Five badasses setting aside egos and working toward the common (very, very) good.

Emergency Third Rail Power Trip is simply one of the essential texts of American psychedelic rock.

It’s tempting to say the Sextet simply picks up where it left off on the self-titled album, but that’s selling short what this group does.

Using the bridges in Monk tunes as a starting point, the trio leaps off into a set of original songs.

Now a name mostly floated in guitar nerd circles, Emily Remler was on her way to becoming a major star of jazz guitar before her untimely death in 1990 at age 32.

The latest in the Zev Feldman*-produced line of *Bill Evans’ European concert recordings, In Norway: The Kongsberg Concert exhibits a show from the 1970 Kongsberg Jazz Festival in the eponymous Norwegian town.

With its breadth, depth, and enthusiastic performances, it’s like a crash course in Arkestral history.

In France captures something simple: a great B.B. King show.

Trumpeter Charles Tolliver is an unsung hero in jazz.

Directing an all-star group of guitar Bill Frisell, pianist Jason Moran, drummer Andrew Cyrille, bassist Thomas Morgan, and, most significantly, legendary saxophonist Lee Konitz, Bro let go of the music as written and embraced the way his bandmates altered his work on the fly.

For Landloper, Andersen hooks his double bass up to a set of effect pedals and goes it alone.

Except for a pair of solo performances, each spontaneously composed track pairs Strønen with a friend or fellow traveler.

Forces of Nature: Live at Slugs’ captures an explosive gig co-led by the two old friends that must’ve ripped the late Slugs’ Saloon a new one.

Now the Swiss pianist returns with Samares, his most diverse, enigmatic, and moody record to date.

In 1993, Canadian pianist Oscar Peterson – a jazz superstar called the Maharaja of the piano by Duke Ellington – suffered a stroke that called into question his ability to keep playing. But by the summer of 1994, he formed a new band, strode back onto European stages, and mounted a resounding comeback.

Ann Arbor and Detroit weren’t the only cities in Michigan that spawned high-octane Midwestern hard rock & roll.

Jazz quartet The Bad Plus continues its aggressive evolution on its latest album_Complex Emotions_.

The band put everything they had into their catchy, well-written songs, playing a classic rock & roll style like they invented it and couldn’t wait to show it off.

The now-retired Jarrett and ECM Records leader Manfred Eicher return to those recordings for another scoop.

It’s a genuine mystery why Edwards hasn’t achieved at least Robyn Hitchock or XTC levels of acclaim.

Pianist and composer Andrew Hill was an iconoclast, a remarkable musician who wrote weird, complex, brilliantly melodic pieces and presented them to musicians who knew exactly how to flow in and outside of the tunes.

Joined by regular partners Aaron Diehl (piano) and Harish Raghavan (bass), Sorey lets his hair down, so to speak, and just plays music he likes, without having the weight of having written them be part of the conversation.

It’s all been building up to this: Planetarium, a three-disk magnum opus, ten years in the making.

Underwater Detection Method puts the man known for quirky postpunk and art rock in the realm of space rock.

Keyboardist/bandleader Henry Hey, guitarist Chris McQueen, and their mates can clearly make anything into jazz.

Wingbeats, the eighth album from jazz trio Thumbscrew, is one of those records about which it’s difficult to write.

Austrian guitarist Wolfgang Muthspiel returns to his classical roots with Etudes/Multitudes – well, sort of.

Seabrook goes it alone, gathering six- and twelve-string guitars, a tenor banjo, a cassette recorder, and a six-string guitar banjo from the 1920s to create his own eccentric sonic world.

Wilkins’ most ambitious album both in theme and artistic endeavor.

Trumpeter and composer Avishai Cohen continues his winning streak with Ashes to Gold.

Consisting of saxophonist Mette Rasmussen, pianist Craig Taborn, and drummer Ches Smith, Weird of Mouth can’t be anything but a free improvisational jazz trio.

The seventh in a nine album series entitled Man’ish Boy that’s dedicated to exploring mental health in the Black community, Legend of e’Boy (The Hypervigilant Eye) vibrates with an emotional intensity not often found on jazz records.

For the forthright Guilty!!! the subject matter is obvious: the 2024 election, and the madness that’s infused the path to get there.

Though he has a raft of recordings under his own name, saxophonist Eric Person made his bones as a steadfast member of drummer/talent scout Chico Hamilton’s band, as well as a stalwart presence in NYC’s “free funk” scene by way of Ronald Shannon Jackson & the Decoding Society.

