New-Jazz: Jazzy, Experimental and Ritual Music

Dimlite - 2010 - Prismic Tops

2010-09-19T03:57:00.000-07:00

Label: Now-Again Records
Catalog#: NA 5060
Released: 04 May 2010
Genre: Electronic, Experimental, Glitch

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“Wonky,” “glitch,” “blip-hop,” “the beat scene;” or – to put it a little more simply - a chorus of bleeps and blurps over disjointed breaks and sampled drums, resounding from smoky bedrooms and teenage myspace pages the world over. When it comes to this particular strain of seemingly new music, much has already been said and written, but very little has actually managed to decipher or to understand it. Dimlite is an artist whose work on the Sonar Kollektiv label allegedly laid the foundations for the current movement, spearheaded by people like Flying Lotus, Hudson Mohawke and Zomby; but it’s only recently that his connection to it has been revitalized and reclaimed.

Dimlite’s music has always been about swimming upstream, dabbling a little in those murky waters of off key sound textures, bringing together elements of darkness and shade. Much like the current crop of beat smiths irking out mixtapes and semi quantized productions there is no recognizable genre tag to mark Dimlite’s work, his sound has - and always will - exist in a wilderness of his own making, measurably isolated from the music of his closest peers

Perhaps his upbringing in rural Switzerland may offer some explanations; although very little personal information exists on the web about the artist born Dimitri Grimm. Locals will tell you he grew up in the countryside in the Swiss-German region of his native land, an area renowned for its spectacular natural beauty, superb cuisine, the impossible kindness and warmth of its villagers and the total and utter lack of any kind of contemporary club scene. Under the surface there is an alternative history however: a lively graffiti movement adorned every otherwise well-kept train station and concrete hard shoulder for miles, and Bern - where Dimlite is rumoured to have been based for a time - has a rich relationship with hip hop, remaining a popular tour-date for modern day hip hop icons such as J Dilla, due in part, no doubt, to the semi-legal availability of high quality marijuana there.

The key recordings that first broke Dimlite were two 12”s, ‘Sponsored By The Alphabet,’ released on the Zurich based label, A Few Among Others, in 2003 and a subsequent 6 tracker entitled ‘A/DD’ for Sonar Kollektiv. ‘Sponsored...’ was an underground smash at the time. Caned hard on the airwaves by Gilles Peterson, its popularity relied heavily on word of mouth as music fans enthused about an artist who sliced samples as thin as miniature cucumber sandwiches, whilst maintaing that Pete Rock bounce, that Marley Marl handclap and a sense of humour plucked straight out of The Goonies. ‘A/DD’ followed suit, quickly becoming a favourite of DJs seeking to bridge the gap between the gulfs of hip hop and electronic music – it was a fresh banger, reminiscent of Detroit hip hop and of what Dabrye had done with Instrmntl a couple of years earlier, but it had an offbeat sensibility all of its own. Dim subverted the beat to a different end, as if he was half Matthew Herbert and half Terry Riley, engineered by Dr Dre.

Dimlite’s production signifiers were born with these records – mechanical clicks, found sounds, distortions and details that make the beats stutter and whirr like mechanical toys; strange interruptions that break the mood sporadically, causing the track to collapse in on itself like a house of cards. Its hip hop, but not the type canonized by tastemaker publications of the time like The Source. It was hip hop for those with a sense of humour and a complete dislike for the banal, much like the work of the aforementioned Hudson Mohawke for Warp Records. With the gift retrospect it comes as no surprise that HudMo is one of Dimlite’s most ardent supporters and that the Glasgow Lucky Me collective has hosted him more times than they’ve had a deep fried mars bar.

Other key moments from Dimlite’s discography to check out would be the albums ‘Runbox Weathers’ and the follow up ‘This Is Embracing,’ both released on Sonar Kollektiv. The former is simply essential, in particular the awesome single ‘Back To The Universe,’ with the flipside ‘In Groups To The Hydrandd’ hitting so hard it could seriously bust your speakers (note: this track is where all that “godfather of wonky” rhetoric began, with the beat in question banging hard enough to move your neck autonomously but sounding puzzling enough to have you pressing rewind over and again to properly sift through the layers). Meanwhile ‘This Is Embracing’ pushes Dimlite’s loosening of the conventions of beat making to the max, with tracks like ‘Lullaby For Gastric Ulcer’ and ‘Cosmic Echoes In The Mockery Room’ sounding like John Cleese’s rubber face expressed as a post-modern work of musique concrete.

And whilst you’re shopping, check out the All City 7” ‘Quiz Tears’ - which seems to have passed everyone by last year; his remixes of the always over-emphasised but still very worthy Flying Lotus, and all the stuff he did under his Dadaist alter ego Misel Quitno, whose dress sense I seriously admire. A sense of fun, a disdain for the obvious and a fart in the face of rhythmic convention is what Dimlite is all about.

Shlohmo - 2010 - Shlomoshun Deluxe

2010-09-10T22:55:00.000-07:00

Label: Friends Of Friends
Catalog#: FOF-004
Format: Digital
Released: 12 Jan 2010
Style: Glitch-Hop, Experimental

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Amon Tobin - Esther's

2010-09-08T10:20:00.000-07:00

Babe Rainbow - 2010 - Shaved (EP)

2010-09-08T10:01:00.000-07:00

Label: Warp Records
Catalog#: WAP291
Format: 12"
Released: 08 Feb 2010
Style: Abstract, Dubstep

Canada's Babe Rainbow makes a bold debut entrance on Warp with the apocalyptic mine-steppin' sound of the 'Shaved EP'. It would appear that the reverberations of dubstep have reached the shores of British Columbia as a muffled clang, rusted with industrial detritus and encrypted with ritualistic tribal percussion. The first shock of Cameron Reed aka Babe Rainbow's sound comes on the sludgy 'Popcommon' sounding like the Substance remix of Monolake's 'Alaska' mixed with Russell Haswell in warm-up mode. 'Screwby' follows, circulating tribal steppers rhythms around marshy subs and banshee screaming atmospherics and 'Combed' lulls us with music box melodies and ghostly string sashays, something like the Caretaker doing a dubstep waltz with Zoviet*France. With 'Care' we're strongly reminded of Shackleton's overcast temperament and rhythmic contours while the final title track evokes images of Scorn-like doom-dub dystopia. Really Strong 12"!!!!

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Discogs, Download (320, 65mb): load2.me

Povarovo - 2007 - Tchernovik

2010-09-06T07:29:00.000-07:00

Released: 2007
Style: dark jazz

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GonjaSufi Discography

2010-09-06T07:13:00.000-07:00

A Sufi And A Killer (2010)

Label: Warp Records
Catalog#: WARPCD172
Format: CD, Album
Released: 08 Mar 2010
Style: Lo-Fi, Psychedelic Rock, Hip Hop, Experimental

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Kobwebz/ Speaketh (Single) (2010)
Label: Warp Records
Catalog#: 7WAP270
Format: WEB, Single
Released: 22 Mar 2010
Style: Leftfield, Downtempo, Psychedelic, Neo Soul

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Kowboyz & Indians (Single) (2009)

Label: Warp Records
Catalog#: WAP269CDP
Format: WEB, Promo
Released: 2009
Style: Abstract, Hip Hop

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Holidays / Candylane (Single) (2009)

Label: Warp Records
Catalog#: 7WAP268
Format: 7"
Released: 02 Nov 2009
Style: Downtempo, Experimental, Neo Soul

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The Herbaliser Biography

2010-07-08T19:30:00.000-07:00

The Herbaliser are one of the more purely hip-hop oriented acts on Ninja Tune's roster of sample-based pocket-funk. Combining deft, mid-tempo beats, well-chosen jazz and funk figures, sparse scratching, and even the odd rap, Herbaliser bridge the gap between dusty B-side instrumental hip-hop and London's new school of psychotropic beat scientists. Formed by Ollie Teeba and Jake Wherry in the early '90s, Herbaliser, unlike many of London's abstract beat scene's acid house-steeped big-name artists, trace their roots to American jazz and funk (Roy Ayers, Johnny Pate, Ramsey Lewis) as well as old-school hip-hop (particularly of the New York variety -- Grandmixer D.ST, Sugarhill, Jungle Brothers). A bass player in acid jazz/funk group the Propheteers, Wherry met local DJ Teeba in South London, where they both lived. The pair assembled a few tracks in Wherry's tiny studio, which they subsequently passed to Ninja Tune bosses Matt Black and Jonathan More (aka Coldcut) in a club. The group were signed to the label shortly after.

Herbaliser released a few warmly received EPs on Ninja Tune in 1994 and 1995 (the hard-to-find Real Killer being the best) before dropping their debut LP, Remedies, which brought both the group and the then up-and-coming Ninja label much attention. While that album capitalized more directly on London's burgeoning underground breakbeat scene, freely mixing styles into a funky, sample-heavy amalgam closer to beat-heavy acid jazz, subsequent singles ("Flawed Hip-Hop," "New & Improved") subtracted the schmaltzier bits from the mix, focusing in and expanding upon the group's hip-hop foundation. Blow Your Headphones, their second LP, presented a solid hour-plus of the same, simultaneously taking aim at U.K. trip-hop's tendency toward gimmick and noodle over depth and kick. Very Mercenary followed in 1999, bolstering the duo's hip-hop foundation, as did 2002's Something Wicked This Way Comes.

The group have provided remixes for artists including DJ Food, Raw Stylus, and label foremen Coldcut's "Atomic Moog," the last of which went to number one on the U.K. singles chart. Wherry has also released solo material through the Parisian Big Cheese label (under the name the Meateaters) and worked with the Propheteers. A touring act as well, Herbaliser assemble a full-blown band for live performances, with Wherry's bass and Teeba's turntable tricks supported by a three-piece horn section and live drums and percussion. That live act gained more influence on their recording activity, seen to small effect on Something Wicked This Way Comes but coming into full flower with 2005's Take London.
© Sean Cooper and John Bush, All Music Guide

8th Wonder - 2001 - Eternal Triangle

2010-05-30T09:02:00.000-07:00

Label: Aphasic Tone
Catalog#: AT 001
Format: 12"
Country: Japan
Date: 2001
Style: Abstract Hip-Hop, Instrumental Hip-Hop

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The Flying Skulls Discography

2010-05-28T21:28:00.001-07:00

Saddle Up (EP)

Since their last album dropped in October, San Francisco’s resident track doctors and improv electronic music innovators The Flying Skulls have been taking time out of their busy touring schedule to hit the studio. Hard. They’ve been sharpening their arsenal of dirty, tripnodic beats for an upcoming opus-of-an-album slated for release in late summer. Luckily three tracks demanded to get out, so we are presenting the Saddle Up EP. The release features a bassy mid-tempo title track, fused with funky synth lines and a driving groove laced with samples that declare western motifs like: “Have gun, will travel.” The EP also features a remix of a classic Skulls track The Dope Trade by two up-and-coming-producers. The first is remixed by one of the premier cutting-edge guitarist/producers on the West Coast, Curtis Sloane of BLVD. He takes The Dope Trade and refits the grooves with that buttery BLVD flavor. The second remix is by Asheville producer Brad Bitt (aka Quetzatl) and is sure to get your trigger finger itchy with it’s hyper edits and crunked-out distorted leads lines! Hopefully these three distinct tracks can hold you over until the LP drops! Cover art by visionary SF painter Ian Hill.

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Take Flight!

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Abducted Vol. 2 (2009)

Label: Daly City Records
Cat#: DCR150
Format: Digital, Single
Date: 29 Sep 2009

he Flying Skulls are at it again! Just months after the world-wide premier of their album "Take Flight!" the Skulls are dropping "Abducted!" a remix album in volumes featuring some of the best West Coast electronic music producers. Volume Two will be available exclusively on Daly City Records, and features remixes from Mochipet, BBQ Chicken Dub, Preshish Moments, Ribotto, and Vladimir Computin, plus art by renown mix media artist Souther Salazar. This marks the first release from the collaboration known as BBQ Chicken Dub, featuring J.Tonal, Snareface, Jerome Forney, and a whole bunch of BBQ chicken. The result? A slow, methodical re-visioning of classic Skulls songs... spicy, tangy, meaty, nu school with shifting basstones... totally off the clock and live. The release also features a remix by Mochipet featuring lyrics and vocals by SF based MC, DJ, and graphic artist The Zap Tap. Mochi pairs his internationally loved mash-up sensibility and palette of exotic sounds with Zap Tap's vocal gymnastics. SF uber-vocalist Audio Angel also graces two tracks, a remix of "Skulls & Angels" by Preshish Moments (2008 SF Laptop/Machine Battle Champ) that contains a frenetic, almost macabre energy, as well as a bass-heavy remix of the same song by electronic band MO2, with Audio Angel riffing over a breaks track with jungly aesthetic.

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Abducted Vol. 1 (2009)

Label: Lowpro Lounge Recordings
Cat#: LPL10
Format: Digital, Single
Date: 29 Sep 2009

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Ella Fitzgerald & Duke Ellington - 1998 - Cote d'Azur Concerts on Verve, 1966 (8CD)

2010-05-28T20:32:00.000-07:00

Label: Polygram
Date: 29 Sep 1998
Format: 8xCD, Box Set, Live

This eight-CD set is a sleek affair, packaged in a plain-Jane, silver-ribbed box with just a peephole in the center. The peephole, though, looks in on the fluorescent jewel cases, each of which faithfully reproduces fantastic Duke Ellington and Ella Fitzgerald sets from July 1966 at France's Cote d'Azur. The Ellington tunes show his orchestra in long form, taking multiple sets (with some tune repetition across the CDs) and thriving in Ellington and Billy Strayhorn's tightly scripted ensemble sections. This is some fairly standard Ellington for the era, with hard-flying solos from Paul Gonsalves and myriad others. What's great is the ability to really dig in to the band, hear it work, set after set, on the tunes and the polyphonic interplay of the ensemble's sections. And then there's the eighth CD, which presents a band rehearsal with Ellington doing what drove some mad: humming sections to instruct the band, calling out key changes quickly and sounding altogether like a practitioner of an oral tradition in musical pedagogy. It's awesome to hear him and the band, banter and all. Then there are the Ella Fitzgerald sets, which are possibly the better portion here. Fitzgerald sounds mightily driven, sometimes almost boundary breaking in her execution. Vocally, she's both tight and loose, brimming with turns of phrase and belting lyrics with popping exactness. The dates caught on this box aren't regarded as the greatest for either of the marquee artists, but in terms of the sheer quality of music and their fullness of vision, Fitzgerald's tunes vie with anything else she did in her career. Sure, many of the tunes are fast and jumping, but their propulsion is largely thanks to Fitzgerald's heightened sense of play. The spiral-bound booklet accompanying this box set is a treat, with all its pop-art slyness and off-the-cuff frankness.

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Download (320, rip from lossless, multiupload): CD1, CD2, CD3, CD4, CD5, CD6, CD7, CD8 (upd: 16 feb 2011)

Bill Evans - The Complete Riverside Recordings (1956-1963) (12CD)

2010-05-28T11:24:00.000-07:00

Label: Riverside
Format: Box Set, 12xCD
Date: 1 Jul 1991 (Original release date 1987)

The span of this 12-CD box set is generally acknowledged as the best Bill Evans material available. That's saying a lot, considering the high quality of The Complete Fantasy Recordings and The Complete Bill Evans on Verve. What the Riverside recordings display is a young Evans discovering his revolutionary harmonic depth and improvisational genius with bursts of energy that, by his second session, had established a kind of moody intensity that seemed to deepen the music while making it at once more complex and easier to absorb. Evans's Riverside years encompass his early dynamos: Everybody Digs Bill Evans is resplendently here, as is the material from Sunday at the Village Vanguard and Waltz for Debby. So, too, are sessions with Cannonball Adderley, Jim Hall, and Zoot Sims. Through it all, Evans remains firmly planted in a winding style that's creatively unstoppable and visceral in its intensity. One could write hundreds of pages about these 12 CDs. Instead, you should indulge their dozen-plus hours.

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Discogs, Download (320, rip from lossless, multiupload): CD1: 1956-1958, CD2: 1959, CD3: 1959-1961, CD4: 1961, CD5: 1961, CD6: 1961, CD7: 1962, CD8: 1962, CD9: 1962, CD10: 1963, CD11: 1963, CD12: 1963 (upd: 16 feb 2011)

Bill Evans Biography

2010-05-28T10:26:00.000-07:00

Bill Evans (1929-1980)

Who Was Bill Evans?
Bill Evans, one of the most influential and tragic figures of the post-bop jazz piano, was known for his highly nuanced touch, the clarity of the feeling content of his music and his reform of the chord voicing system pianists used. He recorded over fifty albums as leader and received five Grammy awards. He spawned a school of "Bill Evans style" or "Evans inspired" pianists, who include some of the best known artists of our day, including Michel Petrucciani, Andy Laverne, Richard Beirach, Enrico Pieranunzi and Warren Bernhardt. His inescapable influence on the very sound of jazz piano has touched virtually everybody of prominence in the field after him (as well as most of his contemporaries), and he remains a monumental model for jazz piano students everywhere, even inspiring a newsletter devoted solely to his music and influence.

Yet Bill Evans was a person who was painfully self-effacing, especially in the beginning of his career. Tall and handsome, literate and highly articulate about his art, he had a "confidence problem" as he called it, while at the same time devoted himself fanatically to the minute details of his music. He believed he lacked talent, so had to make up with it by intense work, but to keep the whole churning enterprise afloat he took on a heroin addiction for most of his adult life. The result was sordid living conditions, a brilliant career, two failed marriages (the first ending in a dramatic suicide), and an early death.

Origins
Bill Evans was born in Plainfield, New Jersey, in 1929, of a devout Russian Orthodox mother and an alcoholic father of Welsh origins, who managed a golf course. Evans' Russian side accounts for the special feeling many of his Russian fans have for him that he is one of them. Bill received his first musical training in his mother's church; both parents were highly musical. He also held a lifelong attachment to the game of golf.

Bill began studying piano at age six, and since his parents wanted him to know more than one instrument, he took up the violin the following year and the flute at age 13. He became very proficient on the flute, although he hardly played it in his later years. Proficiency at these instruments in which great emphasis is laid on tonal expressiveness, might have encouraged Evans to seek the similar gradations of nuance on piano. He did, of course, thereby extending the expressive range of jazz piano.

Evans' older brother Harry, two years his senior, was his first influence. Harry was the first one in the family to take piano lessons, and Bill began at the piano by mimicking him. He worshipped his older brother and tried to keep up with him in sports too, and was devastated by his death in 1979 at the age of 52.

By age 12 he was substituting for his older brother in Buddy Valentino's band, where at one point he discovered a little blues phrase by himself during a stock arrangement performance of "Tuxedo Junction." It was only a Db-D-F phrase in the key of Bb, but it unlocked a door for him, as he said in an interview, "It was such a thrill. It sounded right and good, and it wasn't written, and I had done it. The idea of doing something in music that somebody hadn't thought of opened a whole new world to me." This idea became the central one of his musical career.

Also, by the late 40s Evans considered himself the best boogie-woogie player in northern New Jersey, according to an interview with Marian McPartland on the radio show Piano Jazz. That was the musical rage at the time; later, however, Evans rarely played blues tunes in his performances or on his recordings.

Evans' Reading Habits
Evans' mother was an amateur pianist herself and had amassed piles of old sheet music, which the young Bill read through, gaining breadth and above all speed at sight reading. This enabled him to explore widely in classical literature, especially 20th century composers. Debussy, Stravinsky, notably Petrouschka, and Darius Milhaud were particularly influential. He found this much more interesting than practicing scales and exercises, and it eventually enabled him to experience broad quantities of classical music. As he told Gene Lees, "It's just that I've played such a quantity of piano. Three hours a day in childhood, about six hours a day in college, and at least six hours now. With that, I could afford to develop slowly. Everything I've learned, I've learned with feeling being the generating force." (Lees, Meet Me, p. 150). And as he later told Len Lyons, playing Bach a lot helped him gain control over tone and to improve his physical contact with the keyboard (Great Jazz Pianists, 226).

College and After
Evans received a music scholarship to Southeastern Louisiana College (now Southeastern Louisiana University) in Hammond, Louisiana, where he majored in music, graduating in 1950. There is an archive there now dedicated to him administered by Ron Nethercutt. His professors faulted him for not playing the scales and exercises correctly, although he could play the classical pieces perfectly with ease. In college he discovered the work of Horace Silver, Bud Powell, Nat King Cole and Lennie Tristano, who was to have a profound influence on him. He also participated in jam sessions with guitarist Mundell Lowe and bassist Red Mitchell. After college he joined reedman Herbie Fields' band. It was in this last position that he learned to accompany horn players. After that he spent 1951 to 1954 in the army, during which he managed to gig around Chicago. Upon his discharge he decided to pursue a jazz career and settled in New York. There he worked in the dance band of clarinetist Jerry Wald and saxophonist Tony Scott, and became known as an exceptional player in musicians' circles. His first professional recording was made accompanying singer Lucy Reed in 1955, and in 1956 he joined George Russell's avant-garde band and began studying Russell's Lydian Chromatic Concept.

First Recording as Leader

In 1956 Mundell Lowe called Orrin Keepnews at Riverside and prevailed upon him and his partner Bill Grauer to listen to a tape of Evans over the phone. This was highly unusual, but Keepnews and Grauer heard enough to convince them they had to record Evans. But first they had to convince him! The very self-effacing Bill Evans didn't believe he was ready to record, and Keepnews and company had to persuade him to the contrary. The atmosphere in the studio was relaxed. Evans had chosen Paul Motian, his drummer with Tony Scott, and Teddy Kotick, an excellent young bassist, who had already worked with Charlie Parker and Stan Getz. They recorded 11 pieces in a single day in September of 1956-it was Riverside's money saving policy-including four Evans originals: "Five," "Conception," "No Cover, No Minimum," and the eventual classic "Waltz for Debbie." This last tune was one of three short (under 2 minutes) piano solos Evans recorded after the other members were dismissed. The album, entitled "New Jazz Conceptions" was a critical success, winning Evans very positive reviews in Down Beat and Metronome (by Nat Hentoff). But it only sold 800 copies in a year.

