What Jazz are you listening to now?

[Jazzrook]

Video for an alternative take of Art Pepper's 'The Trip' with George Cables, David Williams & Elvin Jones in September, 1976:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SfhmYICFsDI

JR

[Stanfordian]

‘White Gardenia’ - tribute album to jazz singer Billie Holiday
Johnny Griffin with Nat Adderley, Clarke Terry, Ernie Royal, Jimmy Cleveland, Paul Faulise & Urbie Green
Riverside (1961)

[Ian Thumwood]

Prompted by hearing him perform at Vienne, I have been listening to the new Julian Lage cd "Love Hurts." It is quite an interesting trio although I think that the record is more interesting for the staggeringly guitar playing than the bass and drums which don't really match Lage's level of creativity. I find Lage a strange player who owes a lot to Bill Frisell in his approach yet there is something about his playing which belongs to a much earlier vintage which stretches back to the 1930s and the kind of Texas Swing which was popular in that decade. He reminds me of musicians such as Pee Wee Russell, Eddie Lang , etc who hail from a pre-bop era yet with some alarming quirky characteristics which make their playing more interesting, There are some traits which mark him out as having slightly avant leanings although the kind of swing is employs is pretty orthodox despite frequently putting a stick in the spokes. The programme of pieces by Keith Jarrett, Jimmy Guiffre, Roy Orbison and the obligatory Ornette Coleman make the music eclectic and eccentric.

It is a fascinating disc. Wondered if Joseph had checked it out? I think the record illustrates just how innovative and creative Frisell is in comparison but Lage seems to be taking the Frisellian influence in another direction. There are moments of the disc where the chords have a bombastic quality which would not have existed with rock yet the reference to composers such as Guiffre and Coleman offer a more wayward approach. I really like what I have heard . It is retrospective in it's own way and even alludes strongly to a time pre-bebop. However, everything is delivered in a fashion which sounds unpredictable - something emphasized by Dave King's rather rigid drumming which the guitar always seems to be pulling against. There is a sense of the ridiculous about the music rather like a dog riding a monocycle on a hi-wire and balancing a chain saw on his nose. The record has that kind of surreal and slightly bizarre quality about it yet it is almost impossible to divert your ears sometimes. It is fascinating and , of you like, a cotemporary take on something like the Brookmeyer "Traditionalism re-visited" where there is a veneer of retrospection that masks the more free-wheeling character of the music. Unlikely to appeal to the edges of the spectrum represented by Bluesnik and SA on this board, I really like Lage's playing.

[Joseph K]

Well Ian, I wasn't too impressed by Modern Lore, but your description of Love Hurts as bizarre and surreal sounds very appealing indeed. I'll see if I can check it out.

[Stanfordian]

‘The Waiting Game’
Tina Brooks with Kenny Drew, Wilbar Ware & Philly Joe Jones
Blue Note (1961)

[Serial_Apologist]

There is a sense of the ridiculous about the music rather like a dog riding a monocycle on a hi-wire and balancing a chain saw on his nose. The record has that kind of surreal and slightly bizarre quality about it yet it is almost impossible to divert your ears sometimes.

Rather like your writing at times then, Ian, which sometimes goes in for some wonderful off-the-wall imagery, such as here!

I remember a band in the mid-1980s called Arguelles, after the names of the two brothers constituting two fourths of its members, saxophonist Julian and drummer Steve. As one of the more eccentric offshoots of Loose Tubes, a guitarist who had previously come to be known through extempore duo performances with Lol Coxhill named Stuart Hall (not the jazz-loving Marxist historian) was member No 3. Nod Knowles, who hosted the 1988 session from the Bath Festival, likened Hall's approach as reminiscent of Hank Marvin's with The Shadows in the late 1950s - a band btw that went in for characterful tunes of its own on its own non-Cliff hanging albums. Inasmuch as Hall was a well-informed, well-read eclectic, as opposed to a maker of postmodernist statements about modernism being dead, he was in sync with the parodists prominent among the Loose Tubes crowd. At the time we were I think just starting to acquaint ourselves with Bill Frisell's spacey musical universe and soundworld, both through the Motian trio with Lovano you rightly admire, and a visit that year with the Mike Gibbs big band. Neither would prepare us for the down-home C&W twangy guitar-featuring Frisell of more recent recordings - more country boy than Eddie Cochrane; certainly no postmodernist, but in ways foreign to Stuart Hall's madcap English eccentricity. My own guess is that Frisell's essentially rural/provincial cultural roots (raised in Denver) have been somewhat disguised by the sonority-expanding electronics giving them more of an avant-garde semblance than his champions acknowledge, thinking him to be an amalgam of Hendrix and the rock end of Fluxus, rather in the way that Chris Spedding was taken up by such as Ian Carr at the dawn of jazz-rock for providing a "flavour". My reason for saying this is the evidence of Kenny Wheeler's "Angel Song" with Konitz, Holland and Frisell, in which for me Frisell's abilities as a jazz improviser are pretty thin, frankly, and I've always felt Kenny was being ironic when mentioning the fact that this was his own highest selling album.

