Tag: Jazz
Two of Finland’s most virtuosic and forward-thinking musicians in saxophonist Timo Lassy and trumpeter Jukka Eskola have teamed up with a number of notable New Orleans musicians for an innovative new album on the Amsterdam-based Dox Records, titled Nordic Stew, that fuses together Nordic jazz and the deep-rooted sounds from the Crescent City.
Italian DJ, broadcaster and internationally respected Mixcloud selector Massimiliano “Jazzcat” Conti has teamed up with the Milan-based label Right Tempo on a brilliant new compilation, titled The Congregation: Jazz Alliance International, that highlights some of today’s most forward-thinking jazz that’s currently being released.
The fantastic Glasgow-based production duo Nuovi Fratelli, featuring DJ and producer Wayne Dickson and sound engineer, music producer, and synth wiz Luigi Pasquini have teamed up again with the superb jazz ensemble Nimbus Sextet, along with special guest vocalists Russell Stewart and lissappear (aka Lissa Chen Robertson) on an incredible new rendition of Roy Ayers’ 1976 soul-jazz classic “Searching”.
Following a slew of standout singles and their 2019 breakthrough album Super-vilains, the 8-piece French jazz-funk group Cotonete has returned with a brilliant new eclectic album on the Heavenly Sweetness label, titled Victoire De La Musique (which takes a dig at the annual French music award ceremony).
After 13 years since its initial CD/Digital-only release in 2011, Flying Lotus’ Brainfeeder label is releasing for the first time on vinyl, the late great Austin Peralta’s cosmic jazz classic Endless Planets. This record was the label’s first dive into jazz, helping set the stage for artists like Kamasi Washington, Thundercat, Miguel Atwood-Ferguson, Kneedelus, and others.
The French label Transversales Disques continues its string of brilliant live ORTF recordings captured at Grand Auditorium’s Studio 104 in Paris’ Maison de la Radio (aka the headquarters of Radio France) with an early 70s session from legendary jazz multi-instrumentalist Rahsaan Roland Kirk. This is the latest in a growing series that has included jazz greats Pharoah Sanders, Archie Shepp, Don Cherry, and Ahmad Jamal.
Under the guidance and direction from London-based DJ, radio broadcaster, and music producer Gilles Peterson, his reissue-focused label Arc Records has recently been diving deep into the Atlantic jazz archives, re-releasing mono versions of Max Roach’s 1968 of Members, Don’t Git Weary and Yusef Lateef’s 1969 Yusef Lateef’s Detroit Latitude 42° 30′ Longitude 83°. With the labels latest release of the series, they unearth a collection of tracks recorded by Roberta Flack in the sessions leading up to the recording of her seminal 1969 debut album First Take.
Originally released in limited quantities through Rough Trade Records back in December 2023, and now more broadly released through Gilles Peterson’s Brownswood label, London-based drummer phenomenon Yussef Dayes and his stellar quintet return with another brilliant live session, performing music from last year’s highly acclaimed Black Classical Music album, new originals and a superb cover of Jaco Pistorius’ “Portrait of Tracy”.
In what is arguably one of the most anticipated releases of early 2024, Paul Murphy’s superb Jazz Room Records will be issuing a must-own 7inch single this month from Japanese producer and bassist Takumi Moriya, featuring his brilliant new take on Joe McPhee’s 1970 soul-jazz classic “Shakey Jake”.
As a follow-up to their first European tour in May of 2023, the highly active and talented Tokyo-based trio Nautilus has recently released a live recording, taken from their last date of the trip at the legendary King Georg in Cologne, Germany.