Gaining Experience
As a sideman that year and the next he also recorded with trombonist Bob Brookmeyer, trumpeter Art Farmer, and reedmen Lee Konitz and Jimmy Giuffre, vibest Eddie Costa, and avant-garde conductor-composer (-pianist) George Russell, whose Lydian harmonic system Evans had found very useful. That year he also met Scott LaFaro, while auditioning him for a place in an ensemble led by trumpeter Chet Baker. Evans was impressed by the young bassist, whom he found overflowing with almost an uncontrolled energy and creativity. When Evans later chose LaFaro for his own trio he found that LaFaro had his talents under better control.

During a concert at Brandeis University in 1957, which combined written-out classical style music and jazz improvisation (before Gunther Schuller had founded the "third stream" movement, which claimed to do just that) Evans distinguished himself during a long solo on George Russell's "All About Rosie." Schuller and Russell were part of the event, along with jazz bassist Charles Mingus, Jimmy Giuffre and composers Milton Babbitt and Harold Shapiro. The solo constituted the announcement of the arrival of a new major talent, which his subsequent recordings would soon confirm.

Miles Hires Him
Evans' big break, though, came when Miles Davis hired him shortly thereafter, putting him in a rhythm section behind John Coltrane and Cannonball Adderley in addition to himself. Miles' former pianist, Red Garland, had walked out on him, and Miles needed someone more versatile anyway. He was looking for a player who could handle modal playing, and Evans was it. He had met Evans through George Russell, with whom Evans was studying.

A performance of the Ballet Africaine from Guinea in 1958 had originally sparked Miles' interest in modal music. Miles had very big ears and was always listening for new musical currents, both inside himself, from his past, and to new sources fellow musicians brought him. This African music, which featured the finger piano or kalimba, was the kind of music which stayed for long periods of time on a single chord, weaving in and out of consonance and dissonance. It was a very new concept in jazz at the time, which was dominated by the chord-change based music of bebop, which was really an extension of the American popular song. Miles realized that Evans could follow him into modal music. Moreover, Evans introduced Miles to Rachmaninoff, Ravel and Khachaturian, revealing new scales to him and generally expanding his appreciation for classical music.

Miles found Evans a very quiet, self-effacing person, so he wanted to test Evans' musical integrity. After all, Evans was the only white guy in a powerful, prominently black band. Miles needed to see if he would be musically intimidated, so he said to Evans one day,

"Bill, you know what you have to do, don't you, to be in this band?"

He looked at me puzzled and shit and shook his head and said, "No Miles, what do I have to do? I said, "Bill, now you kow we all brothers and shit and everybody's in this thing together and so what I came up with for you is that you got to make it with everybody, you know what I mean? You got to f... the band." Now I was kidding, but Bill was real serious, like Trane [John Coltrane].

He thought about it for about fifteen minutes and then came back and told me, "Miles, I thought about what you said and I just can't do it, I just can't do that. I'd like to please everybody and make everyone happy here, but I just can't do that. I looked at him and smiled and said, "My man!" And then he knew I was teasing. (Davis, 226)

So Evans passed the test. Here's why Miles liked Bill's playing:

Bill had this quiet fire that I loved on piano. The way he approached it, the sound he got was like crystal notes or sparkling water cascading down from some clear waterfall. I had to change the way the band sounded again for Bill's style by playing different tunes, softer ones at first. Bill played underneath the rhythm and I liked that, the way he played scales with the band. Red's [Garland] playing had carried the rhythm but Bill underplayed it and for what I was doing now with the modal thing, I liked what Bill was doing better. (Davis, 226)

Evans made 10 albums with Miles in less than a year they were together, February to November, 1958. But Evans was uncomfortable in the group after seven months. He wanted to form his own-so did Adderley and Coltrane. They would all eventually become leaders in the field, and Miles' group, despite the fact that it was at the top of the jazz field, was hemming them in. In addition, Evans disliked all the travelling, and the harrassment he was getting from black fans about being the only white musician in the group was getting to him-it was disturbing to Miles too. There was also the annoying criticism that he didn't play fast enough or hard enough, that his playing was too delicate.

Evans' Second Album as Leader

Evans had his second outing as a leader, once again for Riverside, in December 1958. He had officially left Miles' group by that time. For this recording he chose Miles' drummer Philly Joe Jones, with whom he worked many times after that, and Dizzy Gillespie's bassist Sam Jones (no relation), who went on to a longterm relationship with Cannonball Adderley. The influence of his stay in Miles' band is clear from his driving version of "Night and Day" as well as his choice of and performance on the hard bop tunes "Minority" by Gigi Gryce and "Oleo" by Sonny Rollins.

The real classic during that session is his original "Peace Piece," which was originally conceived as an extended introduction to Leonard Berstein's standard "Some Other Time." It became a jazz standard, and he performs it during a 6 minute 41 second piano solo on the album. The tune is based on a succession of scales, which the player extends at will before going onto another scale, a new kind of balance at the time between structured and free (although similar in concept to Indian ragas) The tune, therefore, would never be played the same way twice.This is the nature of a free piece: the structure as well as the melody is unique to each individual performance occasion.

Along with the more driving swing in this album came a more personal, more nuanced touch. Evans was moving away from the dominant influences of his jazz formation-Bud Powell, with his extended horn lines, and Horace Silver, with his bluesy percussive approach-and toward the sound that would characterize his mature years. It testifies to a large amount of exploration and growth in the 26 months between the two recording sessions, including the assimilation of the influence of Lennie Tristano's long flowing lines into his playing.

Since the stint with Miles had only benefited Bill's reputation, Keepnews decided to title the album Everybody Digs Bill Evans and put testimonials from Davis, George Shearing, Ahmad Jamal and Cannonball Adderley on the cover. Issued in May, 1959, it sold much better than the first one.

Miles Davis' Kind of Blue
Nonetheless, Evans played on Miles' breakthrough Kind of Blue album (recorded in March-April 1959), even though he had been replaced by Wynton Kelly by then. Miles had planned the session around Evans' playing. According to Miles, Wynton Kelly combined what he liked in Evans with what he had liked in Red Garland, and Kelly actually played on one tune on this album, "Freddy Freeloader." The album grew, as did so many of Miles' projects, out of a musical impression floating in Miles' mind, in this case that Ballet Africaine, mentioned above, combined with some gospel music he had heard as a six year-old in Arkansas.

That feeling had got in my creative blood, my imagination, and I had forgotten it was there....So I wrote about five bars of that and recorded it....But you write something and guys play off it and take it someplace else through their creativity and imagination, and you just miss where you thought you wanted to go. I was trying to do one thing and ended up doing something else. (Davis, 234)

Miles wrote only sketches for the session, in order to tap into his musicians' spontaneity, and with no rehearsals. It worked so well that everything was accepted on the first take. Evans applied his deep musical integrity and imagination to the task, as Miles said, "Bill was the kind of player that when you played with him if he started something, he would end it, but he would take it a little bit farther. You subconsciously knew this, but it always put a little tension up in everyone's playing, and that was good" (Davis, 234).

Yet the collective result did not correspond with Miles' original inspiration. The album was acclaimed as a masterpiece, but Miles told people he had missed getting what he wanted. Perhaps he got more; perhaps he never could have gotten it given the degree of freedom he gave his powerful sidemen. Recognizing his articulateness about music, Miles had Evans write the liner notes for the album. Evans summarizes the spontaneous process in the purest possible light, an ironic contrast to Miles' mix of intentions, realization and frustration:

There is a Japanese visual art in which the artist is forced to be spontaneous. He must paint on a thin stretched parchment with a special brush and black water paint in such a way that an unnatural or interrupted stroke will destroy the line or break through the parchment. Erasures or changes are impossible. These artists must practice a particular discipline, that of allowing the idea to express itself in communication with their hands in such a direct way that deliberation cannot interfere.

The resulting pictures lack the complex compositions and textures of ordinary painting, but it is said that those who see well find something captured that escapes explanation.

Every procedural and structural element in this description has its analogue in jazz, and this statement could well stand as Evans personal artistic manifesto. "Ordinary painting" could well refer to classical music.

Bill Evans on His Own Development

Evans was extremely aware about every factor in his music and musical development, making him one of the most articulate jazz musicians on the scene. Throughout his career he did numerous interviews, which not only document his views on a variety of musical subjects, but offer us his eloquent thinking voice. One of the clearest messages he gave dealt with his own development, its difficulties and the rewards of those difficulties:

I always like people who have developed long and hard, especially through introspection and a lot of dedication. I think what they arrive at is usually...deeper and more beautiful...than the person who seems to have that ability and fluidity from the beginning. I say this because it's a good message to give to young talents who feel as I used to. You hear musicians playing with great fluidity and complete conception early on, and you don't have that ability. I didn't. I had to know what I was doing. And yes ultimately it turned out that those people weren't able to carry their thing very far. I found myself being more attracted to artists who have developed through the years and become better and deeper musicians. (Williams, n. p.)

Evans once told Gene Lees right out that he didn't think he had much talent, and later that he had to work on his harmonic concept so much because he "didn't have very good ears" (Lees, Meet Me, 151-2).

Evans' Chord Voicings

Although he rarely talked about them, Evans was the main person responsible for reforming jazz voicings on piano. A voicing is the series of notes used to express a chord. Up until that time chords had been expressed either by spelling the chord, with root, 3rd, 5th, 7th and sometimes 9th, or with a selection of these notes. Bud Powell had pioneered the so-called "shell" voicings or alternations between outer and inner notes of a chord, that is root-7th or 3rd-5th or 3rd-7th.

Evans abandoned roots almost entirely to develop a system in which the chord is expressed as a quality identity and a color, with the root being left to the bassist, or to the left hand on another beat of the measure, of just left implied. The system has become quite widespread, and a student can find it explained in any number of books on jazz piano theory and technique. But Evans had to derive them from composers like Debussy and Ravel and make a standard system out of them so they could be used unconsciously, automatically, and in doing so he transformed jazz piano.

The Piano Trio Concept: Equality of Instrumental Voices

From there Evans launched into a career characterized mostly by trio recordings. His concept of the trio was a much more egalitarian one than the one prevalent at the time. Evans gave the bassist and drummer more active roles than most rhythm section sidemen in trios, with a resulting greater degree of interplay among the musicians. He made a series of live recordings at the Village Vanguard in 1961, embodying this principle. These remain among his best recordings, featuring Scott LaFaro on bass and Paul Motian on drums. Evans, who was normally very critical of himself was quite pleased with these recordings. In them he also reveals his prediliction for the waltz, which would be a constant throughout his career.

When bassist Scott LaFaro died tragically later that year in a car accident at age 23, these recordings took on even more significance as his memorial. Evans did not record for almost a year while mourning for LaFaro. During the rest of his career Evans searched for LaFaro's equals on bass. He may have found them later in Eddie Gomez and Marc Johnson.

Awareness of His Stylistic Identity and Its Influence

Evans maintained that he was not aware of the importance of his influence on jazz piano, although he finally believed it, after hearing it so many times. He saw his own style as simply the necessary one to express what he wanted to express. Here's how he explained it:

First of all, I never strive for identity. That's something that just has happened automatically as a result, I think, of just putting things together, tearing things apart and putting it together my own way, and somehow I guess the individual comes through eventually....I want to build my music from the bottom up, piece by piece, and kind of put it together according to my own way of organizing things....I just have a reason that I arived at myself for every note I play (Enstice and Rubin, 139-140).

Evans on One's Personal Sound

As a corollary to a musician's stylistic identity, one eventually develops one's own unique sound. This may be very difficult to define, although easily recognizable by ear. Not everyone has one. "I think having one's own sound in a sense is the most fundamental kind of identity in music," said Evans.

But it's a very touchy thing how one arrives at that. It has to be something that comes form inside, and it's a long-term process. It's a product of a total personality. Why one person is going to have it and another person isn't, I don't know why exactly. I think sometimes the people I seem to like most as musical artists are people who have had to-they're like late arrivers....They've had to work a lot harder...to get facility, to get fluency...Whereas you see a lot of young talents that have a great deal of fluidity and fluency and facility, and they never really carry it any place. Because in a way they're not aware enough of what they're doing. (Enstice & Rubin, 140)

Bill Evans' Mature Style

Evans' mature style has been such a pervasive influence in jazz piano over the past thirty years that in many ways it is almost undetectable. We can speak of his highly nuanced touch, his melodic shapes, and his chord voicings and still be at a distance from the essence of his sound. To clarify this essence it is useful to isolate and describe the elements of his style, which other pianists have picked up with different degrees of fidelity to Evans, and then see what is left to Evans alone.

At the most general level, jazz pianists today tend to sound more like Evans than they do like his two great piano predecessors and influences, Bud Powell, and Lennie Tristano. Like Evans and unlike Powell and Tristano, the contemporary style utilizes a greater proportion of shaped phrases than continuous lines; it utlizes a greater proportion of chromaticism and non-major scale modes than Powell certainly; and it utilizes Evans' chord voicings as a point of departure for its harmonic conception. After this, approaches to touch, harmony, and melodic shape are highly individualized.

At closer stylistic proximity to Evans are the members of his "school," mentioned above, whose playing makes direct reference to his style. In the work of these pianists you will hear more frequently such typical Evans traits as moving inner voices, fleet block chord melodies, rhythmically truncated melodic lines which leave the listener in mid-air, scalar passages-especially diminished scales-in thirds, and his poignant harmonies, including reharmonizations and original tunes with harmonic structures similar to those Evans used.

Yet when you listen closely to the recordings of Evans himself you hear things not present even in his closest followers, for example, the fine gradation of touch that offers up emotional nuance at a truly surprising level of sensitivity. Any of Evans' external figures can be imitated, even nuances of touch, but that's just the surface structure of his music. The key to the uniqueness of his sound which is immediately identifiable and has never been perfectly duplicated by anyone, lay deep within his aesthetic consciousness. Putting into perspective how he arrived at his sound offers a clue to the nature of this consciousness, this emotional intention expressed musically, which is the deep engine of his music and accounts for its uniqueness.

Evans' Internal Musical Engine

We know Evans disliked exercises, avoided playing them; that he read quickly and accurately an enormous amount of classical (and other) printed music, and performed it perfectly; that he stressed that he played nothing without feeling; and that he felt he had arrived at his mastery and hallmark sound the long way around, not by imitating anything, or by any method other than the assimilation of enormous amounts of music. From this perspective a finger exercise would be an unacceptable short-cut, since it would remove the player from the emotional potential of music by unacceptably isolating technique from feeling. By taking the time to refuse to do this during his entire formation Evans recreated jazz piano for himself, and by extension for the rest of the field.

Personal students of Evans say that he would never spell out anything he did for them: chord voicings, fast passages, whatever-you just had to figure it out if you really wanted it. But Evans wasn't just being difficult: he was insisting on the same standards of authenticity for his student as he claimed for himself. But that leaves us with a paradox. If it is impossible through mere imitation for anyone to recreate Evans' style without his internal engine which invested every musical gesture with his emotional content; then by taking Evans' route, by playing no music without an investiture of emotion, the student would necessarily formulate a unique musical personality different from that of Evans.

Of course, this is what Evans, the teacher, wanted. We didn't need any more Bill Evanses. His teaching approach challenged the student to be as deep and as original as he was.

Effects of Evans' Style

But having said this, what can Bill Evans' music accomplish, given its expansive emotional charge and infinitely fine nuances of touch? In a word: intimacy. His music manages to address an attentive listener's inmost private thoughts, so close to the thinking and feeling organ that you are not sure if you are producing the effects or if the music is. When you emerge from the intense and delicate reverie the music has induced the rest of jazz piano may sound unbearably coarse-even Evans' followers. It may take you a while to reset in order to be able to appreciate the separate musical personality of a different player. But you will have felt the power of Evans' aesthetic purity, and when appreciated under the proper conditions, it is awesome.

Many people have had this experience and become devoted fans, wondering all the while if anyone else knew what they were experiencing. Yet this is the paradox of music that achieves intimacy. It offers the illusion that it is addressing itself solely to you. Lees describes it at the beginning of his article.

Evans Meets His Long-Term Manager

Jazz writer Gene Lees, a personal friend of Evans, was in 1962 leaving an editorial post at Down Beat. He had recently met manager Helen Keane and formed a strong personal relationship with her, insisting that she hear Bill Evans. But Evans already had managerial contracts, in fact, two of them, which constituted an official mistake by the musicians' union. First Lees brought Keane to hear Evans. He was playing at the Village Vanguard. Marlon Brando and Harry Belafonte owed their starts to her, and Lees realized Keane could work wonders on Evans' career. As soon as she heard the first few seconds she said, "Oh, no, not this one! This is the one that could break my heart." But she was willing to do it.

Then Lees set up lunch with the president of the union, a personal friend of his, and presenting the conflict, asked him to cancel both of the existing contracts.

His Drug Habit

Evans had been sinking into a heroin habit in the late 50s, and by the time Helen Keane entered his life in 1962 it was in full bloom. He was married, and his wife Ellaine was an addict too. Evans habitually sought to borrow money from friends, every day calling a string of his friends in his address book from a telephone booth on the street outside his apartment, since his phone had been disconnected. Many became infuriated at being contacted again and again for money. One day when Lees blew up at him, saying he didn't even have enough for himself to eat, Evans called back an hour later to say he now had enough for both of them to eat.

His friends were afraid to withhold all money from him, because then he'd go to the loan sharks who'd threaten to break his hands if he didn't pay. At one point his friends, including Lees, Helen Keane, Orrin Keepnews, and his new producer Creed Taylor decided to withhold cash from him, while directly paying his bills, and they appointed the reluctant Lees to break the news to Evans.

Lees found Evans in his apartment, where the electricity had been shut off, but he got around that by running an extension cord from a hallway light under the front door. Evans was furious at his friends' scheme and angrily described the importance of his habit to him, as Lees relates:

"No, I mean it," he said. "You don't understand. It's like death and transfiguration. Every day you wake in pain like death and then you go out and score, and that is transfiguration. Each day becomes all of life in microcosm" (Lees, Meet Me, 156).

It was an elegant, aestheticized account of the process that was destroying him. Lees says that later after Evans was clean he claimed to have learned something valuable from his addiction: tolerance and understanding for his father's alcoholism. This leaves volumes unsaid, of course, namely the devastating effect on Bill's confidence of having an alcoholic father, and the unmet childhood needs which resulted in his own self-destructive addiction. At least he didn't have children during the time he was hooked.

Orrin Keepnews found it difficult to turn down Evans' request for money because of "the sweetness of his nature and his immense moral decency," unlike certain other musicians whose turpitude made him easy to turn down. But Bill would just wait there in the Riverside office until Keepnews would relent and give him some cash.

But when Helen Keane got Evans signed to Verve and negotiated a large advance from producer Creed Taylor, Bill took the money and meticulously paid back everyone what he owed them. He came by for Lees in a cab and went from apartment building to apartment building, with Lees holding the cab, armed with his cash and card file, and took care of all his debts. At the end he reimbursed Lees $200 for pawning his record player and some of his records. He had even went so far as to find Zoot Sims in Stockholm and gave him $600, a sum which Sims had simply forgotten about.

Overdub Albums

In the winter of 1962-63 Evans came up with the idea for his first multi-track solo piano album. Although overdubbing had been used before, specifically by guitarist Les Paul and Mary Ford (Paul had also pioneered the electric guitar), and by Patti Page, it had never been used quite like this. Neither producer Creed Taylor, nor Lees or Keane-who constituted the Evans inner circle at the time-knew quite what Bill had in mind. But Evans knew exactly. Nowadays, overdubbing and digital editing are standard procedure and are used to produce most popular music. Today the techniques are used to build a piece bit by bit, permitting numerous takes of each track and minute editing changes. But back then, with analogue tape running at 30 ips, the artist had to have a complete global grasp of everything before he laid it down. Evans was used to this level of conception. Once he had the session the way he wanted it, his friends were amazed:

The four of us in the control booth-Ray [Hall, the engineer], Creed, Helen, and I- were constantly openmouthed at what was going on. On the second track Bill would play some strangely appropriate echo of something he'd done on the first. Or there would be some flawless pause in which all three pianists were perfectly together; or some deft run fitted effortlessly into a space left for it. I began to think of Bill as three Bills: Bill Left Channel, Bill Right, and Bill Center.

Bill Left would lay down the first track, stating the melody and launching into an improvisation for a couple of choruses, after which he would move into an accompanist's role, playing a background over which Bill Center would later play his solo. His mind obviously was working in three dimensions of them simultaneously, because each Bill was anticipating and responding to what the other two were doing. Bill Left was hearing in his head what Bill Center and Bill Right were going to play a half hour or so from now, while Bill Center and Bill Right were in constant communication with a Bill Left who had vanished into the past a half hour or an hour before. The sessions took on a feeling of science-fiction eeriness.

When Bill had completed the first two tracks, Creed and Helen and I all thought that he shouldn't do a third-that another one would only clutter what he had already done. We were wrong.

As the end of the track neared, the "third" Bill took the opening figure and extended it into a long fantastic, flowing line that he wove in and out and around and through what the other two pianists were playing, never colliding with these two previous selves. That final line seemed like a magic firefly hurrying through a forest at night, never striking the trees, leaving behind a line of golden sparks that slowly fell to earth, illuminating everything around it. I think Helen and Creed were close to tears when he completed that track. I know I was (Lees, Meet Me, 160).

Evans left for Florida, where he successfully kicked his habit for a while, then returned to New York in time to receive a Grammy Award for Conversations with Myself. Later Evans created two more overdub albums, Further Conversations in 1967, also on Verve, produced by Helen Keane, and New Conversations in 1978 on Warner Brothers, which opens with his tribute "Song for Helen," includes a tribute to his second wife Nenette ("For Nenette"), reinforced by the Cy Coleman standard "I Love My Wife," and the Ellington rarity "Reflections in D." It is generally considered to be the best of the three.

