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Seun Kuti and Fela's Egypt 80: Many Things
by Chris May
Few musical styles have been so completely defined by their originator as Afrobeat has been by the Nigerian singer, songwriter, band leader, saxophonist, organist, club and record company operator, polemicist and agitator, Fela Anikulapo Kuti. Since Kuti's death in 1997, few musician's other than Kuti's drummer in Afrika 70, Tony Allen, have stepped forward convincingly to ...
Aaron Parks: Invisible Cinema
by Chris May
Best known for his five-year tenure with trumpeter Terence Blanchard, pianist Aaron Parks is the second Blanchard graduate to debut under his own name on Blue Note in 2008. His disc follows percussionist Lionel Loueke's Karibu (Blue Note, 2008), a fitfully engaging album flawed by trying too hard. Invisible Cinema by contrast is a corker, a ...
Wes Montgomery: The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery
by Chris May
Ask a dozen jazz guitar fans for their all-time top guitar albums and The Incredible Jazz Guitar of Wes Montgomery is likely to be high on every list. If it isn't, chances are Montgomery's live set Full House (Riverside, 1962), recorded two years later, will be. With these discs, Indianapolis-born Montgomery (1923-68) gave the guitar its ...
Richard Galliano: Love Day: Los Angeles Sessions
by Chris May
French-Italian accordionist Richard Galliano began recording for the Milan label in the mid-2000s, since when he's released two tango-based albums, Luz Negra (Milan, 2007) and Live In Marciac (Milan, 2007), made with his Tangaria Quartet. Galliano's Love Day: Los Angeles Session finds him returning to another love, new musette, a jazz-inflected recalibration of the bal-musette cafe ...
John Ettinger / Pete Forbes: Inquatica
by Chris May
With practically no warning, violinist John Ettinger burst out of the San Francisco Bay area scene and towards national cult status in 2006 with Kissinger In Space (Ettinger Music, 2006). The album--made with tenor saxophonist Tony Malaby, bassist Devin Hoff and drummer Scott Amendola--announced Ettinger as a thrilling new voice in creative jazz and made an ...
Rhythms of the City: Rhythms of the City
by Chris May
Led by saxophonist and percussionist Barak Schmool, Rhythms of the City was one of first bands to emerge from London's newly formed F-IRE (Fellowship for Integrated Rhythmic Expression) collective in the late 1990s. Starting life as a samba drumming group, it has since added splashes of salsa, funk, soca and hip hop to create ...
Carver Trio: Broken Sleep
by Chris May
Here in the UK, roughly once a year, an album emerges from the cross-genre margins with enough novelty appeal to attract a mainstream audience and enough integrity to interest jazz listeners. Last year it was the Portico Quartet's Knee Deep In The North Sea (The Vortex, 2007), whose novelty appeal came with the inclusion ...
Joe McPhee / Lisle Ellis / Paul Plimley: Sweet Freedom - Now What?
by Chris May
The older you grow, the more conservative you get and the safer the parameters you set yourself; or so conventional wisdom has it. Now within a whisker of his 70th birthday, multi-instrumentalist Joe McPhee doesn't so much defy the cliche as explode it; still stretching his music, still protesting against injustice. Sweet ...
John Coltrane: Dakar
by Chris May
Often cited as saxophonist John Coltrane's first album as leader, Dakar--recorded on April 20, 1957--is a usurper. Originally credited to the Prestige All Stars (and released as part of a short-lived experiment with 16-rpm discs), it was only credited to Coltrane on its re-release in 1963, when the saxophonist's star was firmly in the ascendant. The ...
Wolfgang Muthspiel 4tet: Earth Mountain
by Chris May
A guitarist who moves at a pace through a variety of styles, from ambient, fusion, straight-ahead and post-rock to experimental jazz, Wolfgang Muthspiel sometimes returns to his projects, typically with a twist. Collaborations with oud player and singer Dhafer Youssef and drummer Brian Blade have already been winningly revisited. Having worked on Youssef's Electric ...
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