[Ian Thumwood]

SA

I would have to beg to differ about Bill Frisell. I think some of his own releases in the 2000s have been underwhelming but it you picked up upon his recent work with Thomas Morgan or Cuong Vu and the solo "Music is" album you would be hard -pushed to find a better jazz guitarist. It is intriguing to read your reference to "Angel Song" as I can recall the excitement this record generated upon it's release. I like Kenny Wheeler's ECM output but always felt "Angel Song" was really dry and austere. Apparently Frisell's inclusion was Manfred Eicher's suggestion as KW originally wanted John Abercrombie who did the subsequent tour. There is a Paul Motian album from the same time which also features Lee Kontiz and Charlie Haden with the trio where they interpret Broadway material which is really good.

The Julian Lage album is interesting. The repertoire is eclectic and the trio concept is effectively limited to the bass and drums providing support. There are no bass solos and no drums solos either but the unusual course and direction of the guitar playing is compelling. It is a bit like a metronome with the soloist pushing and pulling against the groove and producing these bizarre, extruded lines. The version of Guiffre's " Trudgin'" offers the best example of this on this disc.

[Serial_Apologist]

SA

I would have to beg to differ about Bill Frisell.

Somehow I thought you might!

There are no bass solos and no drums solos either but the unusual course and direction of the guitar playing is compelling. It is a bit like a metronome with the soloist pushing and pulling against the groove and producing these bizarre, extruded lines. The version of Guiffre's " Trudgin'" offers the best example of this on this disc.

Have you by any chance come across the duo which Derek Bailey did with the Drum 'n' Bass DJ Ninj in 1996? Maybe the Lage is along similar lines? Its completely what you might have thought Derek Bailey would rather swear allegiance to Glenn Miller than agree to, but I think it works, and Bailey comes across as radically taking on jazz rock and heavy metal guitar via his own idiomatic concept:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HUgcKnwnTTE

It's worth staying with, by the way. I wonder if Joseph K knows of this album.

[Joseph K]

I do know that album! You have mentioned it here before.

[Serial_Apologist]

I do know that album! You have mentioned it here before.

Hi Joe

You know something I did which I can't remember. Age. eh?!

[Stanfordian]

Lester Young – ‘The President plays with the Oscar Peterson Trio’
Lester Young with Oscar Peterson, Barney Kessel, Ray Brown & J.C. Heard
Norgran Records (1952)

[Stanfordian]

‘Headin’ South’
Horace Parlan with George Tucker, Al Harewood & Ray Barretto
Blue Note (1960)

[Stanfordian]

‘Back to the Tracks’
Tina Brooks with Jackie McLean, Blue Mitchell, Kenny Drew, Paul Chambers & Art Taylor
Blue Note (1960)

[Ian Thumwood]

I have been revisiting the new Camila Meza record which has been lauded on other websites. It is a difficult album to judge as the scope and ambition cannot be faulted with the writing for string being really impressive. I also like her guitar playing. However, I am not convinced by her voice. "Ambar" is an interesting concept, mixing a quartet with a string quartet in a programme of original work with a few number by Jobim, Nascimento and Metheny sprinkled in. However, I am starting to think that her pitch control is really ropey and there are too many instances where she sounds out of tune. It is quite intriguing when this happens as it seems to be more of a trait as singers become more ambitious and leave the safety net of standards for something riskier. Meza has been garnering some fulsome praise on line and I admire what she is trying to do but I remain to be convinced 100% by her voice. I am a bit on the fence about her. The writing for strings on the record is far more impressive than on the Laura Jurd record played yesterday and Noam Wiesenerg's writing eschews the syrupy and sentimental for an approach which has intelligence - the best writing for strings in jazz I have heard since Alan Ferber's project of about 6 years ago. If Norma Winstone had done a project like this you would understood the praise. Although their style and voices are different, Meza is coming from a very similar aesthetic but it is not totally successful although sufficiently interesting to deserve repeated listening. Had her voice been a better instrument and she avoided the moments when she goes out of tune, I would have said this would have been one of the most interesting vocal records of recent years - a meeting point of Classical strings, subtle song writing and modern jazz. It just goes to show how difficult it is to deliver something "Third stream" like this.

[Joseph K]

John Coltrane - Transition