The Most Exciting Jazz Albums since 1969: 2020-2023

In the 72 Jazz Thrillers series we've gone from 1969 to 2023, an expansive 54-year journey. From the jazz vanguard of Bitches Brew to the dynamic movie soundtrack of Roy's World, from the sublime guitar of Bill Frisell to the singing guitar of Charlie Ballantine, the thing that all these jazz albums have in common is their amazing listenability, music you can enjoy for years and never get bored. At least I haven't been. Thanks for reading, and I encourage you to check out all of these albums.

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Cold Coffee
Charlie Ballantine
Charlie Ballantine
2020

Charlie Ballantine just may be the best jazz guitarist in the world right now. So, why haven't you heard of him yet? Well, he's been honing his craft for the past 15 years in his hometown of Indianapolis, releasing eight exceptional albums. Playing frequently at the two Indianapolis jazz joints, the Jazz Kitchen and the Chatterbox, Ballantine honed his skills and refined his technique, emerging as a master of his craft. He is most definitely a jazz guitarist, yet his playing reflects influences from country, rock, blues and folk. And boy, can he spin a melody like no one else.

Over the past six years, he's released six albums, all very different: Where is My Mind? (self released, 2017), with originals mixed with standards, Life is Brief: The Music of Bob Dylan (Green Mind Records, 2018), with a dozen Dylan covers, Cold Coffee (self released, 2019), a trio session reviewed here, Vonnegut (Green Mind Records, 2020), a collection of songs inspired by the works of Kurt Vonnegut, Reflections/Introspection: The Music of Thelonious Monk (self released, 2021), a double album—split between a trio and a quartet featuring his wife, alto saxophonist, Amanda Gardier, and finally, Falling Grace (self released, 2022), a quartet with a piano featuring originals and killer covers of "Contemplation" by McCoy Tyner and "Fix You" by Coldplay.

Ballantine just moved to the East Coast and has a new album in the can ready for release in 2024. It wasn't easy to pick a Ballantine album for this series, because, frankly, all his albums are thrilling, but I picked Cold Coffee because it features him in a stripped-down trio at his most penetrating. Two famed standards ("My One and Only Love" and "East of the Sun") are featured in beautiful renditions, but the most thrilling are his originals, three of which open the album with a bang. "Strange Idea" draws on all his talents and styles to great effect with a stinging, bouncing melody. "Zani" has a gentle flow featuring a ringing guitar tone of sublime beauty. Then, the title tune, "Cold Coffee" is a revelation of melody, mood and masterful intensity. Take a hint of tango, cross it with a dash of country, blues and folk, and you have a sound so original and familiar at the same time that it may take your breath away.

The next original, "Further," enters from the mist in a gentle rolling riff, gaining in slow intensity and into a plaintive yearning solo of immense depth. The image is one of angels skating gracefully on ice. Jesse Whitman's steady bass picks up the melody for a few bars and passes it back to Ballantine for a joyous, quietly triumphant close. This song is the thrilling heart of the album. Next, "Bliss" finds Ballantine in an expansive, playful mood, and, while spacious, it boasts a perfect, languid melody. It becomes an ecstatic dance taken to the ends of the universe and back again. The closer, "Moon City" brings us back to earth with a romantic melody of tender, loving beauty and soloing that is full of ardent rapture. Nobody on earth plays quite as truthfully and perfectly as this. (disclaimer: nobody that I've ever heard)

Charlie Ballantine is a brilliant jewel amongst a thousand lesser gems. This album, and in fact, his whole discography is thrilling. The playing is astounding on so many levels. I invite you to dive deeply into Charlie's world. He has a ton of great YouTube Videos as well, with excellent sound. One is featured below.

68

Love
Wildflower
self released
2020

Wildflower is a somewhat kinder and gentler spinoff of Idris Rahman's other luminous band, Ill Considered. The formula is simple: Most songs start with a strong and melodic bass and drum groove by Leon Brichard and Tom Skinner while Rahman improvises over it with one long meandering sax solo that travels the highways byways of inner and outer space. This is the second Wildflower album and is more cohesive and flowing than their initial, self-titled outing. Every song kills, in that the grooves and melodies all assert themselves with gentle power. With seven songs, and just under 36 minutes, we get a full tour of a beautiful, shimmering, dancing world full of rapturous fun.

