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Three-Layer Cake: Sounds The Color Of Grounds
by Mark Corroto
The trio of Mike Watt, Brandon Seabrook and Mike Pride began as a pandemic-era experiment, exchanging music files remotely to create Stove Top (RareNoise, 2021). Now, as Three-Layer Cake, they return with Sounds The Color Of Grounds, a record that reveals a fully realized and cohesive jazz-punk--or perhaps punk-jazz--ensemble. Watt, etched into punk rock's Mt. Rushmore, co-founded the Minutemen with D. Boon in 1980, and later formed fIREHOSE in 1986 following Boon's tragic death. Never confined by genre, ...
Continue ReadingJon Irabagon: I Don't Hear Nothin' but the Blues Volume 3 Part 2: Exuberant Scars
by Hrayr Attarian
Saxophonist Jon Irabagon is a master improviser who routinely creates provocative and moving works. Exuberant Scars, the fourth episode in his I Don't Hear Nothin' But The Blues series is no exception. Irabagon is joined by like-minded musicians on a single, 46-minutes long, spontaneously created piece. Drummer Mike Pride, who has appeared on all four I Don't Hear Nothin' But The Blues, opens the performance with chiming percussion and splashing cymbals. He sets a cinematic ambience. Irabagon's breathy ...
Continue ReadingJonathan Mortiz & Mike Pride: Summertime
by Mark Corroto
Sumertime by the duo of Jonathan Moritz and Mike Pride highlights the distinction between paying attention and attention paid. The former deals with concentration, while the latter concerns awareness or consciousness. With this release or any free improvisation experience, immersion prevails over comprehension. In other words, dig the view instead of building a camp here. Mortiz's saxophone has been paired with Pride's drums in several groups, with Ken Filiano and Nate Wooley, the Jonathan Moritz Trio, and the ...
Continue ReadingJon Irabagon: I Don't Hear Nothin' but the Blues Volume 3 Part 2: Exuberant Scars
by Mark Corroto
Besides being a wunderkind in jazz and improvised music, is Jon Irabagon also a kind of math aesthete? Specifically, does he sometimes dabble in chaos theory? Within the apparent randomness of complex improvised music of Exhuberant Scars, Irabagon finds underlying patterns, interconnections, feedback loops and musical self-organization If one is keeping score, Exhuberant Scars is volume 3, part 2 of Ibragon's I Donʼt Hear Nothinʼ But The Blues (IDHNBTB) series. The concept began as a duo with drummer ...
Continue ReadingJeremiah Cymerman: Body of Light
by Mark Corroto
Body Of Light by clarinetist and composer Jeremiah Cymerman is an album, a collection of recordings that make up a complete work. Cymerman's underlying message here is for the listener to consume these 42 minutes of sound not as four individual tracks but as one whole. Those who are familiar with his music, such as Systema Munditotius, Vol 1 (5049 Records, 2020) and Decay of the Angel (5049 Records, 2018), will know that he works in complete blocks.
Continue ReadingAcceleration Due To Gravity: Jonesville
by Pierre Giroux
Bassist, composer and arranger Moppa Elliott's uniquely-titled nonet Acceleration Due To Gravity presents Jonesville a gravity- defying jazz odyssey. It pays a captivating homage to influential bassist Sam Jones by weaving a sonic tapestry which transcends the boundaries of conventional jazz. In this brief seven-track, twenty-one-minute outing, four compositions are by Elliott, with the remainder being Sam Jones' originals. The members of the octet who participated in this unusual musical excursion are trumpeter Bobby Spellman, trombonist Dave Taylor, alto saxophonist ...
Continue ReadingMoppa Elliott's Acceleration Due To Gravity: Jonesville
by Mike Jurkovic
Whatever 'script renegade bassist/composer Moppa Elliot takes on a daily basis, he should be made to share with the rest of the world. Whatever that tonic, whatever that pill, whatever that gumbo scented elixir is, let us have it now. Elliot may not want to open up his private stash to the public, but he sure knows how to let it fly in the music he and his nonet--Acceleration Due to Gravity--put forth on the rightly raucous and ...
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