Evans' Fortunes on the Rise

Evans became better known and sold more records as the decade went on. He was soon making enough money for him and his wife to move out of Manhattan to a comfortable section of the Bronx called Riverdale. Meanwhile Creed Taylor had left Verve and started his own label CTI, and it fell to Helen Keane to take on the role of producer. Gene Lees helped set up the Montreux Jazz Festival and arranged for Evans to play in it in 1968 and thereafter, recording his performances from that year and 1970. When Evans left Verve he spent some time briefly recording for Columbia, but did not consider it very productive. At one point its president, Clive Davis, tried to get him to make a rock album, which Evans flatly turned down.

After that Evans went to Fantasy, which turned out to be a much more fruitful association. He produced some of his most mature satisfying work there. His fame only continued to grow as he acquired more fans among music lovers and disciples among pianists everywhere. Lees tells the story of a piano-playing Toronto dentist he had called when Evans had a toothache there. Lees had been turned down by the nurse because the call had come in after hours. When the dentist heard about it, he was appalled. "What," he said, "Do you realize you turned down God?" and rushed down to the Town Tavern where Evans was playing, tools in hand, to fix his ailing tooth (Lees, Meet Me, 166).

Personal Tragedy

It was also around this time, 1970, that Evans' wife Ellaine committed suicide by throwing herself under a subway train. As a result, he went back on heroin for a while, then got into a methadone treatment program, and stayed away from drugs for almost the last decade in his life. He married again, to Nenette, and had a child by her, whom they named Evan. His son became the inspiration for the beautiful tune "Letter to Evan." The marriage did not last, however, and soon he was living by himself in Fort Lee, New Jersey, right across the George Washington Bridge.

Last Decade of Recording
Evans' last decade of recording showed him growing even more as an artist. His 1974 live LP, Since We Met, is one of his very best, containing new versions of his ruminative ballad in memory of his father, "Turn Out the Stars," his radically beautiful "Time Remembered," the Earl Zindars beauty "Sareen Jurer," performed in both 3/4 and 4/4 time, and Cy Coleman's waltz "See-Saw," among others. In 1979 he gave a magnificent concert in Paris which Helen Keane later turned into two LP releases on Musician, called simply Paris Concert, Edition I and II. They reveal him with an unmatched rhythmic drive, summoning up all his stylistic resources, filling the entire musical space with an expanding energy. He takes fruitful risks, such as when he opens his classic "Nardis" with a solo piano improvisation, a kaleidoscopic exploration of figures and forms, finally landing on the familiar middle-Eastern sounding melody, bringing in the rest of the rhythm section in a triumphant release of suspense. The audience was ecstatic.

Last Addiction and Death

In 1980 Bill Evans began using cocaine, the fashionable drug that he imagined was "safe." But actually it demands replenishment in the bloodstream every few hours rather than just once a day like heroin, and as a stimulant, it wears you down that much faster. At the end of summer of that year, Bill asked his drummer Joe LaBarbera to drive him to the hospital, since he was having severe stomach pains. He calmly directed Joe to Mount Sinai, checked in, and died there the 15th of September.

The tributes poured in, and by 1983 a double album had been assembled with pianists who had been influenced or touched by Evans, each contributing a single piece. His stature has only continued to grow, with a newsletter devoted to his music and followers edited by Win Hinkle in North Carolina, and now on the Internet. He has become, along with Oscar Peterson, one of the major enduring forces in jazz piano.

Bibliography

* Aiken, Jim. "Bill Evans." (Contemporary) Keyboard Magazine, June, 1980, pp. 44-55.
* Davis, Miles with Quincy Troupe. Miles: the Autobiography. New York: Simon & Schuster, 1989.
* Enstice, Wayne and Paul Rubin. Jazz Spoken Here: Conversations with Twenty-two Musicians. Baton Rouge, LA: LSU Press, 1992. (Bill Evans)
* Evans, Bill. "Improvisation in Jazz," liner notes on Kind of Blue, Columbia PC 8163, starring Miles Davis, 1959.
* Keepnews, Orrin. "The Bill Evans Sessions." from Bill Evans: The Complete Riverside Recordings, accompanying booklet. Berkeley, CA: Fantasy, 1984.
* Lees, Gene. Meet Me at Jim & Andy's: Jazz Musicians and Their World. New York: Oxford U. P., 1988. (Bill Evans)
* Lyons, Len. The Great Jazz Pianists-Speaking of their Lives and Music. New York: Quill, 1983. (Bill Evans)
* Lyons, Len and Don Perlo. Jazz Portraits: The Life and Music of the Jazz Masters. New York: William Morrow & Co., 1989. (Bill Evans)
* Williams, Martin. "Homage to Bill Evans." from Bill Evans: The Complete Riverside Recordings, accompanying booklet. Berkeley, CA: Fantasy, 1984.

© Joel Simpson, AllAboutJazz

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Jamiroquai Discography

2010-05-24T03:02:00.000-07:00

Dynamite (2005)

Released: 20 Jun 2005
Style: Acid Jazz, Disco

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A Funk Odyssey (2001)

Format: CD
Released: 2001
Style: House, Acid Jazz, Disco

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Synkronized (1999)

Format: CD
Released: 1999
Style: House, Acid Jazz, Disco

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Travelling Without Moving (1996)

Format: CD
Released: 12 Sep 1996
Style: House, Acid Jazz, Disco

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The Return of the Space Cowboy (1994)

Format: CD
Released: 1994
Style: Acid Jazz

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Emergency on Planet Earth (1993)

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Released: 1993
Style: Acid Jazz

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Billie Holiday & Lester Young - 2003 - The Complete Billie Holiday & Lester Young 1937-1946

2010-05-23T20:32:00.000-07:00

Label: Fremeaux
Date: 22 Oct 2003
Format: 3xCD, Compilation

Billie Holiday often stated that she styled her vocal phrasing to echo the sound of a jazz horn, so it should be no surprise that she found the perfect duet partner in tenor sax player Lester Young. Lady Day and Pres (they bestowed the nicknames on each other) recorded some 60 sides together between 1937 and 1946, many if not all of which have to be considered classics. This three-disc set collects everything the pair did, including alternate takes, and the best tracks are truly revelatory. Given the obvious musical connection on display in these sides, it is telling that both Holiday and Young died only four months apart in 1959. Apparently the world just couldn't handle one without the other.

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Faust - 1998 - Faust Wakes Nosferatu

2010-05-23T17:58:00.000-07:00

Label: Klangbad
Catalog#: FLI 5
Format: LP
Date: 1998
Style: Noise, Score, Avantgarde, Experimental

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Duke Ellington - 1999 - The Duke Ellington Centennial Edition (24CD)

2010-05-19T17:42:00.000-07:00

Label: RCA Victor
Date: 1 April 1999
Format: Box set, 24xCD

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Duke Ellington was the most important composer in the history of jazz as well as being a bandleader who held his large group together continuously for almost 50 years. The two aspects of his career were related; Ellington used his band as a musical laboratory for his new compositions and shaped his writing specifically to showcase the talents of his bandmembers, many of whom remained with him for long periods. Ellington also wrote film scores and stage musicals, and several of his instrumental works were adapted into songs that became standards. In addition to touring year in and year out, he recorded extensively, resulting in a gigantic body of work that was still being assessed a quarter century after his death.
Ellington was the son of a White House butler, James Edward Ellington, and thus grew up in comfortable surroundings. He began piano lessons at age seven and was writing music by his teens. He dropped out of high school in his junior year in 1917 to pursue a career in music. At first, he booked and performed in bands in the Washington, D.C., area, but in September 1923 the Washingtonians, a five-piece group of which he was a member, moved permanently to New York, where they gained a residency in the Times Square venue The Hollywood Club (later The Kentucky Club). They made their first recordings in November 1924, and cut tunes for different record companies under a variety of pseudonyms, so that several current major labels, notably Sony, Universal, and BMG, now have extensive holdings of their work from the period in their archives, which are reissued periodically.

The group gradually increased in size and came under Ellington's leadership. They played in what was called "jungle" style, their sly arrangements often highlighted by the muted growling sound of trumpeter James "Bubber" Miley. A good example of this is Ellington's first signature song, "East St. Louis Toodle-oo," which the band first recorded for Vocalion Records in November 1926, and which became their first chart single in a re-recorded version for Columbia in July 1927.

The Ellington band moved uptown to The Cotton Club in Harlem on December 4, 1927. Their residency at the famed club, which lasted more than three years, made Ellington a nationally known musician due to radio broadcasts that emanated from the bandstand. In 1928, he had two two-sided hits: "Black and Tan Fantasy"/"Creole Love Call" on Victor (now BMG) and "Doin' the New Low Down"/"Diga Diga Doo" on OKeh (now Sony), released as by the Harlem Footwarmers. "The Mooche" on OKeh peaked in the charts at the start of 1929.

While maintaining his job at The Cotton Club, Ellington took his band downtown to play in the Broadway musical Show Girl, featuring the music of George Gershwin, in the summer of 1929. The following summer, the band took a leave of absence to head out to California and appear in the film Check and Double Check. From the score, "Three Little Words," with vocals by the Rhythm Boys featuring Bing Crosby, became a number one hit on Victor in November 1930; its flip side, "Ring Dem Bells," also reached the charts.

The Ellington band left The Cotton Club in February 1931 to begin a tour that, in a sense, would not end until the leader's death 43 years later. At the same time, Ellington scored a Top Five hit with an instrumental version of one of his standards, "Mood Indigo" released on Victor. The recording was later inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame. As "the Jungle Band," the Ellington Orchestra charted on Brunswick later in 1931 with "Rockin' in Rhythm" and with the lengthy composition "Creole Rhapsody," pressed on both sides of a 78 single, an indication that Ellington's goals as a writer were beginning to extend beyond brief works. (A second version of the piece was a chart entry on Victor in March 1932.) "Limehouse Blues" was a chart entry on Victor in August 1931, then in the winter of 1932, Ellington scored a Top Ten hit on Brunswick with one of his best-remembered songs, "It Don't Mean a Thing (If It Ain't Got That Swing)," featuring the vocals of Ivie Anderson. This was still more than three years before the official birth of the swing era, and Ellington helped give the period its name. Ellington's next major hit was another signature song for him, "Sophisticated Lady." His instrumental version became a Top Five hit in the spring of 1933, with its flip side, a treatment of "Stormy Weather," also making the Top Five.

The Ellington Orchestra made another feature film, Murder at the Vanities, in the spring of 1934. Their instrumental rendition of "Cocktails for Two" from the score hit number one on Victor in May, and they hit the Top Five with both sides of the Brunswick release "Moon Glow"/"Solitude" that fall. The band also appeared in the Mae West film Belle of the Nineties and played on the soundtrack of Many Happy Returns. Later in the fall, the band was back in the Top Ten with "Saddest Tale," and they had two Top Ten hits in 1935, "Merry-Go-Round" and "Accent on Youth." While the latter was scoring in the hit parade in September, Ellington recorded another of his extended compositions, "Reminiscing in Tempo," which took up both sides of two 78s. Even as he became more ambitious, however, he was rarely out of the hit parade, scoring another Top Ten hit, "Cotton," in the fall of 1935, and two more, "Love Is Like a Cigarette" and "Oh Babe! Maybe Someday," in 1936. The band returned to Hollywood in 1936 and recorded music for the Marx Brothers' film A Day at the Races and for Hit Parade of 1937. Meanwhile, they were scoring Top Ten hits with "Scattin' at the Kit-Kat" and the swing standard "Caravan," co-written by valve trombonist Juan Tizol, and Ellington was continuing to pen extended instrumental works such as "Diminuendo in Blue" and "Crescendo in Blue." "If You Were in My Place (What Would You Do?)," a vocal number featuring Ivie Anderson, was a Top Ten hit in the spring of 1938, and Ellington scored his third number one hit in April with an instrumental version of another standard, "I Let a Song Go out of My Heart." In the fall, he was back in the Top Ten with a version of the British show tune "Lambeth Walk."

The Ellington band underwent several notable changes at the end of the 1930s. After several years recording more or less regularly for Brunswick, Ellington moved to Victor. In early 1939 Billy Strayhorn, a young composer, arranger, and pianist, joined the organization. He did not usually perform with the orchestra, but he became Ellington's composition partner to the extent that soon it was impossible to tell where Ellington's writing left off and Strayhorn's began. Two key personnel changes strengthened the outfit with the acquisition of bassist Jimmy Blanton in September and tenor saxophonist Ben Webster in December. Their impact on Ellington's sound was so profound that their relatively brief tenure has been dubbed "the Blanton-Webster Band" by jazz fans. These various changes were encapsulated by the Victor release of Strayhorn's "Take the 'A' Train," a swing era standard, in the summer of 1941. The recording was later inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame.

That same summer, Ellington was in Los Angeles, where his stage musical, Jump for Joy, opened on July 10 and ran for 101 performances. Unfortunately, the show never went to Broadway, but among its songs was "I Got It Bad (And That Ain't Good)," another standard. The U.S. entry into World War II in December 1941 and the onset of the recording ban called by the American Federation of Musicians in August 1942 slowed the Ellington band's momentum. Unable to record and with touring curtailed, Ellington found an opportunity to return to extended composition with the first of a series of annual recitals at Carnegie Hall on January 23, 1943, at which he premiered "Black, Brown and Beige." And he returned to the movies, appearing in Cabin in the Sky and Reveille with Beverly. Meanwhile, the record labels, stymied for hits, began looking into their artists' back catalogs. Lyricist Bob Russell took Ellington's 1940 composition "Never No Lament" and set a lyric to it, creating "Don't Get Around Much Anymore." The Ink Spots scored with a vocal version (recorded a cappella), and Ellington's three-year-old instrumental recording was also a hit, reaching the pop Top Ten and number one on the recently instituted R&B charts. Russell repeated his magic with another 1940 Ellington instrumental, "Concerto for Cootie" (a showcase for trumpeter Cootie Williams), creating "Do Nothin' Till You Hear from Me." Nearly four years after it was recorded, the retitled recording hit the pop Top Ten and number one on the R&B charts for Ellington in early 1944, while newly recorded vocal cover versions also scored. Ellington's vintage recordings became ubiquitous on the top of the R&B charts during 1943-1944; he also hit number one with "A Slip of the Lip (Can Sink a Ship)," "Sentimental Lady," and "Main Stem." With the end of the recording ban in November 1944, Ellington was able to record a song he had composed with his saxophonist, Johnny Hodges, set to a lyric by Don George and Harry James, "I'm Beginning to See the Light." The James recording went to number one in April 1945, but Ellington's recording was also a Top Ten hit.

With the end of the war, Ellington's period as a major commercial force on records largely came to an end, but unlike other big bandleaders, who disbanded as the swing era passed, Ellington, who predated the era, simply went on touring, augmenting his diminished road revenues with his songwriting royalties to keep his band afloat. In a musical climate in which jazz was veering away from popular music and toward bebop, and popular music was being dominated by singers, the Ellington band no longer had a place at the top of the business; but it kept working. And Ellington kept trying more extended pieces. In 1946, he teamed with lyricist John Latouche to write the music for the Broadway musical Beggar's Holiday, which opened on December 26 and ran 108 performances. And he wrote his first full-length background score for a feature film with 1950's The Asphalt Jungle.

The first half of the 1950s was a difficult period for Ellington, who suffered many personnel defections. (Some of those musicians returned later.) But the band made a major comeback at the Newport Jazz Festival on July 7, 1956, when they kicked into a version of "Dimuendo and Crescendo in Blue" that found saxophonist Paul Gonsalves taking a long, memorable solo. Ellington appeared on the cover of Time magazine, and he signed a new contract with Columbia Records, which released Ellington at Newport, the best-selling album of his career. Freed of the necessity of writing hits and spurred by the increased time available on the LP record, Ellington concentrated more on extended compositions for the rest of his career. His comeback as a live performer led to increased opportunities to tour, and in the fall of 1958 he undertook his first full-scale tour of Europe. For the rest of his life, he would be a busy world traveler.

Ellington appeared in and scored the 1959 film Anatomy of a Murder, and its soundtrack won him three of the newly instituted Grammy Awards, for best performance by a dance band, best musical composition of the year, and best soundtrack. He was nominated for an Academy Award for his next score, Paris Blues (1961). In August 1963, his stage work My People, a cavalcade of African-American history, was mounted in Chicago as part of the Century of Negro Progress Exposition.

Meanwhile, of course, he continued to lead his band in recordings and live performances. He switched from Columbia to Frank Sinatra's Reprise label (purchased by Warner Bros. Records) and made some pop-oriented records that dismayed his fans but indicated he had not given up on broad commercial aspirations. Nor had he abandoned his artistic aspirations, as the first of his series of sacred concerts, performed at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco on September 16, 1965, indicated. And he still longed for a stage success, turning once again to Broadway with the musical Pousse-Caf?which opened on March 18, 1966, but closed within days. Three months later, the Sinatra film Assault on a Queen, with an Ellington score, opened in movie houses around the country. (His final film score, for Change of Mind, appeared in 1969.)

Ellington became a Grammy favorite in his later years. He won a 1966 Grammy for best original jazz composition for "In the Beginning, God," part of his sacred concerts. His 1967 album Far East Suite, inspired by a tour of the Middle and Far East, won the best instrumental jazz performance Grammy that year, and he took home his sixth Grammy in the same category in 1969 for And His Mother Called Him Bill, a tribute to Strayhorn, who had died in 1967. "New Orleans Suite" earned another Grammy in the category in 1971, as did "Togo Brava Suite" in 1972, and the posthumous The Ellington Suites in 1976.

Ellington continued to perform regularly until he was overcome by illness in the spring of 1974, succumbing to lung cancer and pneumonia. His death did not end the band, which was taken over by his son Mercer, who led it until his own death in 1996, and then by a grandson. Meanwhile, Ellington finally enjoyed the stage hit he had always wanted when the revue Sophisticated Ladies, featuring his music, opened on Broadway on March 1, 1981, and ran 767 performances.

The many celebrations of the Ellington centenary in 1999 demonstrated that he continued to be regarded as the major composer of jazz. If that seemed something of an anomaly in a musical style that emphasizes spontaneous improvisation over written composition, Ellington was talented enough to overcome the oddity. He wrote primarily for his band, allowing his veteran players room to solo within his compositions, and as a result created a body of work that seemed likely to help jazz enter the academic and institutional realms, which was very much its direction at the end of the 20th century. In that sense, he foreshadowed the future of jazz and could lay claim to being one of its most influential practitioners.

by William Ruhlmann

Duke Ellington Biography

2010-05-19T05:43:00.000-07:00

byname of Edward Kennedy Ellington
(1899–1974)

(born April 29, 1899, Washington, D.C., U.S.—died May 24, 1974, New York, N.Y.) American pianist who was the greatest jazz composer and bandleader. One of the originators of big-band jazz, Ellington led his band for more than half a century, composed thousands of scores, and created one of the most distinctive ensemble sounds in all of Western music.

Ellington grew up in a secure middle-class family in Washington, D.C. His family encouraged his interests in the fine arts, and he began studying piano at age seven. He became engrossed in studying art during his high-school years, and he was awarded, but did not accept, a scholarship to the Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York. Inspired by ragtime performers, he began to perform professionally at age 17.

Ellington first played in New York City in 1923. Later that year he moved there and, in Broadway nightclubs, led a sextet that grew in time into a 10-piece ensemble. The singular blues-based melodies; the harsh, vocalized sounds of his trumpeter, Bubber Miley (who used a plunger [“wa-wa”] mute); and the sonorities of the distinctive trombonist Joe (“Tricky Sam”) Nanton (who played muted “growl” sounds) all influenced Ellington's early “jungle style,” as seen in such masterpieces as “East St. Louis Toodle-oo” (1926) and “Black and Tan Fantasy” (1927).

Extended residencies at the Cotton Club in Harlem (1927–32, 1937–38) stimulated Ellington to enlarge his band to 14 musicians and to expand his compositional scope. He selected his musicians for their expressive individuality, and several members of his ensemble—including trumpeter Cootie Williams (who replaced Miley), cornetist Rex Stewart, trombonist Lawrence Brown, baritone saxophonist Harry Carney, alto saxophonist Johnny Hodges, and clarinetist Barney Bigard—were themselves important jazz artists. (The most popular of these was Hodges, who rendered ballads with a full, creamy tone and long portamentos.) With these exceptional musicians, who remained with him throughout the 1930s, Ellington made hundreds of recordings, appeared in films and on radio, and toured Europe in 1933 and 1939.

The expertise of this ensemble allowed Ellington to break away from the conventions of band-section scoring. Instead, he used new harmonies to blend his musicians' individual sounds and emphasized congruent sections and a supple ensemble that featured Carney's full bass-clef sound. He illuminated subtle moods with ingenious combinations of instruments; among the most famous examples is “Mood Indigo” in his 1930 setting for muted trumpet, unmuted trombone, and low-register clarinet. (Click here for a video clip of Duke Ellington and his band playing “Mood Indigo.”) In 1931 Ellington began to create extended works, including such pieces as Creole Rhapsody, Reminiscing in Tempo, and Diminuendo in Blue/Crescendo in Blue. He composed a series of works to highlight the special talents of his soloists. Williams, for example, demonstrated his versatility in Ellington's noted miniature concertos “Echoes of Harlem” and “Concerto for Cootie.” Some of Ellington's numbers—notably “Caravan” and “Perdido” by trombonist Juan Tizol—were cowritten or entirely composed by sidemen. Few of Ellington's soloists, despite their importance to jazz history, played as effectively in other contexts; no one else, it seemed, could match the inspiration that Ellington provided with his sensitive, masterful settings.

