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Jazz Articles about Tom Skinner
Tom Skinner: Voices Of Bishara Live
by Chris May
Best known in the U.S.A. as a member of the late Sons Of Kemet and now The Smile with Radiohead's Thom Yorke and Jonny Greenwood, Tom Skinner has been a vital presence on London's underground jazz scene for twenty years. Yet remarkably, only in 2022 did the drummer and composer release his first album under his own name. Voices Of Bishara (International Anthem) featured Skinner alongside four friends and fellow radicals, tenor saxophonists Nubya Garcia and Shabaka Hutchings, playing together ...
Continue ReadingRuth Goller: Skyllumina
by Chris May
The Italian-born, British-based bassist and composer Ruth Goller has been rattling jazz's cage since 2007, the year she joined Acoustic Ladyland. The band was in the vanguard of what became known as “jazz punk," although its sound was closer to metal than classic punk, and the lineup included tenor saxophonist Pete Wareham and drummer Sebastian Rochford. Four years later, Acoustic Ladyland disbanded and Goller and Wareham morphed into Melt Yourself Down, where they were joined by tenor saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings ...
Continue ReadingTom Skinner: The Son Of Kemet Shines A Light
by Chris May
Tom Skinner has been a vital presence on the alternative London jazz scene for close on twenty years. Yet, remarkably, only now in November 2022 is the drummer and composer releasing his first album under his own name. Voices Of Bishara features Skinner alongside four friends and fellow radicals: tenor saxophonists Nubya Garcia and Shabaka Hutchings, playing together on record for the first time, cellist Kareem Dayes and bassist Tom Herbert. As jazz supergroups go, this lineup would be hard ...
Continue ReadingTom Skinner: Voices Of Bishara
by Chris May
Voices Of Bishara is one of the top three jazz albums of 2022 so far and it would take the second comings of John Coltrane, Charles Mingus, Horace Silver and Lee Morgan to threaten to dislodge it. Before going into the particulars, the backstory.... An epically cross-genre drummer, Skinner has lit up avantist British jazz and related musics for around twenty years. He emerged among the cohort of musicians loosely grouped around the self-help collective F-IRE (Fellowship ...
Continue ReadingWildflower: Better Times
by Karl Ackermann
The ground-breaking London trio Wildflower features bassist Leon Brichard, saxophonist Idris Rahman, and drummer Tom Skinner of the group Sons of Kemet. Brichard and Rahman are founding members of Ill Considered. Similar in style, the music of Wildflower has the fundamentals of post-minimalism, hard bop, and free improvisation. Spiritual and powerful, Better Times mostly lives up to its title, even while leaving the frustrating sense of an unkept promise. An outstanding reed player on the hot London jazz ...
Continue ReadingSons of Kemet: Black To The Future
by Chris May
Sons Of Kemet is led by tenor saxophonist, clarinetist and composer Shabaka Hutchings who, though he is far too modest to make any such claim himself, is the de facto standard-bearer for the new wave of musicians who have emerged on the London jazz scene since around 2015. The band is one of three Hutchings either leads or co-leads which are signed to Impulse!. The other two are the cosmic-fusion trio The Comet Is Coming and Shabaka & The Ancestors, ...
Continue ReadingWildflower: Season 2
by Karl Ackermann
On paper, the UK trios Wildflower and Ill Considered bear an obvious resemblance. Each features the outstanding reed player Idris Rahman and bassist Leon Brichard, and both groups are groove-oriented progressive jazz. Wildflower is the slightly more melody-driven and the less raw of the two bands, with intricate improvisations interwoven throughout. Season 2 sees Rahman altering moods with his interchanging of the bass clarinet, bamboo flute, and his trademark tenor saxophone. Rahman is well-known in Britain for his ...
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