert at Vassar College, New York, ...
Continue ReadingPrestige Rara Avis: Kenny Burrell and Frank Wess
by C. Andrew Hovan
Over the past decade, music lovers and jazz collectors have enjoyed a wealth of opportunities thanks to the ongoing vinyl renaissance. Back in the 1980s and '90s, Fantasy Records became a favorite among enthusiasts with its Original Jazz Classics series, reissuing nearly a thousand titles from its vast catalog, which included Prestige, Riverside, and Contemporary. After going dormant for a time following Concord's acquisition of the vaults, Craft Recordings revived the OJC imprint in 2023 with a slate of meticulously ...
Continue ReadingDreams And Dust: Two From Pianist Izumi Kimura
by Ian Patterson
2025 will go down as a busy year for Ireland-based, Japanese pianist Izumi Kimura. The first half of the year served up the solo album Butterfly Effect (Codama Records) and Glacial Voyage (Between The Lines)--the latter a free-form duo collaboration with guitarist Christy Doran. Both albums favored explorations of mood and textures over virtuosity. Two further collaborative albums once again find Kimura on improvisational terrain, though they are quite different in character. Taken together, these albums are windows onto Kimura ...
Continue ReadingRyan Lee Crosby, Kent Burnside and Garry Burnside: Blues As A Way Of Life
by Doug Collette
The eternal appeal of the blues lies in the attraction it holds to successive generations of musicians and music lovers. And such connections are not necessarily grounded in blood relations, as is the case with Kent and Garry Burnside, but also in the bonds of mentorship as with Ryan Lee Crosby: while there are more than a few breeding grounds for genre seeds, Mississippi's Hill Country and beyond may be the most fertile. Promising durability in these efforts and in ...
Continue ReadingVince Guaraldi’s Charlie Brown: Jazz Impressions and Good Sport
by Mark Sullivan
Everyone knows the Vince Guaraldi soundtrack A Charlie Brown Christmas (Fantasy Records, 1965). However, Guaraldi composed and performed music for many other Peanuts-related projects, two of which have been recently released. They represent the beginning and end of the journey: Jazz Impressions of a Boy Named Charlie Brown was recorded in 1964, one year before the broadcast of A Charlie Brown Christmas; 1975's You're a Good Sport, Charlie Brown was the penultimate soundtrack Guaraldi recorded before he died in 1976. ...
Continue ReadingOpa and The Blackbyrds: Coveted 1970s Jazz-Funk
by Mark Sullivan
Opa released only two albums before disbanding in the early 1980s. While neither of their albums found commercial success during their initial releases (despite the high-profile personalities involved), both titles gained underground followings over the following decades. The Blackbyrds' City Life celebrates its golden anniversary. “Happy Music," the dancefloor-ready title track and the group's heavily sampled signature hit, “Rock Creek Park" are the showpieces. The LP re-releases are a gift to DJs and samplers who have had to do serious ...
Continue ReadingGrateful Dead: The Music May Never Stop
by Doug Collette
The keepers of the Grateful Dead vault, overseen by chief archivist David Lemieux, must have been hard pressed to adequately commemorate the sixtieth anniversary of the iconic band's formation. After all, the recognition of the half-century milestone a decade ago found the curators homing right in on the most distinctive aspects of the group's thirty-year history with 30 Trips Around the Sun (Rhino, 2015). In a reflection of the psychedelic warriors' own often inscrutable sense of logic, Lemieux ...
Continue ReadingMatthew Shipp: On The Ascent
by Doug Collette
The simultaneous release of two markedly different efforts documents pianist/composer Matthew Shipp's arguably inevitable ascent into the upper echelons of contemporary jazz. The man's rise to prominence has been inexorable to be sure, but all the more laudable for the slow but steady nature of his journey. As such, the arc of Shipp's career not surprisingly mirrors his musicianship: virtually without exception, playing alone or with others, he invariably takes his time to explore the possibilities of the material as ...
Continue ReadingPhil Haynes: Electricity Incarnate!
by Doug Collette
In the annals of jazz both short-term and long, the influence of drummer-led initiatives is immeasurable. There is Art Blakey and his Jazz Messengers, of course, plus Tony Williams' Lifetime and, in addition, numerous single-minded efforts like these two coincidental releases of Phil Haynes. Each is a largely freewheeling exercise in revisitation gestated during COVID lockdowns: Transition(s) is Haynes' reunion with one-time frequent jam partner guitarist Ben Monder, while Return To Electric constitutes a reprise of earlier excursions into vintage ...
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