A high point in Ellington's career came in the early 1940s, when he composed several masterworks—including the above-mentioned “Concerto for Cootie,” his fast-tempo showpieces “Cotton Tail” and “Ko-Ko,” and the uniquely structured, compressed panoramas “Main Stem” and “Harlem Air Shaft”—in which successions of soloists are accompanied by diverse ensemble colours. The variety and ingenuity of these works, all conceived for three-minute, 78-rpm records, are extraordinary, as are their unique forms, which range from logically flowing expositions to juxtapositions of line and mood. Tenor saxophonist Ben Webster and bassist Jimmy Blanton, both major jazz artists, were with this classic Ellington band. By then, too, Billy Strayhorn, composer of what would become the band's theme song, “Take the ‘A' Train,” had become Ellington's composing-arranging partner.

Not limiting himself to jazz innovation, Ellington also wrote such great popular songs as “Sophisticated Lady,” “Rocks in My Bed,” and “Satin Doll”; in other songs, such as “Don't Get Around Much Any More,” “Prelude to a Kiss,” “Solitude,” and “I Let a Song Go out of My Heart,” he made wide interval leaps an Ellington trademark. A number of these hits were introduced by Ivy Anderson, who was the band's female vocalist in the 1930s.

During these years Ellington became intrigued with the possibilities of composing jazz within classical forms. His musical suite Black, Brown and Beige (1943), a portrayal of African-American history, was the first in a series of suites he composed, usually consisting of pieces linked by subject matter. It was followed by, among others, Liberian Suite (1947); A Drum Is a Woman (1956), created for a television production; Such Sweet Thunder (1957), impressions of William Shakespeare's scenes and characters; a recomposed, reorchestrated version of Nutcracker Suite (1960; after Peter Tchaikovsky); Far East Suite (1964); and Togo Brava Suite (1971). Ellington's symphonic A Rhapsody of Negro Life was the basis for the film short Symphony in Black (1935), which also features the voice of Billie Holiday (uncredited). Ellington wrote motion-picture scores for The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and Anatomy of a Murder (1959) and composed for the ballet and theatre—including, at the height of the Civil Rights Movement, the show My People (1964), a celebration of African-American life. In his last decade he composed three pieces of sacred music: In the Beginning God (1965), Second Sacred Concert (1968), and Third Sacred Concert (1973).

Although Ellington's compositional interests and ambitions changed over the decades, his melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic characteristics were for the most part fixed by the late 1930s, when he was a star of the swing era. The broken, eighth-note melodies and arrhythms of bebop had little impact on him, though on occasion he recorded with musicians who were not band members—not only with other swing-era luminaries such as Louis Armstrong, Ella Fitzgerald, and Coleman Hawkins but also with later bop musicians John Coltrane and Charles Mingus. Ellington's stylistic qualities were shared by Strayhorn, who increasingly participated in composing and orchestrating music for the Ellington band. During 1939–67 Strayhorn collaborated so closely with Ellington that jazz scholars may never determine how much the gifted deputy influenced or even composed works attributed to Ellington.

The Ellington band toured Europe often after World War II; it also played in Asia (1963–64, 1970), West Africa (1966), South America (1968), and Australia (1970) and frequently toured North America. Despite this grueling schedule, some of Ellington's musicians stayed with him for decades; Carney, for example, was a band member for 47 years. For the most part, later replacements fit into roles that had been created by their distinguished predecessors; after 1950, for instance, the Webster-influenced Paul Gonsalves filled the band's solo tenor saxophone role originated by Webster. There were some exceptions to this generalization, such as trumpeter-violinist Ray Nance and high-note trumpet specialist Cat Anderson.

Not least of the band's musicians was Ellington himself, a pianist whose style originated in ragtime and the stride piano idiom of James P. Johnson and Willie “The Lion” Smith. He adapted his style for orchestral purposes, accompanying with vivid harmonic colours and, especially in later years, offering swinging solos with angular melodies. An elegant man, Ellington maintained a regal manner as he led the band and charmed audiences with his suave humour. His career spanned more than half a century—most of the documented history of jazz. He continued to lead the band until shortly before his death in 1974.

Ellington's sense of musical drama and of his players' special talents and his wide range of moods were rare indeed. His gift of melody and his mastery of sonic textures, rhythms, and compositional forms translated his often subtle, often complex perceptions into a body of music unequaled in jazz history. Charles Ives is perhaps his only rival for the title of the greatest American composer. Ellington's autobiography, Music Is My Mistress, was published in 1973.

© 1994-2009 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

Links:
official site
discogs
last.fm
wikipedia

Louis Armstrong & The All Stars - 1996 - At Symphony Hall, Boston, November 30, 1947

2010-05-18T15:01:00.000-07:00

Label: Giants of Jazz
Cat#: CD 53011
Date: 1996

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Black To Comm - 2009 - Alphabet 1968

2010-05-18T14:21:00.000-07:00

Marc Richter (aka Black to Comm) is no newcomer to the experimental music scene. As the figurehead of the Hamburg-based Dekorder label, the musician and designer has brought countless oddities to the attention of rabid music fans in the last few years, but it is with his own compositions that he has made the biggest splash. Releasing for a plethora of labels including Digitalis, Trensmat and of course his own imprint, he has pioneered a new, organic drone sub-genre using tape loops, vintage organs and an inexhaustible swamp of found sounds. With this latest album however, it was Richter’s intention to move away from the epic drones he had made his own and into something more ‘classic’.

The mission statement for ‘Alphabet 1968’ was to write an album of ‘songs’ for want of a better word. Short tracks which represented genre points, the milestones which stuck in Richter’s mind when he thought back to his favourite records. What we arrive at is an breathtaking ten track album which, over the course of forty-five minutes, explores world music, techno, noise, avant-garde, ambient music and even exotica. Each track is linked with a loose thread of radio static or environmental sound, dragging you through the album as if tuning in to a stray broadcast or a particularly adventurous mix.

Richter has pieced the album together from hours of recordings made at his studio with home made gamelan, small instruments and loops gathered from a collection of ancient vinyl and 78 records. The scope of the album is admirable but ignoring this it is simply a shockingly arresting collection of experimental oddities, with references ranging from Moondog to Basic Channel by way of Bernard Herrmann. It’s not hard to fall in love with ‘Alphabet 1968’, far harder would be to place exactly where the record should fit into your collection.

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The Glitch Mob - 2010 - Drink the Sea

2010-05-17T17:10:00.000-07:00

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Tzolk'in Discography

2010-05-10T09:10:00.000-07:00

Haab' (2008)

Label: Ant-Zen
Cat#: act 210
Format: CD
Date: 19 Feb 2008
Style: Dark Ambient, Tribal, IDM, Ambient

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Tzolk'in (2004)

Label: Divine Comedy Records
Catalog#: DC 033
Format: CD
Date: 24 Sep 2004
Style: Rhythmic Noise, Tribal, Ambient

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Charlie Parker - 1999 - Complete Savoy Sessions

2010-05-06T08:59:00.000-07:00

Label: Definitive
Format: 4xCD, Box set
Date: 6 Sep 1999

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Review for another re-issue of this release:

That Charlie Parker was one of the greatest jazz musicians who ever lived cannot be disputed. Whether he was the architect of bebop music or simply its most facile interpreter can be argued from now until the end of time, but it scarcely matters any more than it matters who actually wrote the compendium of dramatic literature presented to the world under the name of William Shakespeare. The plain fact is that both the music of Parker and the plays of Shakespeare are among the most sublime cultural artifacts the human race will ever produce. Among the great work of Charlie Parker, the recordings he did for the Dial and Savoy labels have always been counted as among his most representative and enduring work. This work has been released in a variety of collections and formats, including Atlantic's exhaustive eight-CD Complete Savoy and Dial Studio Recordings 1944-1948. That set is essential for any hardcore Parker fanatic of jazz collector, containing as it does numerous alternate takes that demonstrate Parker's ability to truly improvise vastly new and different conceptions on the same tune instantaneously. But it can get tiresome hearing numerous takes of the same tune, no matter how wonderful Parker's playing, and there are certainly good arguments for hearing the final selection, made by Parker and his producer, of the definitive version of a track. For that reason, as well as economics, the three-disc collection just released by Savoy Records, The Complete Savoy & Dial Master Takes, is compelling listening and a must-have for anyone at all interested in modern jazz.

The Complete Savoy & Dial Master Takes begins in 1944, with Bird's first Savoy recordings as a sideman for jump-blues performer Tiny Grimes. These recordings show Parker already in possession of a prodigious talent, even though neither he nor the quintet is playing bop yet. Still, on the Grimes' composition "Red Cross", you can tell that Parker was already well aware of where he was headed, and soon most other jazz musicians would be headed that way, too. Though he is already throwing off some of the runs that would make him the envy of every saxophonist within hearing, he demonstrates just how much bop's rhythmic conception owed to the laconic phrasing of Lester Young. Barely a year later, on his own session, the evolution of bebop is already well advanced, as Parker, Dizzy Gillespie (sometimes a young Miles Davis), and drummer Max Roach are displaying all the elements that would enshrine their names in the annals of jazz forever.

In the very brief "Warmin' Up a Riff" -- a throwaway, really -- Parker is displaying his trademark genius melodic, harmonic, and rhythmic conceptions as well as his penchant for throwing musical quotations into the mix. There are several numbers on this session, including "Billie's Bounce", "Now's the Time", and "Koko" (on which Gillespie plays not only trumpet, but probably piano as well) that would become mainstays of the bebop canon. In March of 1946, Parker recorded "Moose the Mooche", "Yardbird Suite", "Ornithology", and "A Night in Tunisia" for Dial with a septet that included Miles Davis on trumpet, tenor saxophonist Lucky Thompson, and one of bebop's greatest pianists, Dodo Marmarosa. These sessions are quintessential Parker, and the 20-bit digital transfers that have been done on this collection give them a new vibrancy. Of course, Parker is the main attraction, but the sessions are incredibly valuable for the opportunity to hear Thompson and Marmarosa, two incredibly talented musicians who were severely under-recorded. They also demonstrate that Miles Davis was not, as has often been reported, unable to play bebop changes or keep up with Parker. True, Davis is no Dizzy Gillespie in terms of either range or dexterity, but he certainly is able to follow the changes and play solos that, for their brevity, are well conceived. It's hard to believe that as recently as 1998, there were no complete and good CD versions of the Savoy sessions available, and that the Dial recordings remained unavailable in the US for many years. Without hearing this music, one can hardly say that one has heard Charlie Parker.

The second disc contains a session by Charlie Parker's New Stars, featuring Howard McGhee on trumpet, tenor sax player Wardell Gray, another underexposed but brilliant player, Marmarosa, guitarist Barney Kessel, Red Callender on bass, and drummer Don Lamond. Recorded in February 1947, after Parker's breakdown and subsequent recovery at the Camarillo mental facility, it includes "Relaxin' at Camarillo" and three McGhee compositions, "Cheers", "Carvin' the Bird", and "Stupendous". The opportunity to hear Parker, at the top of his game, with Gray, who was also heavily influenced by Lester Young, is well worth the price of admission. The disc also contains a session from May of '47 featuring Bud Powell, bassist Tommy Potter, and Max Roach. This unit gives definitive performances of "Donna Lee", "Chasin' the Bird", "Cheryl", and "Buzzy". There's also a Savoy session under the heading of Miles Davis All Stars, with pianist John Lewis, Max Roach, Nelson Boyd on bass, and Parker on tenor sax. These sessions feature several Davis compositions, including "Milestones" and "Half Nelson", both of which would later figure prominently in Davis' repertoire. Here there is evidence that Davis' work with Parker had strengthened his technique considerably, as he demonstrates much more confidence than on the earlier sessions.

The set drifts from Disc Two to Disc Three on a huge session from the end of 1947 by a quintet comprised of Parker, Davis, Potter, Duke Jordan on piano, and Roach. As a Musicians Union recording ban approached, Dial owner Ross Russell was accelerating his recording of Parker, so there is another Dial session done on 17 December of '47, with Russell's wife, Dorothy, supervising the session because Ross was apparently ill yet unwilling to cancel the session. Good thing, too, because the quintet adds trombonist J.J. Johnson for some beautiful workouts on "Quasimodo", "Crazeology", and "How Deep Is the Ocean?" Not to be left behind, Savoy brought Parker into the studio on December 21st to wax another four tracks. We're lucky that both labels were recording Parker so prodigiously at this time, largely because they both had legitimate claims to his services. Russell relocated to New York solely for the purpose of recording Parker, claiming that Bird was under contract to him, while Savoy maintained the same claim. Had either been totally in the right, I'm sure the resulting lawsuit would have meant that some of these glorious tracks wouldn't have been made. That should be a lesson on the mechanics of when it's best to shut up and just do your thing vs. rushing into a lawsuit. In any case, once the recording ban was over, only Savoy returned to recording him, with two September '48 sessions, on the 18th and 24th proving to be the label's swan song with Parker.

Parker moved on to record with Verve Records under the leadership of Norman Granz. There, he produced some fine recordings, but he only lived for another six years. When one considers that the material on The Complete Savoy & Dial Master Takes represents four crucial years of Parker's career, their significance becomes clear. Granz could take Parker to a new level of acceptance and popularity with recordings like Bird With Strings, but he could never recreate the freshness, danger, and sheer delight of discovery that informed Bird's first years as a leader. Track for track, this Savoy release represents the very best Charlie Parker performances available on a single collection. That is definitely something to get excited about.

Tracklist

CD1
01. Tiny's Tempo #1
02. Tiny's Tempo #2
03. Tiny's Tempo #3
04. I'll Always Love You Just the Same #1
05. I'll Always Love You Just the Same #2
06. Romance Without Finance #1
07. Romance Without Finance #2
08. Romance Without Finance #3
09. Romance Without Finance #4
10. Romance Without Finance #5
11. Red Cross #1
12. Red Cross #2
13. Warming Up a Riff
14. Billie's Bounce #1
15. Billie's Bounce #2
16. Billie's Bounce #3
17. Billie's Bounce #4
18. Billie's Bounce #5
19. Now's the Time #1
20. Now's the Time #2
21. Now's the Time #3
22. Now's the Time #4

CD2
01. Thriving on a Riff #1
02. Thriving on a Riff #2
03. Thriving on a Riff #3
04. Meandering
05. Ko Ko #1
06. Ko Ko #2
07. Donna Lee #1
08. Donna Lee #2
09. Donna Lee #3
10. Donna Lee #4
11. Donna Lee #5
12. Chasin' the Bird #1
13. Chasin' the Bird #2
14. Chasin' the Bird #3
15. Chasin' the Bird #4
16. Cherryl #1
17. Cherryl #2
18. Buzzy #1
19. Buzzy #2
20. Buzzy #3
21. Buzzy #4
22. Buzzy #5
23. Milestones #1
24. Milestones #2
25. Milestones #3
26. Little Willie Leaps #1
27. Little Willie Leaps #2
28. Little Willie Leaps #3

CD3
01. Half Nelson #1
02. Half Nelson #2
03. Sippin' at Bells #1
04. Sippin' at Bells #2
05. Sippin' at Bells #3
06. Sippin' at Bells #4
07. Another Hair Do #1
08. Another Hair Do #2
09. Another Hair Do #3
10. Another Hair Do #4
11. Bluebird #1
12. Bluebird #2
13. Bluebird #3
14. Klaunstance
15. Bird Get's the Worm #1
16. Bird Get's the Worm #2
17. Bird Get's the Worm #3
18. Barbados #1
19. Barbados #2
20. Barbados #3
21. Barbados #4
22. Ah-Leu-Cha #1
23. Ah-Leu-Cha #2
24. Constellation #1
25. Constellation #2
26. Constellation #3
27. Constellation #4
28. Constellation #5
29. Parker's Mood #1
30. Parker's Mood #2
31. Parker's Mood #3
32. Parker's Mood #4

CD4
01. Parker's Mood #5
02. Perhaps #1
03. Perhaps #2
04. Perhaps #3
05. Perhaps #4
06. Perhaps #5
07. Perhaps #6
08. Perhaps #7
09. Marmaduke #1
10. Marmaduke #2
11. Marmaduke #3
12. Marmaduke #4
13. Marmaduke #5
14. Marmaduke #6
15. Marmaduke #7
16. Marmaduke #8
17. Marmaduke #9
18. Marmaduke #10
19. Marmaduke #11
20. Marmaduke #12
21. Steeplechase #1
22. Steeplechase #2
23. Merry Go Round #1
24. Merry Go Round #2
25. Groovin' High
26. All the Things You Are
27. Dizzy Atmosphere
28. Dizzy's Boogie
29. Dizzy's Boogie (Alternative)
30. Flat Foot Boogie
31. Flat Foot Boogie (Alternative)
32. Poppity Pop
33. Slim's Jam

Stee Downes Discography

2010-05-05T13:42:00.000-07:00

Put a Little Love in My Soul (EP) (2009)

Label: Sonar Kollektiv
Cat#: SK205
Format: 12"
Date: 1 Feb 2009
Style: Soul, House

After his great contribution to Sonar Kollektiv’s critically acclaimed compilation Secret Love 5 (SK196CD/folkwaves) with the beautiful song Destruction of Ourselves, Irish DJ, producer and songwriter Stee Downes brought out his long awaited debut album All in a Day (SK203CD/illicity) Jazzanova’s label in 2008. Following his debut album All in a Day, Stee Downes now presents us a remix 12" with 4 exclusive versions of his heartfelt songs. Opening this fresh remix single is Stee Downes's long friend and musical companion, Ishfaq with whom Stee also produced the album. Although also originally from Dublin, Ireland, Ishfaq is currently based in Croatia. He has previously remixed the likes of DJ Vadim and Bugs in the Attic and it's no wonder that his remix treatment of Put A Little Love In My Soul is spot on - after all he did play on and mix down the original album version.
Stee Downes' lovely track What's wrong with groovin' also appeared on the recent Jazzanova compilation SK200 to mark Sonar Kollektiv's 200th release. Stee's harmonies combine seamlessly with his Fender Rhodes and a funky groove to make this a great tune for slow dancing to. London based DJ Simbad has had remixes on Brownswood Recordings, Pantone Music and BBE as well as productions work on Compost and Karen Ps ...Broadcasting on Sonar Kollektiv to name but a few. His remix of A Need For Something Else is a fine and soulful slice of minimal house, guaranteed to get the crowd moving.
Winding up this fine remix 12" is Diesler with his mix of Movement. While other of Stee Downes songs have a certain melancholy, tracks don't get any more uplifting than this. It's a feel good crowd-pleaser if ever there was one. In Stee's own words: “Emotionally, I would describe All in a Day as a heart-felt and an honest expression of who I am and how I feel. The album is based around a simplistic and direct approach to melody, rhythm, emotion and message. There is an underlying bittersweet feeling to all the songs.” That holds true for this 12" too plus you have the added bonus of 4 exclusive tracks which are sure to get the party jumping.

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All in a Day (2008)

Label: Sonar Kollektiv
Cat#: SK203CD
Format: CD
Date: Sep 2008
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo, Soul

After his great contribution to Sonar Kollektiv’s critically acclaimed compilation Secret Love 5 (SK196CD/folkwaves) with the beautiful song Destruction of Ourselves, Irish DJ and producer Stee Downes is now back on Jazzanova’s label to expose his unique talents of singer and songwriter with his brilliant debut album All in a Day (SK203CD/illicity). The upcoming artist hailing from Dublin has been raised with the love of Soul music. He deeply fell in love with the music of Stevie Wonder, Roy Ayers, George Benson, and Curtis Mayfield amongst many others at a young age thanks to his parents’ record collection. This experience shaped his outlook on music and life. Artists such as Donny Hathaway, Dangelo, James Brown and Aretha Franklin took in a place in his heart and still inspire him today. Multi-instrumentalist – he plays guitar, bass, keyboard – and renowned DJ that mixes skilfully many different styles from Soul, Folk, Funk and over to Hip-hop and House music for more than 10 years, Stee is very open-minded. This ever-growing interest in other cultures got him traveling all around Europe. In 2002 after the completion of his studies Stee left Ireland’s capital-city for Amsterdam, where he started to focus his attention on writing and production. With his warm and groovy voice Stee rapidly gained recognition in the community of soulful music lovers. London based outfit Loose Ensemble got their hands on one his demo’s and promptly asked him to feature on two tracks for the Catalyst EP, which was released on Foundation records. He later collaborated with Echoplex’s Ed Eustace to be part of Vinylvibes first release, which received the massive support from top-DJs, music connoisseurs and tastemakers such as Dom Servini, Rainer Trueby, Michael Ruetten and Jazzanova. Inspired by the positive reaction Stee was determined to keep on pushing. He developed his vocal talents and combined them with his original song-writing to create a unique sound. He began to build his repertoire and put together a live show, later supporting top acts such as Amp Diffler, Bugz in the Attic and Money Mark in 2006.
In April 2008 he teamed up with old friend and musical counterpart Ishfaq to record his debut album All in a Day (SK203CD/illicity). They settled into their makeshift studio in Croatia and recorded the album in two weeks. Coming from the same school of thought and heavily influenced by similar music they formed a solid partnership and played all the instruments on the project. The songs on the album are a collection of thoughts, observations and experience. His creativity is driven by his personal feelings and by his philosophy of always being honest and true to himself. As Stee puts it: “Emotionally, I would describe All in a Day as a heart-felt and an honest expression of who I am and how I feel. The album is based around a simplistic and direct approach to melody, rhythm, emotion and message. There is an underlying bittersweet feeling to all the songs.” In ten songs that fuse the emotion of Soul and the groove of Funk with the coolness of Jazz, Stee Downes opens his hearts and gives it all to you. With his laidback and soulful voice Stee will relax you at once. All in a Day features Stee Downes' excellent and first single Asunder (DK031/illicity), chill-out and feel-good tunes such as When I’m Feeling, What’s wrong with Groovin’, funky and groovy numbers such as Disciples and Movements, as well as deeper and more intimate songs like Put A Little Love In My Soul, Obviously and Destruction of Ourselves. If you are feeling down, All in a Day (SK203CD/illicity) will help you releasing stress and anxiety and if you feel good, the music of Stee will make you smile even more! All in a Day is the best cure to soothe your mind and refresh your soul, give it a listen and let Stee Downes take you on board for a relaxing and soulful cruise.

