Tag: Jazz
XL Recordings celebrates the 10 year anniversary of the late great Gil Scott-Heron’s final studio recording I’m New Here, prior to his passing in May of 2011, with a re-worked version of the album by visionary Chicago-based composer, producer, and drummer Makaya McCraven, titled We’re New Again.
Composer, trumpeter, and member of the UK-based jazz quartet Ruby Rushton, Nick Walters has recently released an explosive new jazz album, titled Active Imagination on Tenderlonious label 22a.
Portugese-based label Mad About Records continues their string of truly essential reissues with the release of Syncro Jazz’s extremely rare 1982 live album featuring legendary Brazilian saxophonist Nestico Aguiar, and his sister, pianist Lilu.
Composer, multi-instrumentalist and Tortoise guitarist Jeff Parker follows up his first New Breed recording, released back in 2016 and named best album of the year by London’s Observer, with a great new album on Chicago’s International Anthem, titled Suite for Max Brown.
One of the records that completely missed my radar when it was released back in the summer of 2019 was Los Angeles producer Jason McGuiness brilliant cosmic jazz album Empyrean Tones.
Gilles Peterson launches his brand new reissue label Arc Records, focusing on rare and interesting records from his basement vaults, with the experimental jazz recording Musica Infinita from by Mexican drummer and composer Tino Contreras.
Over the past decade, there many incredible jazz releases from a number of new rising exploratory artists looking to explore new ground and continue to push the music forward. With jazz having an overall strong resurgence in places like London, Chicago, New York, Los Angeles, Melbourne and numerous of other cities and regions globally, it’s great to look back at some of the most essential albums from the past ten years.
With six incredible releases across multiple projects, and numerous collaborations with some of the most-forward thinking artists in the world, as well as ongoing performances that touched just about every corner of the globe, BeatCaffeine’s 2019 Artist of the Year is Los Angeles-based producer and multi-instrumentalist Mark de Clive-Lowe.
In what has turned into quite a productive year for Greg Foat, the London-based pianist follows up a number of incredible releases for Edinburgh’s Athens of The North label, including the one of the year’s best albums in The Mage, and released another brilliant full-length to close out the year, titled The Dreaming Jewels.
Bassist and composer Junius Paul has been making a name for himself over the last decade both in Chicago with his jam sessions at the now-shuttered Velvet Lounge, and internationally with his collaborative work with drummer and beat-maker Makaya McCraven. As usual, Chi-town’s International Anthem Recordings continues to have their finger on the pulse, and have just released Paul’s debut album, titled Ism.
