Jazz Articles about Nate Wood

About Nate Wood

Album Review

Testimonianza del tour europeo del 2025 (replicato anche quest'anno con alcune date italiane) Live in Europe presenta l'Euro-American Quartet del contrabbassista Billy Mohler nella versione che meglio ne esalta la spiccata comunicatività e il creativo interplay, ossia la dimensione dal vivo presente su questo--disco pubblicato dalla Dox Records--grazie alla registrazione di due concerti, alla BimHuis di Amsterdam e al Carambolage di Bolzano. Le composizioni di Mohler nascono sempre dalle linee del suo contrabbasso per poi integrarsi con il ...

Album Review

Donny McCaslin: Lullaby for the Lost

Read "Lullaby for the Lost" reviewed by Neil Duggan

by Neil Duggan
September 11, 2025

Saxophonist Donny McCaslin and his band's collaboration on David Bowie's final album Blackstar (ISO Records, 2016) marked a pivotal moment in McCaslin's career. Following Bowie's death just two days after the album's release, McCaslin transitioned from being a well-respected jazz musician to achieving international recognition. His band's innovative contributions helped make Bowie's final album a critically acclaimed late-career highlight. Since then, McCaslin's brand of innovative, contemporary jazz fusion has continued breaking through barriers to define a distinctive sound ...

Album Review

Trio Grande: Urban Myth

Read "Urban Myth" reviewed by Mario Calvitti

by Mario Calvitti
July 1, 2024

Il chitarrista israeliano Gilad Hekselman si è da tempo distinto come uno degli interpreti moderni più interessanti del suo strumento con i suoi vari progetti solistici, e anche questa recente collaborazione lo conferma. Il trio denominato Trio Grande è stato formato dal chitarrista nel 2019 insieme al sassofonista e tastierista Will Vinson e al batterista Antonio Sanchez, e lo stesso anno ha registrato un album omonimo pubblicato nel 2020 in piena pandemia, il che ha impedito al gruppo di esibirsi ...

Album Review

Billy Mohler: Ultraviolet

Read "Ultraviolet" reviewed by Vincenzo Roggero

by Vincenzo Roggero
April 8, 2024

Aveva spiazzato tutti con Focus, album del 2019 nel quale riuniva alcuni degli improvvisatori più in vista della scena jazz statunitense, in controtendenza rispetto alla sua fama di produttore e songwriter per leggende della musica pop, rock, R&B e country, di vincitore grammy e di compositore per importanti campagne pubblicitarie. Parliamo di Billy Mohler, bassista dai molteplici talenti, che con UltraViolet presenta il medesimo quartetto, e che quartetto, che aveva dato seguito all'esordio con l'altrettanto apprezzato Anatomy. ...

Album Review

Louis Cole: Quality Over Opinion

Read "Quality Over Opinion" reviewed by Scott Lichtman

by Scott Lichtman
February 18, 2024

Louis Cole is a chameleonic genius--merging beats, samples and catchy tunes across styles ranging from “metal-funk-fusion" to “pastoral falsettos." His loose incorporation of jazz traits, including syncopation, funk keys and sophisticated horn arrangements, has yielded new validation with a Grammy 2024 Best Alternative Jazz Album nomination for Quality Over Opinion (originally released in 2022). Cole plays fluid keys, guitar, drums, sings and produces. There are twenty pieces on Quality Over Opinion. Practically every tune--the majority clock-in at under ...

Album Review

Billy Mohler: Anatomy

by John Chacona
July 2, 2022

Can we please retire the old cliché about jazz from Los Angeles being limp, wan and bland? One listen to pianist Cameron Graves' slamming metal-jazz or to the jittery complexity of David Binney's recent releases should be enough to torch that outdated canard. Now comes bassist Billy Mohler with Anatomy, 43 minutes of amped-up, torqued-out energy that pulses with the elevated heart-rate of first-wave punk rock. That's no accident. Mohler is a pop music pro, a Grammy nominee ...

Album Review

Ben Wendel: High Heart

Read "High Heart" reviewed by Mike Jacobs

by Mike Jacobs
October 30, 2020

If Ben Wendel's fifth outing as a leader High Heart shows anything, it's that the saxophonist is ever advancing. While this may seem a fait accompli for a card-carrying member of the shapeshifting collective Kneebody, Wendel's worthy solo efforts have been notably more in a traditionally-sounding vein and thus his innovations were perhaps a bit less readily evident to ears acclimated to that other side of his resume. And yes, by comparison to Kneebody, High Heart still tacks toward a ...