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Charlie Parker Biography

2010-05-03T07:11:00.000-07:00

byname of Charles Parker, Jr. , also called Bird or Yardbird
(1920 - 1955)

(born August 29, 1920, Kansas City, Kan., U.S.—died March 12, 1955, New York, N.Y.) American alto saxophonist, composer, and bandleader, a lyric artist generally considered the greatest jazz saxophonist. Parker was the principal stimulus of the modern jazz idiom known as bebop, and—together with Louis Armstrong and Ornette Coleman—he was one of the three great revolutionary geniuses in jazz.

Parker grew up in Kansas City, Missouri, during the great years of Kansas City jazz and began playing alto saxophone when he was 13. At 14 he quit school and began performing with youth bands, and at 16 he was married—the first of his four marriages. The most significant of his early stylistic influences were tenor saxophone innovator Lester Young and the advanced swing-era alto saxophonist Buster Smith, in whose band Parker played in 1937. Two years later Parker experienced a personal stylistic breakthrough during a jam session in New York City. He described this moment of revelation in Hear Me Talkin' to Ya (1955), edited by Nat Hentoff and Nat Shapiro:

I'd been getting bored with the stereotyped changes (harmonies) that were being used all the time. … I found that by using the higher intervals of a chord as a melody line and backing them with appropriately related changes I could play the thing I'd been hearing. I came alive.

Parker recorded his first solos as a member of Jay McShann's band, with whom he toured the eastern United States in 1940–42. It was at this time that his childhood nickname “Yardbird” was shortened to “Bird.” His growing friendship with trumpeter Dizzy Gillespie led Parker to develop his new music in avant-garde jam sessions in New York's Harlem. Bebop grew out of these experiments by Parker, Gillespie, and their adventurous colleagues; the music featured chromatic harmonies and, influenced especially by Parker, small note values and seemingly impulsive rhythms. Parker and Gillespie played in Earl Hines's swing-oriented band and Billy Eckstine's more modern band. In 1944 they formed their own small ensemble, the first working bebop group. The next year Parker made a series of classic recordings with Red Norvo, with Gillespie's quintet (“Salt Peanuts” and “Shaw Nuff”), and for his own first solo recording session (“Billie's Bounce,” “Now's the Time,” and “Koko”). The new music he was espousing aroused controversy but also attracted a devoted audience. By this time Parker had been addicted to drugs for several years. While working in Los Angeles with Gillespie's group and others, Parker collapsed in the summer of 1946, suffering from heroin and alcohol addiction, and was confined to a state mental hospital.Following his release after six months, Parker formed his own quintet, which included trumpeter Miles Davis and drummer Max Roach. He performed regularly in New York City and on tours to major U.S. cities and abroad, played in a Gillespie concert at Carnegie Hall (1947), recorded with Machito's Afro-Cuban band (1949–50), and toured with the popular Jazz at the Philharmonic troupe (1949). A Broadway nightclub, Birdland, was named after him, and he performed there on opening night in late 1949; Birdland became the most famous of 1950s jazz clubs.The recordings Parker made for the Savoy and Dial labels in 1945–48 (including the “Koko” session, “Relaxin' at Camarillo,” “Night in Tunisia,” “Embraceable You,” “Donna Lee,” “Ornithology,” and “Parker's Mood”) document his greatest period. He had become the model for a generation of young saxophonists. His alto tone was hard and ideally expressive, with a crying edge to his highest tones and little vibrato. One of his most influential innovations was the establishment of eighth notes as the basic units of his phrases. The phrases themselves he broke into irregular lengths and shapes and applied asymmetrical accenting. His brilliant, innovative technique—speed of execution, full sound in all registers, and precision during very fast tempos—was widely imitated.Parker's most popular records, recorded in 1949–50, featured popular song themes and brief improvisations accompanied by a string orchestra. These recordings came at the end of a period of years when his narcotics and alcohol addictions had a less disruptive effect on his creative life. By the early 1950s, however, he had again begun to suffer from the cumulative effects of his excesses; while hospitalized for treatment of an ulcer, he was informed that he would die if he resumed drinking. He was banned from playing in New York City nightclubs for 15 months. He missed engagements and failed to pay his accompanying musicians, and his unreliability led his booking agency to stop scheduling performances for him. Even Birdland, where he had played regularly, eventually fired him. His two-year-old daughter died; his fourth marriage fell apart. He twice attempted suicide and again spent time in a mental hospital.If Parker's life was chaotic in the 1950s, he nonetheless retained his creative edge. From roughly 1950 he abandoned his quintet to perform with a succession of usually small, ad hoc jazz groups; on occasion he performed with Latin American bands, big jazz bands (including Stan Kenton's and Woody Herman's), or string ensembles. Recording sessions with several quartets and quintets produced such pieces as “Confirmation,” “Chi-Chi,” and “Bloomdido,” easily the equals of his best 1940s sessions. Outstanding performances that were recorded at concerts and in nightclubs also attest to his vigorous creativity during this difficult period. He wanted to study with classical composer Edgard Varèse, but, before the two could collaborate, Parker's battle with ulcers and cirrhosis of the liver got the better of him. While visiting his friend Baroness Nica de Koenigswarter, he was persuaded to remain at her home because of his illness; there, a week after his last engagement, he died of a heart attack.The impact of Parker's tone and technique has already been discussed; his concepts of harmony and melody were equally influential. Rejecting the diatonic scales common to earlier jazz, Parker improvised melodies and composed themes using chromatic scales. Often he played phrases that implied added harmonies or created passages that were only distantly related to his songs' harmonic foundations (chord changes). Yet for all the tumultuous feelings in his solos, he created flowing melodic lines. At slow tempos as well as fast, his were intense improvisations that communicated complex, often subtle emotions. The harmonies and inflections of the blues, which he played with passion and imagination, reverberated throughout his improvisations. Altogether, Parker's lyric art was a virtuoso music resulting from a coordination of nerve, muscle, and intellect that pressed human agility and creativity to their limits.Parker's influence upon modern jazz was immense. His many followers included Ornette Coleman, John Coltrane, and Albert Ayler—leading figures in the development of free jazz. His difficult life was the subject of Bird (1988), a film directed by Clint Eastwood.

© 1994-2008 Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

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jazzdisco
wikipedia

De-Phazz Discography

2010-04-26T15:08:00.000-07:00

Lala 2.0 (2010)

Label: Phazz-a-delic
Cat#: PHAZZ 046
Format: CD
Date: 2010
Style: Downtempo, Broken Beat, Latin, Pop Rock, Soul, Synthpop

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Big (2009)

Label: Phazz-a-delic
Catalog#: phazz 040
Format: CD
Date: 30 Jan 2009
Style: Nu Jazz, Bossa Nova, Latin Jazz, Big Band

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Days of Twang (2007)

Label: Phazz-a-delic
Cat#: phazz 027
Format: CD
Date: 23 Mar 2007
Style: Breakbeat, Leftfield, Trip Hop, Disco

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Natural Fake (2005)

Label: Universal Music Classics and Jazz
Cat#: 986 917-5
Format: CD
Date: 7 Mar 2005
Style: Nu Jazz, Latin, Jazzdance

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Daily Lama (2002)

Label: Universal Jazz (Germany), Phazz-a-delic
Cat#: 018 817-2
Format: CD
Date: 21 Oct 2002
Style: Nu Jazz, Soul-Jazz, Jazzdance

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Plastic Love Memory (2002)

Label: Mole Listening Pearls
Cat#: MOLE051-2
Format: CD
Date: 2002
Style: Downtempo, Nu Jazz, Jazzdance, Trip Hop, Drum and Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 145mb): load2.me

Best of De-Phazz: Beyond Lounge (2002)

Label: United Recordings
Cat#: UTD7001
Format: CD
Date: 2002
Style: Downtempo, Nu Jazz, Broken Beat

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Rare Tracks and Remixes (2002)

Label: Mole Listening Pearls
Cat#: ML 375
Format: CD
Date: 2002
Style: Downtempo

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Detunized Gravity (2002, 1997)

Label: Mole Listening Pearls
Cat#: MOLE007L-2
Format: CD
Date: 2002, original 1997

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Death by Chocolate (2001)

Label: Mole Listening Pearls
Cat#: MOLE037-2
Format: CD
Date: 2001
Style: Downtempo, Nu Jazz, Acid Jazz

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Godsdog (1999)

Label: Mole Listening Pearls
Cat#: MOLE020-2
Format: CD
Date: 1999
Style: Downtempo, Nu Jazz, Breakbeat

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Kieran Hebden & Steve Reid Discography

2010-04-20T14:08:00.000-07:00

NYC (2008)

Label: Domino
Cat#: WIGCD219
Format: CD
Date: 10 Nov 2008
Style: Free Jazz, Experimental

Think of a studio that's seen Missy Elliot, Miles Davis, The Roots, Chic, Steve Reich, Ron Carter, and Joe Henderson record classic sides, then try to imagine a duo whose sound is so open-ended and original that it would be a surprisingly short step to connect them to anyone of those names – a sound that fuses the digital slash-and-staple of sampling and the irresistible momentum of jazz drumming, all without ever forgetting that there’s such a place as the dancefloor. The studio is Avatar, in Manhattan’s Hell’s Kitchen; the duo is Kieran Hebden and Steve Reid.

Kieran and Steve recorded NYC at Avatar over two days in February 2008, and the choice of location is at the heart of what the record is about. “Steve wanted to do something with the sound and feel of his home city,” explains Kieran. The whole set, down to the choice of tracks and their sequencing, was influenced by New York City’s (in)famous energies.

The duo’s impressionistic take on their New York surroundings comes out in a language that’s got increasingly developed as the two build up their history. With NYC, Kieran and Steve are already onto their fourth album together in three years, not to mention Kieran's contributions to Steve Reid Ensemble records in the same time (such as last year’s Daxaar for Domino). This continuous flow of collaboration and work has blossomed into its most satisfying shapes yet. While their earliest sets were instant compositions, Kieran and Steve went into Avatar with a number of themes already mapped out, and road-tested over the course of the previous year’s live shows.

Kieran is credited as playing simply “electronics”, but that doesn’t do justice to the sound collages he whips up here. Sampled fragments of analogue synth, melodica, Kieran’s own electric guitar playing, white noise, all are turned into riffs that are sent to buzz around the central motor that is Steve Reid’s extraordinary drumming. The “talking drum” is a fundamental part of West African musical tradition; but if drums can talk, Steve shows they can sing too, such is the bell-like clarity of his tone and touch. With its garrulous give and take, its musical questions and answers, NYC is Kieran and Steve’s best work yet. The only question it leaves the listener with at the close is: what’s the next destination?

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Tongues (2007)

Label: Domino
Cat#: WIGCD189
Format: CD
Date: 2007
Style: Free Jazz, Experimental

Tongues is the new record from Kieran Hebden and Steve Reid, and as you'd expect from two musicians so addicted to fresh sounds, it finds them speaking a whole new language after their earlier collaborations. You could never mistake Tongues for Volume 3 of the duo's acclaimed Exchange Sessions, even if they were produced with a similar aesthetic in mind. Like those encounters, Tongues features no overdubs or edits, just the unfiltered sound of two minds engaging in musical dialogue. The kaleidoscopic effects of Steve's drumming and Kieran's electronic chops and change-ups are all carved out and created in real time. But things have changed. The Exchange Sessions were documents of a specific moment, when Kieran and Steve had barely played together at all. The takes were long, loose and exploratory as the two musicians tested the waters and got to know each other. Tongues is more explosive. A series of shorter tracks, it's an altogether more focussed and even melodic blast. And it's been influenced by the heavy round of touring the duo have undertaken since those first encounters.

''We've been playing all kinds of mad different shows, from drum'n'bass nights in Italy to the Green Man festival in Brecon,'' explains Kieran, ''so the crowds have been really unpredictable. You get old jazz heads coming out to see Steve and dance kids too.'' So one thing thats come through from all this touring is Tongues' more concentrated style of improvisation, with explosive riffing from both Steve's kit and Kieran's multiple sampler set-up. Another is Steve's pounding rhythmic pulse. His kick-drum anchors the sound no matter how wild things get, just as Elvin Jones' hi-hat did for Coltrane's classic quartet (Jones and Art Blakey are two of Steve's particular drum heroes). It means that wherever the audiences are coming from, whether from jazz, drum'n'bass or even Detroit techno (Kieran and Steve have been interpreting the Derrick May classic 'Strings of Life' in concert this year), they're going away happy. For the recording sessions in February 2006 Kieran prepared a set of possible departure points - samples or melodic ideas which Steve had never heard. In the case of 'Greensleeves', the initial idea came from Steve, who'd been picking through some music boxes in a shop and bought one for Kieran: ''Check it out, they had a Coltrane one!'' But all the tracks here are Steve and Kieran's instant, first-take responses to these ideas.

Though he commonly practises for three hours a day, Steve doesn't see the point of rehearsing material, or even soundchecking for too long: if something happens, the time to capture it is right then, in the moment, when it first happens. 2007 promises to be an even busier year for Kieran and Steve. A 10-date UK tour is booked for March, culminating in another show at London's Koko, to follow up on the 2005 date played with Steve Reid's full Ensemble which widely blew minds and burned the rubber off dancing feet. Remixes by Audion and James Holden will see the light of day, and the duo have a trip to Senegal planned for more recording time. In the meantime, the duo can be seen in action on Nigel Godrich's groundbreaking online music show, From the Basement.

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The Exchange Session Vol. 2 (2006)

Label: Domino
Cat#: DNO 100
Format: CD
Date:
06 Jun 2006
Style: Free Jazz, Experimental

When I talked to Kieran a couple of years back, about from where he drew inspiration, he demurred saying that he really couldn't locate the sort of records he hoped would exist in the hinterlands of jazz, Krautrock and experimental electronic music. Since then, it seems - in addition to his ceaseless search for such illusive pearls - he's decided to start making his own. Steve Reid is the legendary drummer who in 1964 at 19 years of age played on Martha Reeves & the Vandellas' 'Dancing In The Street', and subsequently went on to play with Miles Davis, Fela Kuti and James Brown (think about that for a moment), not to mention Fats Domino, Sun Ra, Peggy Lee, Chaka Khan, Dexter Gordon, Dionne Warwick and many, many more.

Early in April this year, he went into The Exchange in Camden, London (where Kieran cuts his records) to extemporise with the young man from Four Tet. Wholly improvised, unedited and without overdubs, 'The Exchange Session Vol 2' is the second half of the real-time result of this fecund union.

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The Exchange Session Vol. 1 (2006)

Label: Domino
Cat#: WIGCD169
Format: CD, Album
Date: 2006
Style: Free Jazz, Experimental

Steve Reid is the legendary drummer who in 1964 at 19 years of age played on Martha Reeves & the Vandellas' 'Dancing In The Street', and subsequently went on to play with Miles Davis, Fela Kuti and James Brown (think about that for a moment), not to mention Fats Domino, Sun Ra, Peggy Lee, Chaka Khan, Dexter Gordon, Dionne Warwick and many, many more. Early in April this year, he went into The Exchange in Camden, London (where Kieran cuts his records) to extemporise with the young man from Four Tet.

Wholly improvised, unedited and without overdubs, 'The Exchange Session Vol 1' is the real-time first result of this fecund union. ''My life changed the day we recorded the Exchange sessions. I couldn't believe I was involved in making this music. It was such a revelation to be able to create improvised music with this epitome of African-American rhythmic drum tradition.'' Kieran Hebden. ''I consider us to be pioneers, doing the electricity and the drums live. In the future this is going to be considered really important, but for now there's just this.'' Steve Reid.

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The Flaming Lips Discography

2010-04-13T10:16:00.000-07:00

big update 13.04.2010: ep+albums

The Dark Side of the Moon (2009)
Label: Warner Bros. Records
Catalog#: none
Format: Digital
Date: 22 Dec 2009
Style: Alternative Rock, Rock and Roll, Psychedelic Rock, Experimental

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The Soft Bulletin Outtakes (Bonus CD) (2009)

Label: Warner Bros. Records, Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 518653-1, PRO-CD-518619
Format: CD
Date: 2009
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Indie Rock, Experimental

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Embryonic (2009)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 520857-2
Format: CD
Date: 13 Oct 2009
Style: Psychedelic/Experimental Rock

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Once Beyond Hopelessness (Soundtrack) (2008)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 516831-1
Format: LP
Date: 2008
Style: Score, Psychedelic Rock, Experimental, Ambient

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At War with the Mystics (2006)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9362-49966-2
Format: CD
Date: 3 Apr 2006
Style: Psychedelic/Experimental/Indie Rock

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The Fearless Freaks - 20 Years of Weird: The Flaming Lips 1986-2006 (Compilation) (2006)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 44136-2
Format: CD, Compilation
Date: 2006
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Experimental, Alternative Rock, Indie Rock

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It Overtakes Me (EP) (2006)

Label: Warner Bros. Records, WEA International Inc.
Cat#: W750CD, 9362 42986-2
Format: CD, EP
Date: 13 Nov 2006
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Experimental, Leftfield, Noise

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In a Priest Driven Ambulance (2005)

Label: Plain Recordings
Cat#: plain114
Format: LP + 12", Limited Edition
Date: 16 Dec 2005
Style: Alternative Rock, Indie Rock

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Fight Test (EP) (2003)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 48433-2
Format: CD, EP
Date: 22 Apr 2003
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Indie Rock, Experimental, Noise

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Ego Tripping at the Gates of Hell (2003)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9362485142
Format: CD, EP
Date: 2003
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Indie Rock, Experimental, Noise

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Yoshimi Battles the Pink Robots (2002)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9362-48141-2
Format: CD
Date: 2002
Style: Experimental/Indie Rock, Synthpop

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The Soft Bulletin (1999)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9 46876-2
Format: CD
Date: 22 Jun 1999
Style: Psychedelic/Experimental/Indie Rock

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Zaireeka (1997)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9 46804-2
Format: 4xCD (here 1CD)
Date: Oct 1997
Style: Psychedelic Rock, Indie Rock, Experimental

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Clouds Taste Metallic (1995)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9362 45911-2
Format: CD
Date: Sep 1995
Style: Psychedelic/Indie Rock

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Transmissions from the Satellite Heart (1993)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9 45334-2
Format: CD
Date: 22 Jun 1993
Style: Psychedelic/Experimental/Indie Rock

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Hit to Death in the Future Head (1992)

Label: Warner Bros. Records
Cat#: 9 26838-2
Format: CD
Date: 11 Aug 1992
Style: Psychedelic/Indie Rock

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Telepathic Surgery (1989)

Label: Restless Records
Cat#: 7 72350-2
Format: CD
Date: Feb 1989
Style: Experimental/Psychedelic Rock

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Oh My Gawd!!!... (1987)

Label: Restless Records
Cat#: 72207-1
Format: LP
Date: 1987
Style: Alternative/Psychedelic Rock

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Hear It Is (1987)

Label: Pink Dust
Cat#: 72173-2
Format: CD
Date: 1987
Style: Indie Rock

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High Places - 2010 - High Places vs Mankind

2010-04-13T06:29:00.000-07:00

Label: Thrill Jockey
Cat#: THRILL 238
Format: CD
Date: 23 Mar 2010
Style: Experimental Rock

Using samples, loops, found sounds, household appliances, and a highly developed sense of childlike joy and wonder, High Places create some magic on their debut full-length album. The duo of Mary Pearson and Robert Barber take a get-in-where-you-fit-in approach to their sound, splicing in elements of indie pop, electronica, world music, dub, and outer space kids music and ending up with a sound that isn't miles away from what fellow sonic adventurers like Panda Bear or El Guincho are doing, but retains more than enough individuality and invention to be totally unique and original. Credit Barber's amazing ability to weave bits and bobs of noise and sound into a blipping, jerky music that soothes the ears and makes your feet want to move. It could have easily ended up a jumbled mess or a corny gimmick, instead it sounds like a thoroughly modern update on the kind of primitive music humans have been making all along. Pearson's vocals too deserve all kinds of praise. They are unfailingly sweet without being sugary, sometimes treated and trippy but always directed straight for the heart. She gives the whirlwind of sound a stable and very human center. Within the group's hermetically sealed and unified world of sound there is enough variation to keep things very interesting, whether it's stuttering dance beats on "Gold Coin," the heavenly clouds of what sounds like bells and strings but could be anything on "Papaya Yeah," the almost Chinese guitars on "The Storm," or the clattering steel drums on "The Tree with the Lights On It," Barber and Pearson show a mastery of atmosphere and dynamics without sacrificing the beauty of the melodies and the impact of the songs. High Places' debut lives up to the promise of their singles (and then some) and is hopefully the first of many impressive and inspiring records to come from the duo.