For Element of Light, his fifth album and first for the legendary label Candid, he brings it all together into one direction.

Drawing specifically on the spiritual jazz of Pharoah Sanders and the Coltranes and the European tradition of free improvisation, Flatten paints a landscape that undulates between heaven and hell, with violent sound blasts interrupted by flowing ocean waves.

Downes, Frisell, and Cyrille find a commonality in drone, as each musician channels their instruments into a forward drift towards a universal tone.

One might well wonder why saxophonist Walter Smith III gave his latest album such a literal title.

Saxophonist Miguel Zenon embarks on his most ambitious project yet on his latest album Golden City: no less than a tribute to the city of San Francisco.

Saxophonist Ivo Perelman continues his attempt to be the world’s most prolific free improviser with three new albums that continue established series, both putting the free jazz master in pairs with like-minded colleagues.

Despite coming from an era where his preferred milieu was so cheesy it should have been surrounded by mousetraps, Stern’s career has endured.

Mountains moves from hard bop to postbop to avant-big band and back again, showing off the musicians’ prowess without losing sight of the tune.

Dear Mr. Hill doesn’t showcase a gifted mimic – Wilcox is his own person.

Steve Wynn’s first solo album since 2010, Make It Right is a musical memoir that coincides with the release of I Wouldn’t Say It If It Wasn’t True, his literary one.

The arrangements lean away from the good-time bombast of a lot of big band music, with the horns used less as bludgeoning melody than lush orchestration.

When singer/songwriter/guitarist Michael Chapman died at 80 in 2021, he was working on an album entitled Another Fish, a sequel to his 2015 guitars ‘n’ effects album Fish.

Never an artist lacking ambition, trumpeter Marquis Hill came up with a cool idea for his latest album.

Forward-thinking Chicago flautist Nicole Mitchell and innovative Bamako (Mali) kora player Ballaké Sissoko have created something truly magnificent: a respectful, enthusiastic blend of artistic approaches.

The popularity of jazz polymaths Snarky Puppy made it safe for fusion musicians to get funky again – a situation of which King Llama takes full advantage on their second album fata implexis.

Imaginative and passionate, Zealous Angles is a great example of the kind of record that makes you think, “Daaaamn…I’d forgotten how good this person is.”

These top-flight players trade licks, blend textures, and revel in the spirit of group interplay and the sheer joy of making music together.

German jazz titan ECM continues its Luminessence vinyl reissues series with a pair of guitar gods from the 1970s.

The production quality of the average ECM release would sound great coming from a TDK cassette – on pristine vinyl it sounds as incredible as it does on CD, and in nice, full-size jackets to boot.

The combo of performing expertise and melodic feel might well break the brain of a well-rounded picker, but just as easily speaks to the heart of the non-musician.

Bassist/composer William Parker has music oozing from his soul at all times.

While never shy when it comes to spontaneity, Guidi finds a new kick coming from guest James Brandon Lewis.

The Los Angeleno may draw from tradition, but he doesn’t stick to it – instead he gives his wry tunes an arty spin that far more Sparks than Badfinger, more Bowie than Beatles.

London blends his usual swinging take on Jewish folk melodies with impressions from adventure jazz figures.

With such a solid band with whom to collaborate, Escreet can’t help but bring his triple-A game.

Recorded in Munich in 2004, September Night documents an especially fruitful show.

Nearly fifty years after their supposed heyday, the Hollywood Stars still have plenty left in the tank.

Saxophonist Oded Tzur has gone from strength to strength ever since he moved from studying Indian classical music in Rotterdam to playing jazz in New York.

New Concepts in Piano Trio Jazz, too, charts a new path for Shipp, bassist Michael Bisio, and drummer Newman Taylor Baker, as the lines between free improvisation and compositional craft blur.

Saxophonist Ivo Perelman and pianist Matthew Shipp have been making records together for a good quarter of a century. So when it comes time to add to their catalog of duo albums, they fall into it like a long-married couple into their warm, soft bed.

Once freed from his role as the Keith Richards of scuzz rock, Rowland S. Howard was determined to forge a path with his own vision at the forefront.

Recorded live at SMOKE Jazz Club in 2023, Reverence stays the course of McPherson’s career, featuring performances that reveal his fealty to the old school bop sound.

