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Soft Machine: Softs
by John Kelman
The last several years have seen the bulk of legendary British group Soft Machine's original recordings reissued: some available after years out-of-print; all receiving sonic upgrades as definitive as they'll likely ever get. Still, Esoteric Recordings' Mark Powell gave all the love he could to Sony's reissue of the group's classic Third (1970), but its marginal ...
Soft Machine: Land of Cockayne
by John Kelman
Three years after Alive & Well: Recorded in Paris (Harvest, 1978), Britain's Soft Machine suddenly resurfaced momentarily with Land of Cockayne. Given the experimental nature of its glory days and a latter-day fusion masterpiece in Bundles (Esoteric, 1975), it's understandable why Cockayne has historically been considered Soft Machine's dullest moment. But time heals all wounds, and ...
Jeff Berlin: Still the Ace of Bass
by John Patten
Through the course of a four-decade career, Jeff Berlin has refused to end his musical quest. He crafted a popping, percussive style so thoroughly ingrained in the recordings of the 1980s, it's nearly ubiquitous. His work with Bill Bruford, whom he met during a stint with Yes, led to further innovations in playing.More recently, ...
Soft Machine: Bundles
by John Kelman
If the recent discovery of NDR Jazz Workshop (Cuneiform, 2010) demonstrated that the once considered “transitional" 1973 line-up of British psychedelia-cum-electric-avant- jazzers Soft Machine was, indeed, a fine enough standalone unit, then Esoteric's near- concurrent reissue of 1975's Bundles proves that the addition of guitarist Allan Holdsworth lit one serious fire beneath that same group. Back ...
Soft Machine: NDR Jazz Workshop - Hamburg, Germany May 17, 1973
by John Kelman
Every year it seems that more archive material is unearthed from Soft Machine, the legendary British group that began life in Dadaist psychedelia, but wound down as a powerhouse, chops-centric, fusion outfit at the end of the 1970s, with stops in more complex writing and free jazz territory along the way. As influenced by minimalist composers ...
Don Rendell Ian Carr Quintet: Live at the Union 1966
by John Kelman
During its five-year run, the Don Rendell Ian Carr Quintet was one of the UK's premiere small ensemble jazz groups. Five albums on Columbia didn't hurt either, from 1965's Shades of Blue through to 1969's Change Is, where dissention ultimately resulted in the band's dissolution. Sometimes it's for the best, though; saxophonist/flautist Rendell continued on in ...
Bozzio, Holdsworth, Levin, Mastelotto: Amped In Amsterdam
by Phillip Woolever
Terry Bozzio, Allan Holdsworth, Tony Levin and Pat Mastelotto Paradiso Amsterdam, The Netherlands April 8, 2010 Instrumental mastery was the only rhythmic constant for an experimental exercise that paid off in uncharted realms. Drummers Terry Bozzio and Pat Mastelotto, along with guitarist Allan Holdsworth and bassist Tony Levin, looked ...
John McLaughlin and The 4th Dimension: John McLaughlin and The 4th Dimension: To The One
by John Kelman
After two studio albums that fell into the category of special projects--the large-casted but surprisingly cohesive Industrial Zen (Verve, 2005) and synth-laden Floating Point (Abstract Logix, 2008), where the iconic guitarist flipped his past concerns of playing eastern music with a western sensibility by recruiting a largely Indian group to play some very western fusion--John McLaughlin ...
Take Five With Matt Stevens
by AAJ Staff
Meet Matt Stevens: Matt Stevens is a musician and composer from North London. An instrumental artist, he uses an acoustic guitar and a sampler to create multi-layered tracks live. This is often called Live Looping. His music is compared with artists as diverse as John McLaughlin and Sigur Ros. He plays live all over ...
Chris Jentsch: Cycles and Reflecting on the Journey
by Ludwig vanTrikt
John Coltrane once said, “Let the music speak for itself." The guitarist/composer and band leader Christopher Jentsch adds an interesting twist on that subject by opting to describe himself when asked about the broader subject of how to capture his music in his own words. “I think of myself as a composer/guitarist working with contemporary improvisational ...
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