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Tracklist

1. The Longest Shadows 5:55
2. On Giving Up 3:27
3. She's A Wild Horse 4:44
4. The Channon 2:39
5. Canada 3:04
6. Constant Winter 5:12
7. On A Hill In A Bed On A Road In A House 2:43
8. Drift Slayer 4:08
9. The Most Beautiful Name 2:47
10. When It Comes 5:10

Alif Tree Discography

2010-04-13T03:51:00.000-07:00

update 13.04.2010: 'Clockwork Remixes Part 1' (2009) & 'Part 2' (2010)

Clockwork Remixes Part 2 (2010)

Label: Compost Records
Date: Feb 2010
Style: Nu Jazz, House

Buy

Download (VBR, 30mb): load2.me

Clockwork Remixes Part 1 (2009)

Label: Compost Records
Date: Jun 2009
Style: House, Techno

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 70mb): load2.me

Clockwork (2009)

Label: Compost Records
Cat#: CPT 304-2
Format: CD
Date: Mar 2009
Style: Nu Jazz

Discogs, Download (320, 150mb): load2.me

French Cuisine (Single) (2006)

Label: Compost Records
Cat#: COMPOST 205-2
Format: CD
Date: 6 Feb 2006
Style: Nu Jazz, Contemporary Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 130mb): load2.me

Forgotten Places (Single) (2006)

Label: Compost Records
Cat#: COMPOST 204-1
Format: 12", Single
Date: Mar 2006
Style: Nu Jazz, Deep House

Discogs, Download (VBR, 35mb): load2.me

Spaced (2002)

Label: Universal Records
Cat#: 440 016 860-2
Format: CD
Date: 2002
Style: Nu Jazz, Trip Hop

Discogs, Download (192, 90mb): load2.me

The Observatory (1999)

Label: Memory Music
Cat#: 123292MU659
Format: CD
Date: 1999
Style: Trip Hop

Discogs, Download (192, 80mb): load2.me

Koop Discography

2010-04-08T00:59:00.000-07:00

More Remixes (Single) (2007) feat. Yukimi Nagano

Label: Compost Records
Cat#: COMPOST 244-1
Format: 12"
Date: 2007
Style: Nu Jazz, Minimal, Tech House

Discogs, Download (VBR, 25mb): load2.me

Koop Islands (2006)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7208CD
Format: CD
Date: 2 Oct 2006
Style: Acid Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 70mb): load2.me

The Swedish Remixes (EP) (2006)

Label: Compost Records
Cat#: COMPOST 242-1
Format: 12"
Date: 2006
Style: Nu Jazz

Discogs, Download (VBR, 25mb): load2.me

Waltz for Koop - Alternative Takes (2003)

Label: Superstudio Grå, Compost Records
Cat#: GRÅ C-5, COMPOST 153-2
Format: CD
Date: 2003
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 125mb): load2.me

Sons of Koop (2003)

Label: Superstudio Grå
Cat#: GRÅ C-2
Format: CD
Date: 2003
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo, Trip Hop

Discogs, Download (320, 105mb): load2.me

Waltz for Koop (2001)

Label: Sony Music Entertainment (Sweden)
Cat#: 505426 2
Format: CD
Date: 2001
Style: Downtempo, Nu Jazz, Deep House

Discogs, Download (320, 75mb): load2.me

Bomb the Bass Discography

2010-04-06T21:46:00.000-07:00

update: album 'Back to Light' (2010), singles 'Up the Mountain' (2010), 'Bug Powder Dust' (1994)

Back To Light (2010)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#:!K7251CD
Format: CD
Released: 2010
Style: House, Synthpop, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (VBR, 65mb): load2.me

Up the Mountain (Single) (2010) feat. The Battle of Land and Sea

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: K7259EPD
Format: Digital
Date: 2010

Download (320, 30mb): load2.me

Boy/Girl (Single) (2010) feat. feat. Paul Conboy

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: K7258EPD
Format: Digital
Date: 19 Feb 2010

Download (VBR, 65mb): multiupload, rghost

X-Ray Eyes (Single) (2010) feat. Kelley Polar

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: K7257EPD
Format: Digital
Date: 2 Feb 2010

Download (320, 45mb): multiupload, rghost

The Infinites (Single) (2010) feat. Paul Conboy

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: K7251EPD

Download (320, 110mb): multiupload, rghost

Black River (Single) (2009) feat. Mark Lanegan

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7237EPD
Format: Single
Date: 2009
Style: Leftfield, Techno, Electro

Discogs, Download (320, 55mb): multiupload, rghost

Future Chaos (2xCD) (2008)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7230CD
Format: 2xCD
Date: 19 Sep 2008
Style: Leftfield, Electro, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 200mb): multiupload, rghost

Butterfingers (Single) (2008)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: K7234EP
Date: 2008
Style: Breaks, Techno

Discogs, Download (VBR, 25mb): multiupload, rghost

Clearcut (EP) (2001) feat. Lali Puna

Label: Morr Music
Cat#: MM018CD
Format: EP
Date: 9 Apr 2001
Style: Downtempo, Abstract, Drum and Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 60mb): multiupload, rghost

Bug Powder Dust (Single, CD1) (1994) feat. Justin Warfield

Label: 4th and Broadway
Cat#: BRCD 300, 854101-2
Format: CD, Single
Date: 1994
Style: Breakbeat, Trip Hop, Big Beat

Discogs, Download (160, 20mb): load2.me

Bug Powder Dust (Single, CD2) (1994) feat. Justin Warfield

Label: 4th and Broadway
Cat#: BRCDX 300, 854103-2
Format: CD, Single
Date: 1994
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (192, 30mb): load2.me

Clear (1994)

Label: Quango Records
Cat#: 162-531 033-2
Format: CD
Date: 1994
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 145mb): multiupload, rghost

Darkheart Part 2 (Single) (1994)

Label: 4th and Broadway, Island Records
Cat#: BRCDX 305, 854 167-2
Format: Single
Date: 1994
Style: Trip Hop, Dub, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 50mb): multiupload, rghost

1 to 1 Religion Part 1 (Maxi-Single) (1994)

Label: 4th and Broadway
Cat#: BRCD 313
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1994
Style: Trip Hop, Dub, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 50mb): multiupload, rghost

Unknown Territory (Maxi-Single) (1991)
Label: Rhythm King Records
Cat#: 468774 2, 01 468774 10, 01-468774-10
Format: CD
Date: Aug 1991
Style: Synthpop, Tech House

Discogs, Download (320, 160mb): multiupload, rghost

The Air You Breathe (Maxi-Single) (1991)

Label: Rhythm King Records
Cat#: 657538 2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1991
Style: House

Discogs, Download (320, 45mb): multiupload, rghost

Winter in July (Maxi-Single) (1991)

Label: Rhythm King Records
Cat#: 657275 2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1991
Style: Trip Hop

Discogs, Download (320, 45mb): multiupload, rghost

Into the Dragon (1988)

Label: Rhythm King Records
Cat#: DOOD LP CD 1
Format: CD
Date: Oct 1988
Style: Breakbeat, House

Discogs, Download (320, 100mb): multiupload, rghost

Say a Little Prayer (Maxi-Single) (1988)

Label: Torso
Cat#: TORSO CD 595
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1988
Style: Acid House, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 40mb): multiupload, rghost

Megablast/Don't Make Me Wait (Maxi-Single) (1988)

Label: Torso
Cat#: TORSO CD 578
Format: Maxi-Single
Date: 1988
Style: Leftfield, Breakbeat

Discogs, Download (320, 45mb): multiupload, rghost

Beat Dis (Maxi-Single) (1988)

Label: BCM Records
Cat#: B.C. 50-2093-44
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1988
Style: Breakbeat, House

Discogs, Download (320, 45mb): multiupload, rghost

Circlesquare Discography

2010-04-05T19:23:00.000-07:00

update: ep Hey You Guys / Dancers (2010 Remixes)

Hey You Guys / Dancers (2010 Remixes) (EP) (2010)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7239EPD
Format: Digital
Date: 2010

Buy

Download (320, 65mb): load2.me

Songs About Dancing and Drugs (2009)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7233CD
Format: CD
Date: Jan 2009
Style: Leftfield, New Wave

Having set up home at Trevor Jackson's Output Recordings between the years of 1999 and 2006, Jeremy Shaw, the man behind Circlesquare decamps to to K7 and produces an album characterised by the seemingly mutually exclusive properties of wistfulness and hedonism. Songs About Dancing And Drugs finds a point of crossover between electronic pop music and minor key, guitar driven songwriting. While 'Dancers' carries a kind of darkened electro-funk - full of gloomy melody - within a few moments 'Music For Satellites' acquires an air of detachment and introspection, held together by strange static transmissions, motorised acoustic guitar strums and aloof, haunted vocals repeating the refrain "All got lost up there". An impressively ambiguous body of work, this is an album that's still trying to work out whether it wants to head for the dancefloor or be left alone, in a state of soul-searching reflection.

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 115mb): multiupload

Hey You Guys (Single) (2009)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7239EP
Format: 12"
Date: Apr 2009
Style: Downtempo, Tech House, Acid, Minimal

Already a splendid slice of electronically-enhanced pop music, Circlesquare's 'Hey You Guys' takes a detour to the dancefloor thanks to the ace Juan Maclean, who lays on some warm, richly woven together house percussion and biting 303s for this lengthy reinterpretation. The production is modern and crisp but the guiding principle go back to the golden age of proto-acid. Taking on a bit of a surreal disco feel, Mickey Moonlight's remix preserves the killer hooks of the original whilst bringing a freshness and clarity to proceedings.

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 40mb): multiupload

Dancers (Single) (2009)

Date: Feb 2009

Covering one half of Circlesquares subject matter for the recent Songs About Dancing And Drugs album, this new single combines cut-up electro-rock production with slippery slide guitar - something stripped away by Konrad Black for his dark minimal techno overhaul. True to form, Lowfish stays closer to the electro-infused pop spirit of the original.

Buy

Download (VBR, 25mb): multiupload

Ten to One (Single) (2009)

Date: Jun 2009

Another single to be lifted from Circlesquare's Songs ABout Dancing And Drugs, 'Ten To One' takes a darker stab at electronic pop than most artists tend to nowadays. There's a cold, new wave edge to all this, and the understated narrative of the original mix will soon burrow its way into your brain, while the Matias Aguayo mix has designs on pummeling you into submission with some unexpected use of fragmented breakbeats. Finally, a remix by Anoraak and Russ Chimes takes on former single 'Dancers', resulting in some summery, hyper-glossy vocoded disco.

Buy

Download (320, 50mb): multiupload

Dancers / Music for Satellites (EP) (2009)

Label: Studio !K7
Cat#: !K7233EP
Format: 12", EP
Date: Jan 2009
Style: Abstract, Downtempo, Tech House, Minimal

Discogs, Download (320, 35mb): multiupload

Fight Sounds (EP) (2006)

Label: Output
Cat#: OPRCD 87
Format: CD, EP
Date: Mar 2006
Style: Leftfield, Post Rock, Experimental

Despite residing under the fizzing-neon banner of Trevor Jackson's Output label, Vancouver-based Circlesquare has always adopted a more considered approach than the shiny Playgroup-style electro-pop which has become synonymous with the imprint. His first new material since 'Pre-Earthquake Anthem' LP, 'Fight Sounds EP' sees Jeremy Shaw further bucking the trend with an EP that unites warring factions - some tracing-paper electronica one minute, ear shattering digitalis the next, whilst in the middle you get some singer-songwriter tenderness for your £££. Opening with 'Part 1' of the title track, Shaw hits you round the face with some proper-brusque beats that incrementally fade out into a spot of mentalism (brief but satisfying) before some steely vocals kick in and take the whole thing down to Colder's gaff. From here, '97 and 02' is a shimmer of tender guitars and hushed vocal rectitude, 'You Missed The Fireworks' dips it's toe in the steely-end of electro, whilst 'Fight Sounds Part 2D' manages to gel pensive guitars and brittle beats without resorting to any kind of -tronica suffix. Square-root of rather good...

Buy

Discogs, Download (256, 60mb): load2.me

Pre-Earthquake Anthem (2003)

Label: Output
Cat#: OPR61CD
Format: CD
Date: 2003
Style: Leftfield, Downtempo

CircleSquare’s debut album on Trevor Jackson’s Output label is a departure from the sleazed-up discoball obsession the label has perfected of late Mixing up a brooding and pounding melancholy, bass fuelled sensory exploration, and purest minimal electronic meltdown that draws on a wide range of influences including punk rock, hip-hop, skate parks, pipe bombs and adolescent suburban anarchy. Dense, considered stuff.

Buy

Discogs, Download (192, 65mb): multiupload

Towa Tei Discography

2010-04-05T17:59:00.000-07:00

update: album 'Big Fun' (2009)

Big Fun (2009)

Label: Columbia Music Entertainment
Cat#: COZP-350~1
Format: CD
Date: 2009
Style: House

Discogs, Download (VBR, 75mb): load2.me

Flash (2005)

Label: V2 Records, Inc.
Cat#: VVR1034132
Format: CD
Date: 2005
Style: House, Breaks, Pop Rock, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 85mb): load2.me

Flasher (Compilation) (2005)

Label: V2 Records Japan
Cat#: V2CP 248
Format: CD
Date: 23 Nov 2005
Style: House, Techno

Discogs, Download (320, 145mb): load2.me

Funkin' for Jamaica (Single) (2002)

Label: Kitsuné Music
Cat#: KITSUNÉ 001
Format: 12"
Date: 2002
Style: House

Discogs, Download (320, 40mb): load2.me

Funkin' for Jamaica (Maxi-Single) (2001)

Label: EastWest Records GmbH
Cat#: 8573 88934-2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 2001
Style: House, Drum and Bass, Funk, J-pop

Discogs, Download (320, 100mb): load2.me

Best (2001)

Label: Akashic Records, EastWest Japan
Cat#: 046, AMCT-4567
Format: CD
Date: 24 Oct 2001
Style: House, Acid Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 150mb): load2.me

Last Century Modern (2000)

Label: EastWest
Cat#: 8573-82962-2
Format: CD, Album
Date: 2000
Style: Nu Jazz, Leftfield, Drum and Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 110mb): load2.me

GBI (German Bold Italic) (Single, CD1) (1998) feat. Kylie Minogue

Label: Arthrob, EastWest
Cat#: ART021CD1, 3984-25333-2
Format: CD, Single
Date: 26 Oct 1998
Style: House

Discogs, Download (320, 35mb): load2.me

Sound Museum/Stupid Fresh (3xCD) (1997)

Format: 3xCD
Style: Acid Jazz, Downtempo

Download (320, 120/90mb): load2.me CD1+CD2/CD3

Happy (EP) (1997)

Label: EastWest Japan
Cat#: AMCY-2303
Format: CD, EP
Date: 25 Jun 1997
Style: House, Downtempo, Drum and Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 85mb): load2.me

GBI (German Bold Italic) (Maxi-Single) (1997) feat. Kylie Minogue

Label: Warner Music (Australia)
Cat#: 3984-24740-2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1997
Style: House, Drum and Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 55mb): load2.me

Technova (Maxi-Single) (1995)

Label: Elektra
Cat#: 66141-2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 1995
Style: Lounge, Acid House, Techno, House

Discogs, Download (320, 90mb): load2.me

Luv Connection (Maxi-Single) (1995)

Label: Elektra
Cat#: 66098-2
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 12 Sep 1995
Style: Rhythm and Blues, Downtempo, Tech House

Discogs, Download (320, 150mb): load2.me

Future Listening! (1994)

Label: For Life Records,
Cat#: FLCG03004, DA-339
Format: CD
Date: 1994
Style: Downtempo, Latin, Trip Hop

Discogs, Download (320, 110mb): load2.me

Video

Towa Tei feat. Kylie Minogue - GBI (50mb)

Madita Discography

2010-04-05T17:12:00.000-07:00

Pacemaker (2010)

Label: Couch Records
Cat#: 20622
Format: CD
Date: 19 Feb 2010
Style: Trip Hop, Disco

Discogs, Download (320, 90mb): load2.me

Asteroidz (2009) feat. DBN

Label: Yoshitoshi Recordings
Cat#: YR146
Format: Digital
Date: 17 Jul 2009
Style: Progressive House, Tech House, Minimal

Discogs, Download (320, 75mb): load2.me

Too (2008)

Label: Couch Records
Cat#: 20472
Format: CD
Date: 2008
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 125mb): load2.me

Madita (2005)

Label: Couch Records
Cat#: CR 20362
Format: C
Date: 21 Oct 2005
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 100mb): load2.me

The Underbelly - 2010 - Seven Feet Under

2010-04-05T15:20:00.000-07:00

Label: Record Kicks
Cat#: RKX030
Format: CD, Digital
Date: 22 Mar 2010
Style: Funk

The Underbelly are a five piece uptempo funk band from Cornwall, comprised of tenor sax, alto sax, flute/baritone sax, guitar, drums and bass, delivering high energy dancefloor-friendly funk music. After being the resident band for Pete Isaac’s legendary Jelly Jazz parties, The Underbelly are now ready to launch their recording career with this debut full-length, for which they recruited the powerful voice of Dojo Cuts singer Roxie Ray on three tracks. Anticipated by the release of 45 "I Keep Heading On" sung by Miss Ray, with the driving rhythms of "Cold Toast" on the B-side, “Seven Feet Under” is set to redefine the modern funk scene.

The album kicks off to a strong start with the soulful, uplifting grooves of instrumental “V-funk”, and proceeds to capture all the raw, live energy that established The Underbelly as one of the most exciting funk bands to emerge today. From the fast-paced “Erik FM”, to the more mellow and laid-back jazz-feel of “Packin Up”, this album is by no means a typical debut, but rather a confident display of tight musicianship, innovative sounds and infectious breakbeats. Already counting on the support of DJs such as Craig Charles, who called them “the find of the year” during his show on BBC 2, The Underbelly put a modern, edgy twist on the classic sounds of soul and funk, resulting in an album that captures the ears and feet of anyone in a 5 mile radius, so careful how high you turn your speakers on!

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 70mb): load2.me

Drop Logik - 2010 - Hot Box Studies

2010-04-05T12:03:00.000-07:00

Label: Black Bridge
Cat#: Black011
Date: 1 Mar 2010

Were proud to introduce you to the debut full-length artist album from Black Bridges very own Drop Logik.

Hailing from the mountains of the Southwest United Crates of America, a sound physician was born. Making drum kits out of trash cans, empty paint barrels, and whatever the hell else made noise, Chad Dixon aka Drop Logik aka Crate Diggler, began rearranging sound from an early age. Moving on to simply looping beats from dual cassette decks to buying his first sampler and drum machine and so on and so forth. Its always been an outlet of inner combustion ready to be released into your headphones. Now is the time to press play!

Hot Box Studies bangs out space age mental gymnastics with crunchy samples and syncopated beats. Musical movements are cut together with turntablist acumen across a deep abyss of sound as swirly interludes play between the loftier scores. Stand out picks include the cut-em-up-flapper Hear To Wear, the sultry big beat Get!Get!, and the outer space gospel Out Of My Head. Finally,Smoke Ring Dreams brings us home and serves as your well deserved introduction to the one and only Crate Diggler.

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 50mb): load2.me

Bonobo Discography

2010-03-30T12:17:00.000-07:00

Black Sands (2010)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCD140
Format: CD
Date: 24 Mar 2010
Style: Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 120mb): load2.me

Eyesdown (EP) (2010) feat. Andreya Triana

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCDS258P
Format: CD, EP
Date: 2010
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, mb): load2.me

The Keeper (Single) (2009) feat. Andreya Triana

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENDNLS247
Format: Digital
Date: 2009
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, mb): load2.me

Between The Lines/Recurring (Remixes) (Single) (2009)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZEN10223
Format: 10", Single
Date: 23 Mar 2009
Style: Soul-Jazz, Downtempo, Experimental

Discogs, Download (VBR, 20mb): load2.me

Days to Come (2xCD) (2006)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCD119
Format: 2xCD
Date: 2 Oct 2006
Style: Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 115/60mb): load2.me CD1/CD2

Nightlite (Zero dB Reconstruction) (Single) (2006)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCDS 189
Format: Single
Date: 2006
Style: Downtempo, Drum&Bass

Discogs, Download (320, 40mb): load2.me

Nightlite (Single) (2006)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCDS 189 P
Format: Single
Date: Jun 2006
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 30mb): load2.me

Solid Steel Presents Bonobo - It Came from the Sea (Mixed) (2005)

Label: Ninja Tune
Catg#: ZENCD 107
Format: CD, Mixed
Date: 30 Sep 2005
Style: Downtempo, Breaks

Discogs, Download (320, 95mb): load2.me

Live Sessions (EP) (2005)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: zen CDS170
Format: CD,EP
Date: 31 May 2005
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 75mb): load2.me

Dial 'M' for Monkey (2003)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZEN CD80
Format: CD
Date: 9 Jun 2003
Style: Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 95mb): load2.me

Pick Up (Maxi-Single) (2003)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZEN 10137
Format: 10"
Date: Apr 2003
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (192, 15mb): load2.me

Flutter (Maxi-Single) (2003)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCDS 147
Format: CD, Maxi-Single
Date: 2003
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (VBR, 20mb): load2.me

One Offs... Remixes and B Sides (Compilation) (2002)

Label: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRUCD031
Format: CD, Compilation
Date: 12 Aug 2002
Style: Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 120mb): load2.me

Animal Magic (2001)

Label: Ninja Tune
Cat#: ZENCD63
Format: CD, Reissue
Date: 13 Nov 2001
Style: Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 105mb): load2.me

Kota (Single) (2001)

Label: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRU7 020
Format: 7", Single
Date: 27 Nov 2001
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (VBR, 15mb): load2.me

Silver (Single) (2000)

Label: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRU 7008
Format: 7", Single
Date: 27 Jun 2000
Style: Downtempo

Discogs, Download (192, 15mb): load2.me

Le Cercle - 2008 - Magnetic

2010-03-29T17:28:00.001-07:00

Label: New Track Music, Anticraft Sarl
Format: CD
Date: 2008
Style: Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz

Download (VBR, 80mb): load2.me

Tracklist:

01. Woodop
02. Say What
03. No Job Feat David Le Deunff
04. Take Control
05. The Beat Goes On
06. Downtown Streets
07. Kick Dat Bass
08. Reform
09. What Kind Of Music Do You Play
10. Mighty
11. Parano Feat Bring's
12. Voodo
13. Outro

Franz Schubert - 2004 - The Masterworks CD40

2010-03-29T16:10:00.000-07:00

Label: Brilliant
Format: 40xCD (here 1 CD, #40)
Date: 2004

Buy

Download (320, 140mb): load2.me

Tracklist:

01. Divertissement A L'Hongroise, D818; Andante
02. Divertissement A L'Hongroise, D818; Marcia
03. Divertissement A L'Hongroise, D818; Allegretto
04. Divertissement A La Francaise, D823; Tempo di Marcia
05. Divertissement A La Francaise, D823; Andantino
06. Divertissement A La Francaise, D823; Rondo, allegretto

The Dave Brubeck Quartet - 2009 - Time Out (50th Anniversary)

2010-03-29T15:35:00.000-07:00

Label: Sony Legacy
Format: 2xCD
Date: 26 May 2009

Buy

Download (256, 75/100mb): load2.me CD1/CD2

Tracklist:

CD1
01. Blue Rondo a La Turk
02. Strange Meadow Lark
03. Take Five
04. Three to Get Ready
05. Kathy's Waltz
06. Everybody's Jumpin'
07. Pick Up Sticks
CD2
01. St. Louis Blues
02. Waltz Limp
03. Since Love Had Its Way
04. Koto Song
05. Pennies from Heaven
06. You Go to My Head
07. Blue Rondo a La Turk
08. Take Five

Review:

The first million-selling album in jazz history.

