Tag: Jazz
Over the last several years, Poland has produced some of today’s most forward-thinking and innovative jazz artists and ensembles like EABS, Wojtek Mazolewski, Piotr Damasiewicz, and Bloto to just name a few. We can now add the Wrocław-based Sneaky Jesus to that last list, as the Polish quintet has just released a superb debut album, titled For Joseph Riddle on the South London label Shapes Of Rhythm.
The innovative London-based trio, featuring bassist and founding member of Ill Considered Leon Brichard, saxophonist Idris Rahman (Soothsayers), and drummer Tom Skinner (Sons of Kemet), have followed up last year’s outstanding album Season 2, with a brilliant new four-track EP, titled Better Times. This also marks the debut release on notable London-based Portuguese DJ Mafalda Daniel‘s new label Tropic of Love Music.
As we move into the warmer months of summer, it’s great to see that many of the record shops that were either closed for over a year and/or only doing online sales are finally opening up again. In my opinion, it doesn’t get much better than a Saturday trip (or any day really) to the local record shop(s). Somewhat similar to last year, this year’s typical annual Record Store Day has been broken up into not just one, but two Saturdays (or what is being referred to as “Drop 1” & “Drop 2”) on June 12th and July 17th.
One can make the argument, that the term “Holy Grail” is sometimes used a bit too loosely, however that certainly isn’t the case when applied to Ron Everett’s 1977 obscure soul jazz masterpiece Glitter Of The City. Originally self-released in 1977 on a shoestring budget, UK’s Jazzman Records has recently reissued the essential recording as a part of it’s ongoing superb Jazzman Holy Grail series.
For the seventh release in what continues to be an absolutely brilliant Jazz Is Dead series, Los Angeles based producers/multi-instrumentalists Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad have teamed up with legendary Brazilian composer and pianist João Donato on a superb new full-length album.
Following last year’s phenomenal compilation Soul Love Now and a number of revisited album releases from groundbreaking artists like Oneness Of Juju (aka Juju), Lon Moshe, and others, London’s Strut Records continues it’s ongoing spotlight on the now considered legendary Richmond, Virginia label Black Fire (run by Jimmy Gray) with a reissue of the late Philadelphia reedman Byard Lancaster’s 1992 soulful spiritual jazz recording My Pure Joy. Originally released on CD three years after it was recorded, due the label’s financial challenges, this marks the first time this album has ever been released on vinyl.
The groundbreaking London-based two horn-two drummer quartet known as Sons of Kemet featuring saxophonist Shabaka Hutchings, tuba player Theon Cross, and drummers Tom Skinner and Edward Wakili-Hick have returned following their breakthrough 2018 Mercury Prize-nominated album Your Queen Is a Reptile, with their most adventurous and collaborative album to date, titled Black To The Future.
London-based reissue label Melodies International, run by Floating Points (aka Sam Shepherd) and Mafalda, have just launched their Melodies Record Club series featuring “mini compilations” in a twelve-inch format selected by notable DJs and artists. The series kicks off with a bang, with highly-acclaimed and innovative producer and DJ Four Tet (aka Kieran Hebden) selecting two peak-time jazz dance classics that he used to spin regularly at the now legendary Plastic People nightclub in London.
Over the past decade, New York City based tenor saxophonist and composer James Brandon Lewis has made his mark as one of the leading and most cutting-edge artists in jazz. Voted “Rising Star Tenor Saxophonist” in the 2020 DownBeat Magazine International Critic’s Poll, Lewis very much carries on the torch of those great saxophonists that came before him, like John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy, Albert Ayler, Pharoah Sanders and others. He has just released his highly-anticipated new album with his group the Red Lily Quintet, titled Jesup Wagon on the Brooklyn-based AUM Fidelity label.
From his collaborative work with Yussef Dayes, 44th Move with Richard Spaven, and a number of breakthrough recordings of his own, including his highly acclaimed 2017 debut Antiphon and stellar follow-up Structuralism, the London-based producer, self-taught pianist, and rapper Alfa Mist has become one of the leading artists among today’s UK jazz scene. He returns with a brilliant new groove-oriented jazz full-length album, titled Bring Backs.
Fresh off of the reissue release of Khan Jamal’s 1984 spiritual jazz “holy grail” Infinity, Paul Murphy’s Jazz Room Records has just reissued the highly obscure 1964 cool jazz 7inch Le Monocle Rit Jaune by highly prolific French film composer Michel Magne.
After being featured as an integral part of Matthew Halsall’s Gondwana Orchestra, Welsh harpist Amanda Whiting steps out on her own to release a brilliant and mesmerizing new full-length album on Jazzman Records, titled After Dark.
Over the last several years, Nimbus West, who released some of the greatest recordings to come out of the spiritual Jazz scene in Los Angeles during the late 70s and early 80s has been diving deep back into it’s vaults and unearthing a number of incredible sessions. Most recently, they have issued saxophonist Billie Harris‘ masterful 1980 album I Want Some Water on vinyl for the first time.