After the undulating groove of the opener, "Under the Night Sky," you might think it can't possibly get any better. And then "Mirage" opens with a plaintive sax followed by a bass groove that sways like rippling seaweed as the sax dives into the flowing tides of a glistening, underwater world. The groove of "Fire" is hot and urgent, burning through the grass, heading toward the forest until the conflagration is total. "Distant Thunder" opens with a swaying sax verse, mirrored by the bass, repeating the simple melody over and over again like a child's nursery rhyme. Then, the sax explores freer territory. "Rush" returns with a quick, bouncy groove followed by the frantic sax rushing to get somewhere important and as fast as possible. "Light in the Sorrow" is a Zen poem set to music—a search for peace.

The finale, "Where the Wild Things Dance" meets expectations with a hard, four-note groove that pushes a wild, dancing flute, an explosion of nature's spirits, and then overdubbed reeds add to the wildness as the song ends abruptly. There are thrills aplenty in Wildflower's overflowing and passionate Love.

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Americana Vol. 2
JD Allen
Savant
2022

Blues is the foundation of jazz, but much jazz has strayed from the blues. Instead, it has incorporated rock, soul, and even classical music. But this, JD Allen's 18th release, isn't just influenced by the blues, it IS the blues, as blue and as deep as the original blues recordings of the 1930s. Allen employs the talents of Charlie Hunter on guitar, Gregg August on bass and Rudy Royston on drums. All the songs are simple, straightforward blues melodies, but stripped of all ornamentation. They just PLAY the blues. And it is glorious. Allen has never played better, more convincingly, and Hunter is simply a marvel.

Americana Vol. 2 does what all these jazz thrillers do—find a deep groove and play perfectly constructed melodies that stick in your head days later. I believe the blues have healing properties because they make you feel real and deep feelings—sadness, regret, despair and love. For instance, "Mickey and Mallory" is unspeakably mournful, while "The Battle of Blair Mountain" is happily triumphant. "You Don't Know Me," the Eddie Arnold standard from 1955 is a perfect rendition of this song of lost love. Allen has outdone himself on this album, crafting a jazz-blues classic for the ages.

70

In Solitude
SLUGish Ensemble
Slow and Steady
2023

Note that this is an edit of a recent review of this album on AAJ. See the full review here.

This is an extremely satisfying and enjoyable album on so many levels. First of all, it is infused with lovely, dancing grooves. The opener, "Del Sur," sets the pace with a provocative, snakelike bass clarinet solo that falls into place like a song you've known forever. Most of the songs name-check the streets of the Miraloma neighborhood with vistas of San Francisco, where Steven Lugerner lived and walked during the pandemic and where he came to embrace solitude.

"Portola" reflects the hustle of the busy thoroughfare in San Francisco; the start-and-stop traffic is almost visible. It upshifts in the song's back end with a baritone solo as vast as the sky. "Moraga," the album's longest song at over eight minutes, features pianist Javier Santiago in an uplifting groove, while Lugerner, on reeds, travels leisurely through the Inner Sunset on the way to Ocean Beach and a spectacular sunset, while Justin Rock overlays an aching, love-drenched and rock-tinged guitar solo.

"No Justice, No Peace," a tribute to Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd, is the album's most emotional song. Starting off quite dour, it builds momentum and complexity, conveying anguish and solidarity. The final songs, "La Bica," "Juanita," and "Myra," reflect a wide variety of emotions: tranquility, intensity, simplicity, complexity and wonderous beauty.

The languid, melodic grooves seem to burst into a thousand pastel-hued fractals of life-infused joy. Languid is the natural, slow flow of life itself. Somehow, Lugerner and company find that life-affirming groove on every single song and then dance to its ecstatic flow.