1959 was a banner year for jazz, but no album captured the public's attention like Dave Brubeck's Time Out. "Take Five," the surprise radio hit from Time Out, would enter the record books as the first million-selling jazz instrumental single on the Billboard Hot 100, and "Blue Rondo à la Turk" would become an instant classic. This edition marks the 50th anniversary with an unprecedented presentation of music, images, insight and history, including the chance to hear the classic Brubeck Quartet in top form live at Newport, plus a companion DVD offering a fresh take on the making of this pioneering recording.

The experimental meters of Brubeck's music set Time Out apart from the pack. But the appeal of this album - in 1959 and today - is less in the rules it broke, and more in the sheer sweep and effervescence and pure unadulterated fun of the music. For all his seriousness and ardor, Dave Brubeck had somehow recaptured a sense of childlike wonder in this project. And for that reason, the decades may pass and tastes may change, but it will always be the right time for Time Out.

The Souljazz Orchestra - 2010 - Rising Sun

2010-03-29T15:23:00.000-07:00

Label: Strut
Cat#: STRUT058CD
Format: CD
Date: 2010
Style: Jazz, Fusion, Funk

Buy: LP, CD

Discogs, Download (VBR, 55mb): load2.me

Tracklist:

01. Awakening
02. Agbara
03. Negus Negast
04. Lotus Flower
05. Mamaya
06. Serenity
07. Consecration
08. Rejoice (Part 1)
09. Rejoice (Part 2)

Zero dB - 2010 - One Offs, Remixes & B Sides

2010-03-28T12:23:00.000-07:00

Label: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRUCD209
Format: 2xCD, Compilation
Date: 22 Feb 2010
Style: Broken Beat, Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 140/120mb): load2.me CD1/CD2

Tracklist:

CD1
01. Zero dB - Come Party
02. Alice Russell - Universe (Dave da Gato's 'F_ck Up The Festivals Bounce')
03. Zero dB - A Pomba Girou (Moonstarr Remix)
04. Zero dB - Click
05. Vogado Projects - Mas Fuerte Que El Sol
06. Javi p3z Orquesta - El Pinball (Dave da Gato Uno Mas Mix)
07. Inverse Cinematics - 7x7 (Dave da Gato's Baad Ass Tapas Remix)
08. Zero dB - On The 1&3 vs. Know What I'm Saying (Aaron Jerome Mix)
09. Quantic - Life in the Rain (Dave Da Gato's Ferile Touch)
10. Frank De JoJo - Turn Off the Lights
11. Brighter Days - Toufe Yen Yen (Dave da Gato Remix)
CD2
01. Zero dB - The Snare
02. John Kong & Moonstarr - Future Vision (Zero dB Reconstruction)
03. Zero dB - Conga Madness (Seiji Remix)
04. DJ Kentaro - dBeep On (Zero dB Reconstruction)
05. Grupo Batuque - E Ruim (Zero dB Reconstruction)
06. Hexatic - Distorted Minds (Zero dB Mix)
07. Zzouf - That Drum Track
08. Zzouf - You Not Been Drinkin
09. Dave da Gato - El Diablo
10. Raphael Sebbag feat. Telmary - El Fantasma De La Libertad (Zero dB Reconstruction)
11. Bonobo - Nightlife (Zero dB Reconstruction)

Review:

With their exhilarating and influential 2006 album ‘Bongos, Bleeps and Basslines’ sparking the kind of universal critical love-in that most producers can only dream of pioneering underground duo Zero dB bring together their One Offs, Remixes and B Sides

As if the mere prospect of a new release by Zero dB weren’t enough to get tongues wagging and feet dancing, this 2 CD, 23 track monster boasts the best of a truly humungous catalogue of remixes courtesy of luminaries including Moonstarr, Aaron Jerome and Seiji among others. It also heralds a first and eagerly-awaited CD release for a handful of highly sought-after cuts – not least Hextatic’s Distorted Minds (Zero dB mix), the Dave Da Gato Mix of “Seven By Seven” by Inverse Cinematics and the almighty Zero dB classic, “The Snare” – that were previously only available on limited vinyl and all snapped up by eagle-eared fans way back when. And, in addition to the big names and rarities on this latest addition to Tru Thoughts’ esteemed ‘One Offs…’ artist compilation series (which has previously seen Bonobo, Quantic, Nostalgia 77 and Domu dust off some of their best kept secrets for the fans), there’s also a healthy sprinkling of completely new and exclusive material including the immense Dave Da Gato’s F_ck-Up The Festivals Bounce version of “Universe” by Alice Russell, bringing the soul diva/national treasure’s song to the heady, neck-snapping heights of euphoric club nastiness.

As any avid follower will know, the Zero dBoys, Chris Vogado and Neil Combstock, have been keeping busy at the cutting edge singe the release of ‘BB & B’, making killer club music under various monikers, many of them to be found on this record, and packing out dancefloors with DJ sets in some of the biggest clubs and best soundsystems known to man, including Plastic People and Japan’s Club Yellow. Vogado, now living in Barcelona, runs the boutique Fluid Ounce label from his legendary Fl. Oz. Studios, and Combstock has also seen his muse lead him round the globe, living, DJing and making music variously in Japan and Thailand among other places.

Zero dB’s ‘One Offs, Remixes and B Sides’ is not only an essential listen for existing fans of Zero dB’s unique concoction of Latin heat, jazz colour, startling beats and pure bassline filth, but for anyone who has been remotely moved by dance music in the last half decade.

Ametsub Discography

2010-03-28T10:13:00.000-07:00

The Nothings of the North (2009)

Label: Progressive Form, Third Ear
Cat#: PFCD18, XECD-1110
Format: CD
Date: 4 Feb 2009
Style: Glitch, Nu Jazz

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 100mb): load2.me

Surge (2007) with Jimanica

Label: Mao
Cat#: DDCM-5021, maocd-20
Format: CD, Mini-Album
Date: 29 Aug 2007
Style: Glitch, Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 70mb): load2.me

Linear Cryptics (2006)

Label: Progressive Form
Ca#: PFCD13
Format: CD
Date: 2006
Style: Glitch, IDM, Downtempo, Experimental

Discogs, Download (VBR, 100mb): load2.me

Birdy Nam Nam Discography

2010-03-28T06:59:00.000-07:00

Manual for Successful Rioting (2009)

Label: Has Been
Ca#: HB002
Format: CD
Date: 12 Jan 2009
Style: Electro

Discogs, Download (320, 105mb): load2.me

The Parachute Ending (EP) (2009)

Label: Has Been, Sony Music
Cat#: HB003, 886977532331
Format: 12"
Date: Jun 2009
Style: Electro

Discogs, Download (VBR, 30mb): load2.me

Worried (EP) (2008)

Label: Has Been
Cat#: HB001
Format: 12"
Date: 3 Dec 2008
Style: Electro

Discogs, Download (320, 30mb): load2.me

Trans Boulogne Express (2007)

Label: UWe
Cat#: UWE 242
Format: CD
Date: 2007
Style: Electro

Discogs, Download (320, 45mb): load2.me

Birdy Nam Nam (2005)

Label: UWe
Cat#: UWe-CD-6
Format: CD
Date: 2005
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Turntablism, Nu Jazz

Discogs, Download (320, 130mb): load2.me

Engineer Fear (EP) (2005)

Label: Kif Recordings
Cat#: KIFHH104
Format: 12"
Date: 19 Apr 2005
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Turntablism, Nu Jazz

Discogs, Download (VBR, 30mb): load2.me

Body, Mind, Spirit... (EP) (2004)

Label: Kif Recordings
Cat#: KIFHH102
Format: 12"
Date: May 2004
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Turntablism, Nu Jazz

Discogs, Download (192, 30mb): load2.me

Damu The Fudgemunk - 2010 - How It Should Sound (Promo EP)

2010-03-28T04:38:00.000-07:00

Label: Redefinition Records
Cat#: none
Format: Digital
Date: 25 Mar 2010
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop

Free

Discogs, Download (320, 30mb): load2.me

Tracklist:

1. New LP (Intro) 1:44
2. Judgement Day 3:34
3. Fabrega's Discotecas 3:00
4. You Know Who! 2:12
5. Bills Be Gone 1:04
6. Wonka Beat 3 1:55

Bill Evans - 1977 - You Must Believe in Spring

2010-03-26T07:13:00.000-07:00

Download (320, 80mb): load2.me

Tracklist:

1. B Minor Waltz (For Ellaine) 3:20
2. You Must Believe in Spring 5:47
3. Gary's Theme 4:23
4. We Will Meet Again (For Harry) 4:07
5. The Peacocks 6:05
6. Sometime Ago 4:40
7. Theme From M*A*S*H (aka Suicide is Painless) 5:55

Review

“You Must Believe in Spring” is an indispensable part of the huge recorded output of Bill Evans, for musical reasons, but its significance is otherwise noteworthy as well. It was his first date for Warner Brothers, after a long and fruitful association with Fantasy Records. Recorded in August 1977 at Capitol studios in Los Angeles, but not released until early 1981 -- it was also the first album released by any company after the pianist’s death in September 1980, thus adding to the bittersweet experience of listening to its beauty, for those of us who first picked it up on vinyl back then. It still holds up as one of the most "billevans-ish" albums there are, to coin a phrase: so many of the unique qualities ascribed to his playing over the years can be found right here in this recording.

One of the most-loved of his records (which came in at #9 on Billboard's Jazz Charts in 1982) , it was also the last session Bill did with bassist Eddie Gomez, who amicably left the trio soon after these dates after an eleven year tenure, to pursue other projects. Appearing on Marian McPartland’s “Piano Jazz” show in 1979, Evans spoke of this then yet-untitled album, in that it was already “in the can” and he specifically remarked how well Gomez played on the date. Even among bassists, and other working musicians, it’s still a wonder how he was so finely tuned-in to not only Bill’s melodic ideas, but to his freely played rubatos -- knowing where to come in on a chord change, or where to land in close sync with the piano, even though the tempo might be so slow (as in many intros) as to be essentially undefined. This CD is evidence of just how much Gomez had grown as a player, and of his often symbiotic interplay with Bill.

This remastered reissue is a gem, and with its three “new” tracks, it is almost foolhardy not to have it. It was already one of the more well-regarded Evans albums for its absolutely superb sound quality, as engineered by veteran sound wizard Al Schmitt, whose amazing work on Steely Dan’s “Aja” (also 1977), George Benson’s “Breezin", Natalie Cole's “Unforgettable” , and so many others has been highly praised. Schmitt just won another Grammy this year for Diane Krall’s “The Look of Love”.

Tommy LaPuma, Schmitt’s partner in so many projects, co-produced these sessions with Bill’s usual producer/manager Helen Keane. Their touch is critical to the album's success: The piano is crystal clear and rich and warm, has a nice touch of appropriately added reverb, and this remaster brings out more of drummer Eliot Zigmund’s tasty and unobtrusive drumming contributions , and Gomez' aforementioned bass work.

And what of the music? Those familiar with this album may want to skip ahead in this review, but for the uninitiated, it should be noted that the tunes on this record fit together so well, it’s almost a “concept album” . There are two exquisite Evans originals: the luxuriously linear beauty and deep harmonies of “B Minor Waltz” (For Ellaine)” and the deeply felt, minor key dedication to his beloved brother Harry, “We Will Meet Again”. Both are wistful and searching in mood, and are models of intelligent songwriting constructs [Piano players: see Jack Reilly’s analysis in his “Harmony of Bill Evans” book] . Not a note is wasted compositionally or in the solo of "B Minor Waltz"; it's evocative of Chopin and Erik Satie and refreshes the soul with each listening. Both tunes evoke the feeling of reflection and rumination, their inner chord voicings moving with perfect logic. This is as it should be - his brother was a tragic suicide, and so was his former girlfriend Ellaine. That Bill Evans was so often able to distill such singular and personal communicative beauty in his music from the deeply painful tragedies of his life has been often commented on. So much naked and emotional clarity is here in these performances, and like other jazz giants such as Bird, Billie Holiday, Miles and others, it came out in the playing. But rarely has it been as keenly felt and profoundly noted by listeners -- so many who have responded, as if they were the only ones able to understand what Bill was communicating. As pointed out long ago by Gene Lees, Orrin Keepnews and others who knew Bill well, this has long been a common phenomenon among Evans fans. Such was his genius, and the rare mark of a true artist.

The late pianist Jimmy Rowles wrote the gently exotic “The Peacocks”, and its graceful falling melody provides more room for Bill’s contemplative chromatacism. He had played it previously with Stan Getz in 1974, but this is the first time he did this superb composition under his own name. According to biographer Peter Pettinger, Rowles -- who was thrilled at Bills’ recording of his tune -- went to see the trio at London’s Ronnie Scott’s nightclub, and went backstage to see Bill, who told him he had just missed their performance of it. After that intermission, Evans decided to play it again, as a courtesy, and even introduced Rowles, even asking him to take a bow. This is the kind of gentleman that was Bill Evans.

Back in 1958 when Bill was with Miles Davis group, he played on some of the leader’s sessions for an album arranged by then -newcomer Michel Legrand (available as "Legrand Jazz"] . Legrand went on, of course, to be a noted pop composer, and Evans was attracted to his writing style in later years, recording such tunes as “What Are You Doing the Rest of Your Life” , “We Will Meet Again” and the title tune here. He knew it well from doing a version with Tony Bennett, and it’s an ideal vehicle for Bill’s interpretation, what with its extended melodic cells and the often surprising chordal movement. Critic Francis Davis notes that it was an inspired choice for Evans “because its inner structure mirrors so many of his improvisational strategies” . This version has obvious edits, the album credits indicating they were done by Columbia Records engineer Frank Laico back in NYC (the bass solo immediately following the melody, for one) though they seem perhaps a tad smoother in this excellent remastering.

“Gary’s Theme” , a latter-day Evans repertoire favorite of great delicacy and precision -- is by the pianist’s old friend Gary McFarland, with whom he did an album for Verve in 1963. Often called “Gary’s Waltz” when Evans played it ‘live’, it's another stand-out in the Evans catalog, and sounds almost like it was written for him specifically. Bill pores carefully over every note, the concentration so apparent, it virtually comes through the speakers. The song uses a common tone in the bridge’s melody, over which shifting harmonies weave the tale. Those familiar with "The Tokyo Concert" album may note a resemblance in Bill's approach to "Hullo Bolinas" from that record.

The last tune on the original release offered the pianist’s first recorded version of the theme from “M*A*S*H” -- which was to become a staple of the last trio’s repertoire from then on. Bill takes the theme through several keys it at a medium pace, with a quasi-Latin feel in the drums. It’s one of those tunes that Bill enjoyed just playing the head for, without soloing over the chords -- just improvising over the eight bar intervals between key changes. Though surely more reserved than later performances, it works well here in its first recorded outing. Later takes with Philly Joe Jones (in Europe) were far more aggressive, as were live versions with the Johnson and LaBarbera trio, so its interesting to listen to this first reading.

The old Vincent Youmans - Billy Rose standard “Without a Song” is the first of the three previously unreleased tracks. Bill does a superb solo introduction, adding some of his own rich reharmonizations, and you wonder why he didn’t get around to recording this old chestnut before. As the swinging feel steadily increases, Eddie Gomez’ interplay and solo spots are stellar, and Zigmund is given room to stretch out here (which we didn’t get to hear in the original album).

The one “Kind of Blue” track Evans didn’t play on in that landmark Miles album was “Freddie the Freeloader”, and is featured here with some electric piano (which seems an unnecessary choice, considering the superb quality of studio's acoustic piano ). It's a blues, of course, (only altering the last chord) and Bill was not known for his blues playing, preferring far more advanced structures to hang his tapestries on. Still, its a fun romp through the changes, and more extroverted than the other tracks on the date -- as is “All of You” , an Evans perennial since 1961’s Vanguard sessions. The trio interacts with great flair, as Bill's lines often pounce against the groove in rhythmic displacement (a favorite technique he expounds on in that Marian McPartland show in 1979).

“You Must Believe in Spring” may well be one of Evans’ greatest trio records -- and perhaps one the all-time great “rainy day” albums. And with the significant inclusion of these three previously unreleased tracks, we get to have some sunshine too, after remembering the rain.

Mux Mool Discography

2010-03-26T07:05:00.000-07:00

Skulltaste (2010)

Style: Instrumental Hip Hop, Experimental

Mux Mool's Skulltaste is a sprawling epic of an album, darting between genres with a rapacious hunger for new beats and genre-mashing electronics. This torrid sequence takes in Flying Lotus style hip hop one moment ('Hog Knuckles', 'Dandelion') and garish neon disco ('Enceladus') the next, taking in brilliantly crafted synthcore instrumentals along the way. The laser beam melodies and vocoded jumble of 'Death 9000' sound a little like a hi-fi take on the sort of Betamax-chewing new wave of someone like Dylan Ettinger, while other highlights tread a very different path - 'Morning Strut' has its foundations in good old fashioned sampling, while 'Crackers' goes all out for cartoonish, yammering techno complete with over-compression and gaudy synth arpeggios. All this, plus the digital edition comes with five bonus tracks....

Buy

Download (320, 180mb): load2.me

Viking Funeral (EP) (2010)

Label: Ghostly International
Cat#: GI-96
Format: Digital
Date: 2 Feb 2010
Style: Instrumental Hip Hop, Experimental

Discogs, Download (320, 35mb): load2.me

Lady Linda (2010)

Label: Ghostly International
Cat#: GI-103
Format: Digital
Date: 26 Jan 2010
Style: Instrumental Hip Hop, Downtempo

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 20mb): load2.me

Versus Series Round 2 - Alt Hip Hop (2009) split with Charles Trees

Label: Moodgadget
Cat#: MGT-059
Format: Digital
Date: 27 Oct 2009
Style: Instrumental Hip Hop

Buy

Discogs, Download (m4a, 16mb): load2.me

Just Saying is All (2009)

Label: Moodgadget
Cat#: MGT-046A
Format: Digital
Date: 31 Mar 2009
Genre: Instrumental Hip Hop, Industrial, Chiptune

A cross-genre selection of electronics from Mux Mool, shifting between the mock Italo disco of 'End Guy' (which, it has to be said, has a whiff of 'The Final Countdown' about it) to the brash, vocoded big-beat of 'Merlinfist!' without batting an eyelid. Better yet is 'Eagle Fantasies' which slips into a hip hop production that's very much of the Dabrye One/Three school, but restless as ever disco and house influences start to take over again for 'B'Genius' and '2muxLUV'. Finally, 'Teal Trim' might well supply the finest moment on the EP, though it's buried as a kind of miniature bonus beat, tucked away after several minutes of silence following the main track. This added on extra is a blissful bitcrushed boom-bap riff that really could have done with a prominent place on the tracklist.

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 100mb): load2.me

Death 9000 (2008)

Label: Moodgadget
Cat#: MGT-025
Format: Digital
Date: 04 Nov 2008
Style: Instrumental Hip Hop

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 20mb): load2.me

Greyboy Discography

2010-03-24T01:49:00.000-07:00

Era Correct (2009)

Discogs, Download (VBR, 70mb): load2.me

15 Years of West Coast Cool (2008)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: UR243
Format: CD
Date: 21 Oct 2008
Style: Nu Jazz, Hip Hop, Downtempo, Funk

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 95mb): load2.me

Soul Mosaic (2004)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD 144
Format: CD
Date: 6 Apr 2004
Style: Broken Beat, Nu Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 120mb): load2.me

Land of the Lost (1995)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD 012
Format: CD
Date: 1995
Style: Acid Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 125mb): load2.me

Freestylin' (1993)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD003
Format: CD
Date: 1993
Style: Acid Jazz

Discogs, Download (320, 125mb): load2.me

The Greyboy Allstars Discography

2010-03-24T01:48:00.000-07:00

What Happened to Television (2007)

Label: Sci Fidelity Records
Cat#: none
Format: CD
Date: 17 Apr 2007
Style: Jazz-Funk, Funk

Discogs, Download (320, 110mb): load2.me

A Town Called Earth (1997)

Label: Greyboy Records
Cat#: GBRCD005
Format: CD
Date: 1997
Style: Soul-Jazz, Funk

Discogs, Download (320, 170mb): load2.me

West Coast Boogaloo (1994)

Label: Greyboy Records (2)
Cat#: GBRCD001
Format: CD
Date: 1994
Style: Soul-Jazz, Funk

Discogs, Download (320, 105mb): load2.me

Eric Lau - 2008 - New Territories

2010-03-20T07:34:00.000-07:00

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD 227
Format: CD
Date: Mar 2008
Style: Soul, Hip Hop

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 70mb): load2.me

Chris Joss Discography

2010-03-19T07:24:00.000-07:00

Monomaniacs Volume 1 (2010)

Label: Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
Cat#: ESL160
Format: CD
Date: 12 Jan 2010
Style: Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz, Downtempo, Funk, Jazzdance

French multi-instrumentalist and music producer extraordinaire Chris Joss is back again with a new album Monomaniacs Volume 1. Like a long lost vintage LP plucked from a time capsule buried sometime in the 1970’s this album brings Joss back to a distinctly traditional and dusty funk groove. Recalling the iconic blaxploitation and grindhouse film soundtracks of that era, Monomaniacs is filled with ricocheting breakbeats, whirlwinds of wah-wah, rubber-band basslines, cosmic organs, and even a few shredding rock guitars to put some hair on your chest. Can Volume 2 be far behind?

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 90mb): load2.me

Sticks (2009)

Label: Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
Cat#: ESL 144
Format: CD
Date: 10 Mar 2009
Style: Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz, Downtempo, Trip Hop

Already having dropped a stellar pair of albums on ESL Music, international producer and instrumentalist Chris Joss returns with his third effort entitled Sticks! Where You’ve Been Spiked explored dirty blaxploitation funk and Teraphonic Overdubs explored quirky game-show themes, Sticks is a smoky sonic journey through the Asian sub-continent. Filled out by a lush tapestry of ethereal sitars, rubber-funk bass, cheeky organ riffs, snappy drum kicks and smoky atmospherics Sticks captures a deep vintage groove that defies categorization. Light up, kick back, and envelope yourself in the purely irresistible sounds of Chris Joss’ Sticks!

Buy

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Teraphonic Overdubs (2008)

Label: Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
Cat#: ESL 125
Format: CD
Date: 2 Feb 2008
Style: Nu Jazz, Downtempo, Trip Hop

Amidst a whirlwind of vintage funk and psychedelic retro-futurisms, international producer/instrumentalist extraordinaire Chris Joss returns to ESL Music for a second round with Teraphonic Overdubs, a brand new collection of technicolored grooves! This time Chris Joss adds some new surprises to his trademark blaxploitation soundscapes, painting the musical canvas with broad strokes of lush, multi-layered instrumentation. String arrangements, woodblock and cowbell rhythms, near eastern flutes and sitars, and even a marimba and harpsichord play alongside classic wah-wah guitars, elastic bass-lines, and dusty organ riffs for a kaleidoscopic sonic odyssey not to be missed!

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 100mb): load2.me

I Want Freedom (12") (2008)

Label: Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
Cat#: ESL 133
Format: 12"
Date: Sep 2008
Style: Downtempo, Trip Hop, Big Beat

Remix 12" from Chris Joss comes on the heels of his "Teraphonic Overdubs" LP. Features album cut "I Want Freedom" in extended mix plus remixes from Myagi, Smokey Bandits and Atfunk; all delivering that new breed of D.C. electro-funk breaks we've come to love.

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 30mb): load2.me

Superman (12") (2007)

Label: Eighteenth Street Lounge Music
Cat#: ESL 106
Format: 12"
Date: 15 Aug 2007
Style: Acid Jazz, Downtempo

It's a bird, it's a plane... It's Chris Joss returning with an outstanding new 12" "Superman!" Taking the iconic theme song from the original "Superman" film series scored by John Williams, Joss completely forgoes mere sampling and re-records every track element transforming it into a high flying retro-funk jam. Along side the classic theme song is "Superjam," a totally unique spin-off that drops the classic horn section in favor of funky Rhodes key riffing, wah wah guitars, near eastern tabla, and an infections Lalo Schifrin inspired drum groove. If that weren't enough for a single more powerful than a locomotive, check the flipside for a rave-piano accentuated remix of "A Part In That Show" by The Basement Freaks, and a sultry Latin lounge version of "Drink Me Hot" by Plastilina Mosh.

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 25mb): load2.me

You've Been Spiked (2004)

Label: Cristal Records
Cat#: CRCD0411
Format: CD
Date: 2004
Style: Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz, Downtempo

French producer/DJ Chris Joss has spiked the musical cocktail with an intoxicating mix of funky bass lines, wah guitars, and Hammond keys which pulsate over rooty sounding drums. With a dose of obscure samples, scratching and retro-futurist ambiances, Mssr. Joss creates a truly unique cinematic universe. This special edition disc contains two bonus tracks culled from Joss' first album as well as the video for "Discotheque Dancing."

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, mb): load2.me

Dr. Rhythm (2002)

Label: Irma
Cat#: IRMA 508183-2
Format: CD
Date: Jun 2002
Style: Acid Jazz, Downtempo

Discogs, Download (320, 150mb): load2.me

Music From "The Man With A Suitcase" (1999)

Label: Pulp Flavor Recordings
Cat#: PLPCD 011
Format: CD
Date: 1999
Style: Jazzdance, Funk, Breaks

Discogs, Download (320, 95mb): load2.me

Bombay by Bus (12") (1999)

Format: 12"
Date: 1999
Style: Nu Jazz, Funk

Download (320, 60mb): load2.me

Coffee & Cigarettes Band - 2009 - Love Thing

2010-03-19T02:40:00.000-07:00

Label: Electric Roots
Cat#: ERS001
Format: CD
Date: 25 Jul 2009
Style: Nu Jazz, Instrumental Hip-Hop

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 70mb): multiupload.com (upd: 15 feb 2011)

Buddy Peace - 2009 - Late Model Sedan

2010-03-16T12:00:00.000-07:00

Label: Strange Famous Records
Cat#: sfr-bplms
Format: Digital
Date: 18 Aug 2009
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Abstract, Experimental

Turntable genius and mixtape maestro Buddy Peace returns with his first official digital long-player, released on the Strange Famous label. Blending together supremely artful drum-sculpting with snippets of more abstract sounds (as well as a wide-ranging palette of vocal samples, this makes for one of this year's more interesting and organically experimental hip hop instrumental suites. More so than on most albums of this ilk, Buddy's music really takes you on a journey of some sort, but better still, along the way your travelling companions will be a dazzling array of beats, ranging from dark and jazzy, off-kilter figures (as on 'Hawkstring Corpse') to heavier, hiss-laden break treatments ('Arcade Murderflash'). Expertly put together and inventive throughout, Late Model Sedan comes recommended to all open-minded hip hop heads.

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 155mb): load2.me

Para - 2009 - Fallen on Def Ears

2010-03-15T15:58:00.000-07:00

The debut album from the man billed as "the South West's answer to Cut Chemist", following on from a slew of mix CDs and scratch tools he's released. Fallen On Def Ears ignores current dominant trends in hip hop production and instead opts for a more vintage sound, full of cuts, scratches, reconstituted funk breaks and soulful vocal snippets. Obvious reference points would be... well, much of the Ninja Tune catalogue, although on a song like 'Save Your Breath' it gets even more Freshers Week-circa-1996 with a shameless nod towards big-beat, coming across as being a bit Norman Cook. Productions like 'Rescue Me' and 'It's The Hornet' are arguably more successful for sounding more like old 45s in their own right, and when it comes to stitching together samples in a classic cut & paste fashion, Para's clearly got a real craftsman's ear.

Buy

Download (320, 100mb): load2.me

M Slago - 2009 - Nag Champa Sessions

2010-03-15T03:08:00.000-07:00

Free

Download (128, 40mb): load2.me

Teebs - 2009 - Untitled CDR

2010-03-13T14:50:00.000-08:00

Download (320, 90mb): load2.me

Lambent - 2009 - Smoothness Extract (Deep Night at Ishigaki)

2010-03-11T11:46:00.000-08:00

Label: Project: Mooncircle
Cat#: PMC047
Format: CD
Date: 2 Oct 2009
Style: Instrumental Hip-Hop, Downtempo, Abstract, Breaks, Experimental

‘Smoothness Extract (Deep Night At Ishigaki)’ is Lambent’s third full-length, and his first on Project Mooncircle, following previous albums more rooted in experimental ambient electronics for Insine and Expanding.

This record presents his sound in the context of instrumental hip hop, with strong elements of electronica still present. You could group it with the recent wave of Dilla-inspired beats, but equally it could sit with Autechre when they’re at 90 BPM. The album came about after Project Mooncircle heard some of Lambent’s tracks and fell in love with the calmer and smoother parts of his often intense sound. Hence, Lambent compiled these seventeen extracts from the gentler side of his repertoire.

This album is made as his dedication towards a small Japanese island, named Ishigaki. Berlin-resident Lambent is originally from Japan, but he has never visited this place… ‘Smoothness Extract’ is the soundtrack to a summer night trip around the island, visiting the many different aspects of the scenery, nature, feelings, emotions, sights and sounds as Lambent imagines them.

Buy

Discogs, Download (VBR, 65mb): load2.me

My My & Emika - 2009 - Price Tag (EP)

2010-03-11T11:12:00.000-08:00

Label: Aus Music
Cat#: AUS0924
Format: 12", EP
Date: Dec 2009
Style: House, Dubstep, Techno

Buy

Discogs, Download (320, 65mb): load2.me

VA - 2009 - Tru Thoughts - 10th Anniversary (3xCD)

2010-03-11T09:38:00.000-08:00

LabeL: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRUCD200
Format: 3xCD, Compilation
Date: 19 Oct 2009
Style: Jazz, Nu Jazz, Soul, Funk, Downtempo

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Tracklist:

CD1
01. Bonobo - Terrapin
02. Nostalgia 77 - Quiet Dawn
03. Alice Russell - Hurry on Now
04. Natural Self - The Rising
05. Milez Benjiman - Chop That Wood
06. Hint - One Woman Army
07. Quantic & Nickodemus feat. Tempo & The Candela Allstars - Mi Swing Es Tropical
08. Bonobo - Kota
09. Lizzy Parks - Raise the Roof
10. The Limp Twins - Sunday Driver
11. Hot 8 Brass Band - What's My Name? (Rock With the Hot 8)
12. Flevans - The Notion
13. The Nostalgia 77 Octet - Musical Silt
14. Flowering Inferno - Cuidad Del Swing
15. Kinny - Desire
16. Freddie Cruger aka Red Astaire - Pushing On

CD2
01. Saravah Soul - Nao Posso Te Levar A Serio
02. The Quantic Soul Orchestra - Super 8
03. The Bamboos - Step It Up
04. Quantic - Transatlantic
05. TM Juke - Come Away
06. Lanu - Dis-Information
07. Natural Self - Shake Down
08. Belleruche - Northern Girls
09. Alice Russell - All Over Now
10. Quantic - Mishaps Happening (Prins Thomas Edit)
11. Nirobi & Barakas - Bungee Jump Against Racism
12. TM Juke & The Jack Baker Trio - Party Favours
13. Kylie Auldist - Community Service Announcement
14. Quantic - Don't Joke With a Hungry Man
15. Me & You - The Hoop Loop
16. The Broken Keys - The Witch

CD3
01. Flowering Inferno - Time is the Enemy
02. Domu - We Can
03. Flevans - Second Bite
04. Azaxx - Disco Bimbo
05. Hint - Tape Packs
06. Quantic - Only a Little While Here
07. Seravah Soul - Alforria
08. The Bamboos - Turn It Up
09. Freddie Cruger aka Red Astaire - Boogie Down Hagsatra
10. Barakas - Spitfire
11. Stonephace - Singularity
12. Kylie Auldist - No Use (Acoustic Version)

A stellar 3 CD compilation celebrating 10 years and 200 releases of quality independent music…

Tru Thoughts Recordings released its first ever 12”, the dancefloor-directed “Alarming Frequency” EP by Steady, on 1st September 1999, from an ‘office’ under Robert Luis’ stairs in Brighton. Luis and co-founder Paul Jonas were inspired to follow their dream and start the label by a phenomenal response to the wide-ranging musical policy of their renowned Brighton club nights, phonic:hoop and Shake Yer Wig. Now, 10 years, an incredible 200 releases, and an upgrade in company premises later, comes this celebratory limited edition triple CD compilation. Featuring a two disc ‘Best Of’, packed with the Tru Thoughts classics, and an extra-special bonus disc of previously unreleased music recorded especially for the occasion, this limited edition release comes in a covetable premium package with a 24-page booklet bursting with glossy photos and juicy tales. Quite simply a must-have for the ardent Tru Thoughts army of fans, and for those less familiar it is a catch-all introduction to one of the UK’s foremost independent record labels.

In addition to the fruitful stream of up-and-coming artists that Tru Thoughts has developed over the years, nurturing and guiding many to become renowned as leading lights in their musical fields (Quantic, Alice Russell, Bonobo, Nostalgia 77), recent times have seen an influx of established musical figures flocking to the label. National treasures of contemporary jazz and experimental music, Keith and Julie Tippett, collaborated with Nostalgia 77 on the widely acclaimed ‘Sessions’ album; and Stonephace – the supergroup featuring Working Week’s Larry Stabbins and Portishead’s guitarist Adrian Utley – brought their groundbreaking album into the fold, releasing it in May ’09 to immense praise from both high brow jazz commentators and club DJs alike. Alongside these high profile releases, Tru Thoughts continues to seek out and promote fresh talent, giving each artist the freedom to express their musical vision and allowing the music to speak for itself.

Playing like a who’s who of the current Tru Thoughts roster, including Quantic (in his many musical incarnations), Belleruche, The Bamboos, Hot 8 Brass Band, Stonephace, Nostalgia 77, Lizzy Parks, Flevans, Domu, Hint, Natural Self and Kylie Auldist; alongside previous acts such as the mighty Alice Russell, Bonobo and TM Juke; the music on this compilation paints a colourful sonic picture of the history of the label. Tru Thoughts’ staff and artists were asked for their choices, and the selection that you see here have all been pivotal tracks in different ways; some were big sellers, many reflect the producers or vocalists perfectly, some have been massive tunes in clubs and others are simply the songs that are never far from the office stereo – the ones that are guaranteed to raise a smile no matter how many hundreds of times they’re played.

Ohmega Watts Discography

2010-03-11T06:41:00.000-08:00

Ohmega Watts - Watts Happening (2xCD) (2007)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD 218
Format: 2xCD
Date: 9 Oct 2007
Style: Funk, Hip-Hop

While the eclecticism of his debut album The Find won him many fans, Watts Happening pushes the envelope to reveal even more about MC/producer Ohmega Watts and continues to challenge the expectations of what a rap album could be. The record includes collaborations with lauded Philly-based MC/producer Jneiro Jarel and up n’coming Brazilian vocalist Tita Lima who appears on the DJ-friendly Brazilian-tinged excursion “Adaptacao.” Watts wrote “Are You Satisfied” for Bay Area blues n’funkstress, and one of James Brown’s favorite female vocalists Sugarpie Desanto, inspired by recent losses she suffered in a tragic fire at her Oakland home. London instrumentalist, and label mate, Shawn Lee also provides some key sounds from his over-stocked studio. The album includes features from favorite Watts cohorts like the Lightheaded crew, Triple Grip and Theory Hazit.

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Ohmega Watts - No Delay (2006)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: UR12200
Format: 12"
Date: 12 Sep 2006
Style: Hip-Hop

No Delay is driven by a nasty bass-line deep into DJ-friendly head-nodding hip-hop territory. Ohmega Watts is joined on the mic by Surreal, the new MC for the Sound Providers (ABB), who hails from Florida. Surreal also appeared on "Saturday Night Live" from Ohmega Watts' The Find album. "Saywhayusay" is a signature Ohmega Watts instrumental club jam. Starting off with a rough old-school hip hop beat, the mood soon changes with the introduction of a Brazilian Batucada rhythm. Adding to the carnival time pressure is Todd Simon (of Breakestra and Antibalas fame) who beefs up the track with ballistic horn riffs. On the flip Waajeed from PPP takes "The Find", the title track from the Ohmega Watts debut album, and moulds it into a mid-tempo club track complete with big bass-line and shiny horns. An instrumental of the mix is included for all Bling 47 beat fiends.

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Ohmega Watts -The Find (2005)

Label: Ubiquity Records
Cat#: URCD174
Format: CD
Date: 13 Sep 2005
Style: Hip Hop

Huge 22 track album of energetic hip hop funk n’soul from head turning MC and producer Ohmega Watts.

MC and producer Ohmega Watts makes organic and energetic hip hop, funk and soul. It’s original, from the heart, straight no chaser music. Offering both quantity and quality “The Find” is 21 tracks deep and jumps from the laid-back sunshine styled “Where It All Started” and soulful “Your Love” to the turntable-bound rare groove-fueled breaks of “Move!” Inspired as much by hip hop legends like Eric B & Rakim and Premier as contemporary electronic producers like RJD2 and The Herbaliser, “The Find” pushes industry-standard boundaries. Hailing from Flatbush, Brooklyn, brought-up by Jamaican parents Milton Campbell aka Ohmega Watts moved to Florida and now resides amidst a bustling Portland, Oregon scene.

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Soel - 2003 - Memento

2010-03-11T02:41:00.000-08:00

Label: Warner Jazz France
Cat#: PRO4234
Format: CD
Date: 2003
Style: Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz

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HEALTH Discography

2010-03-10T08:11:00.000-08:00

Get Color (2009)

Label: City Slang
Cat#: SLANG9550023
Format: CD
Date: 18 Sep 2009
Style: Experimental Rock, Noise Rock

Discogs, Download (320, 75mb): multiupload, rghost

Die Slow (Market Yourself for Blood) (Single) (2009)

Label: Lovepump United
Cat#: LPU 024
Format: 7", Single
Date: 7 Apr 2009
Style: Experimental, Electronic, Rock

Discogs, Download (192, 15mb): multiupload, rghost

//Disco (2008)

Label: Lovepump United
Cat#: LPU019
Format: 2xLP
Date: 10 Mar 2009
Style: House, Electro, Synth-pop, Experimental

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HEALTH (2007)

Label: Lovepump United
Cat#: LPU 014
Format: LP
Date: 2007
Style: Experimental Rock, Noise Rock

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Xploding Plastix Discography

2010-03-08T10:40:00.000-08:00

Treated Timber Resists Rot (2008)

Label: Beatservice Records
Cat#: BS111CD
Format: CD
Date: 1 Sep 2008
Style: Leftfield, Breaks

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The Rebop by Proxy (EP) (2004)

Label: Palm Beats
Cat#: PALMBEAT 1016-1
Format: 10", EP
Date: 2004
Style: Downtempo

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Sunset Spirals (Single) (2003) feat. Sarah Cracknell

Label: Columbia
Cat#: COL 673937 2
Format: CD, Single
Date: 1 Jun 2003
Style: IDM, Pop Rock, Synthpop

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The Donca Matic Singalongs (2003)

Label: Columbia
Cat#: COL 512977 2
Format: CD
Date: 2003
Style: Leftfield, Breaks, IDM

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The Benevolent Volume Lurkings (EP) (2003)

Label: Columbia
Cat#: COL 673676 2
Format: CD, EP
Date: 31 Mar 2003
Style: Acid Jazz, Breaks, IDM, Drum and Bass

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Geigerteller (Single) (2003)

Label:Sony Music Entertainment (Norway)
Format: CD, Single
Date: 2003
Style: Breakbeat, Big Beat

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Plastic Surgery 3 (2002) split with Danny Byrd

Label: Hospital Records
Cat#: NHS42
Format: 12"
Date: 14 Jun 2002
Style: Nu Jazz, Drum and Bass

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Behind the Eightball (2001)

Label: Beatservice Records
Cat#: BSCDEP041
Format: CD, EP
Date: 5 Nov 2001
Style: Nu Jazz

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Amateur Girlfriends Go Proskirt Agents (2001)

Label: Beatservice Records
Cat#: BSCD038
Format: CD
Date: 12 Mar 2001
Style: Breakbeat, Acid Jazz, Nu Jazz

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Mayer Hawthorne - 2009 - A Strange Arrangement

2010-03-03T11:27:00.000-08:00

Label: Stones Throw Records
Cat#: STH2219
Format: CD
Date: 15 Sep 2009
Style: Soul

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Kinny - 2009 - Idle Forest of Chit Chat

2010-03-03T09:20:00.000-08:00

Label: Tru Thoughts
Cat#: TRUCD175
Format: CD,
Date: 23 Mar 2009
Style: Soul, Funk, Downtempo

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Kinny’s debut solo outing is an original, colourful and up-to-the-minute brand of modern soul, featuring producers including Quantic, Nostalgia 77 and Hint.

Working with seven different producers on ‘Idle Forest Of Chit Chat’ has enabled Kinny to push the boundaries of her own exceptional talent and expose herself to various styles and ways of working – from the tropical, live funk of The Quantic Soul Orchestra and Nostalgia 77’s deep modern jazz; through the catchy, soulful electronica of TM Juke and Souldrop; to Unforscene’s evocative soundscapes and a dose of lush, jazzy soul with a pop sensibility from Hint and Diesler. The result is an exciting melee of influences, all bound together by the unswerving class and charisma of Kinny’s persona.

A Canadian national with a mix of Jamaican, Native Canadian Indian, French and Swedish heritage, Kinny – aka Caitlin Simpson – has always been immersed in an eclectic pool of cultural and musical influences. With a voice that sashays effortlessly between vertiginous, soaring melodies, steely staccato verses and caramel-dipped dulcet tones, it will come as no surprise that Kinny was a classically trained opera singer before the spontaneity and freedom of jazz, reggae and soul music lured her into pursuing her true passion. Describing herself as a ‘freestyle improv vocalist’, Kinny fuses a classical mezzo-soprano sound with the jazzy attitude-soul of the likes of Erykah Badu. Her hunger to cut the ties of convention and embrace new ideas led her to move to Bergen, Norway in 2001, after visiting on tour with her first band, Third Eye Tribe (who became well known in Canada and beyond for their electrifying live shows in which Kinny laid improvised vocals over electronic and dub beats). Bergen is a thriving musical melting pot of a city whose scene she describes as ‘a huge wave of music, covering everything from death metal to dub’. Likening the environment to her native Vancouver, Kinny finds inspiration and intrigue in the extreme seasons, the peace and closeness to nature that abounds in sparsely populated countries, and the vibrant and diverse music scene – which also counts the likes of Röyksopp and Kings Of Convenience – and many of Norway’s famously ardent purveyors of death metal – among its number.

Kinny’s dinstinctive sound will be familiar to many as the voice of Kinny and Horne, whose previous album, ‘Forgetting To Remember’ brought her talent to the attention of the world’s most respected musical minds and tastemakers – including Daddy G, who invited her to audition as a vocalist for Massive Attack; and Andy Smith, with whom she is working on a set of tracks for a potential collaboration in the near future.