Extraordinarily listenable, impossibly deep, In Solitude is a triumph.

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Roy's World
Jason Adaseiwicz
Corbett Vs. Dempsey
2023

I discovered this marvelous album by Jason Adasiewicz the evening before writing this review. Vibraphonist, Jason Adasiewicz has released a scant eight solo albums since 2008, but they have all been engaging, showing great depth of talent and imagination (check out Sun Rooms [Delmark Records, 2010]) However, he's kept himself busy with more than 30 sideman gigs, many in the avant-garde category, but this gem is not only accessible, it is wildly, deliriously entertaining and is also the soundtrack for a movie of the same name. The liner notes explain, "Without a film to cut to, Adasiewicz wrote music aimed at creating a specific set of atmospheres, basically making a record before any footage was chosen." The music works equally well as stand-alone album and as a soundtrack.

The album is a roller-coaster ride and, so far, my favorite album of 2023. It opens with "River Blindness," a cool, swaying blues with a perfectly slinky sax solo by Jonathan Doyle that transports you to a challenging life in cold Chicago in the '50s. "Walkin' To Clinton" is upbeat and bouncy, the two horns dancing in unison. "Do More" is downbeat and moody, with a slow-motion melody of great anguish and beauty. Then "Rudy's Basement" accelerates to a furious pace, conjuring up images of a lot of chaotic (and fun) stuff going on down there with everyone soloing at once. "Blue People" is a down-and-dirty mambo with Adasiewicz on balafon (a wooden xylophone with gourds) in his first stand-alone solo. "Sand" features a bouncing, repetitive rhythm on the sax while Adasiewicz dazzles on the vibes. "Ballad For Kitty" opens with Josh Berman on a searching Spanish-tinged cornet solo that goes to the heart. "Pops" features Berman again in an off-kilter tribute to the trumpet master, Louis Armstrong.

And finally, a gentle reprise of "River Blindness" with just the trio of vibes, bass and drums. It's a wistful farewell to an album that is so dynamic, beautiful and fun that you'll want to play it over and over again.

Roy's World has everything you want in a jazz thriller. What stands out most is the cohesiveness, energy and mastery of a crack jazz band at the top of their game.

72

Other Doors
Soft Machine
Moon in June
Dyad Records
2023

It seems fitting that Soft Machine takes the final place in the 72 Jazz Thrillers series. They put out their first album, The Soft Machine in 1968, then released eight more over an eight-year period (and several live releases over the years), and then went into hibernation for 27 years. They re-emerged as Soft Works in 2003 and then as Soft Machine Legacy in 2005, and finally reverted back to the original Soft Machine name again in 2018. In that time, they released seven studio and four live albums. Over the years, the lineup has varied significantly, but somehow they've maintained that Soft Machine feel and Other Doors may be their very best from this late period.

The Opener, "Careless Eyes," is a beautifully atmospheric tone poem with Theo Travis on reeds and John Etheridge on guitar. That segues into "Penny Hitch," originally on Soft Machine Seven (CBS Records, 1973), with its languid groove and dreamlike melody it soars to the heavens on Etheridge's solo. We're deeply into Soft Machine territory now and enjoying the ride. The title tune reflects the band's prog-rock roots. Every song is fresh, nothing is boring and you get the sense they are excited to make this music. Other highlights include "Joy of a Toy," "The Stars Apart," "Fell to Earth," "Back in Season" and "Backwards" (often played on their live gigs). With the longest song at 8:30 and many in the two-minute range, these 17 pieces feel like a suite, everything falling perfectly into place and nothing overstaying its welcome. Soft Machine has come a long way in 55 years, and this album gives the sense they could go on forever without growing old.

And that my friends are my 72 Jazz Thrillers, from 1969 to 2023. In most cases, I own every album by all of these artists, so these are my very favorites by each of them and they never fail to grab my attention and imagination. Simply put, they thrill me, and I hope some of them will thrill you as well.

To see all the albums in this series, scroll down the page and click on the blue MORE button.

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