Plenty of guitar bands these days attempt to revive the spirit of the nineties, when six-string noise ran strong and melodies were plentiful. To these ears, however, it seems like that kind of sonic maelstrom is best swirled by those who were there the first time around.

Orchestras fulfills a long-held dream on the part of Frisell.

Stripping her sound down from a quintet to a trio, the Madrid-born/NYC-based composer presents Perpetual Void, the next step in her creative arc.

For Silent, Listening, he goes it alone, planting his own entry in ECM’s long line of classic solo piano records.

Though they were brought together in part due to a shared love of Sun Ships, saxophonist Brent Bagwell and drummer Seth Nanaa adopt the band structure of Interstellar Space, cutting out any middle men that might provide things like chords and a bottom.

The blend of two masterful jazz musicians with a pair of post rock heroes plays to the strengths of both.

Is there another songwriter as prolific as Thomas Anderson?

For her seventh album, saxophonist Melissa Aldana returned to the source of her passion for jazz: the late, great Wayne Shorter.

Time passes, the world turns, and, without fail, songwriter Matthew Edwards (The Music Lovers, the Unfortunates, the Hairdressers) re-emerges from his normal life with new music.

Backed by a strong band, Stephens is almost impossibly solid throughout, his smooth, soulful tone a perfect fit for whatever approach a tune takes.

Though he made his bones as a go-to hired gun in the Australian jazz scene, bassist Sam Anning also spend three years backing up beloved Gunditjamara/Bundjalung singer, songwriter, and Aboriginal activist Archie Roach.

Created during the same sessions as last year’s epic album The Hypnogogue, The Church’s latest LP Eros Zeta and the Perfumed Guitars serves as Book 2 in the saga begun by its predecessor.

The tracks come soaked in electronica touches formerly used as texture, and it’s not the synthwaves from the seventies and eighties, either.

The Argentine saxophonist and composer indeed stays the course set by her 2022 debut Jump, with another set of chordless jazz.

Zombi has always had its feet in two camps: electronic soundtrack music a la Tangerine Dream, Goblin, and, especially, John Carpenter; and seventies progressive rock/fusion, like Camel, FM, and Return to Forever.

Concerned by the state of the world, the saxist brought together old and new tunes, with an ear toward inspiring melodies and arrangements.

The rhythm duo fits right into Perelman’s free improv vision, following him anywhere he chooses to roam.

With a rhythm section from Chile and a pianist from Spain, the beats here don’t reflect the danceable end of Latin America. Instead the trio draws on the Chilean chacarera and the Galician xota to find cultural beats that intersect and evolve.

Elegy For Thelonious is a tribute both to its subject and its creator.

Lage and producer Joe Henry plot a divergent course for the music, worrying less about genre than about melody and how best for the players to bring it to life.

Guitarist/composer Doug MacDonald has somehow never been a household name in the jazz world.

Trumpeter Riley Mulherkar usually plies his trade with the all-acoustic, rhythm-less brass band the Westerlies. For Riley, however, he’s chosen a different route: blending standards and originals with modern production approaches.

One of 2024’s most magnificently, passionately musical releases.

Given access to a makeshift studio in the barracks of an abandoned army base, eclectic experimental composer (and New Amsterdam co-founder) William Brittelle created Alive in the Electric Snow Dream, a hypersonic trip through a fractured but fascinating musical mind.

Multi-instrumentalist and composer Seth Applebaum has fingers in many pies: old fashioned analog instrumentation, up-to-the-minute digital and sampling technology, cross-genre arrangements, an interest in American space history, and an unfettered imagination.

Thirty-four years later, the Jack Rubies – consisting entirely of its original lineup – returns with the difficult third album.

Gilded Sorrow, the sixth Obsessed album, bears all the hallmarks of the stoner doom pioneer.

As he approaches his eightieth year on the planet, John Surman chooses not to look back, but to move ever forward.

On his new album nublues, vibraphonist Joel Ross sets expectations early.

Unlike snooty major labels and high-powered management firms, indie label Drunk Dial encourages its artists to write and record while wasted.

Now based in Milano, Italy, Dave Curran’s joined up with a pair of likeminded natives to form Baratro, an ugly power trio now bearing its first album.

On their latest album Chimera, guitarist Sergio Rios, keyboardist Dan Hastie, bassist Dale Jennings, and drummer Sam Halterman lay it down with the assurance of musicians for whom this music is a part of their very bones.

Surrounding himself with horns, strings, bass, electronics, and vocals, Smith conjures a strange and seductive spell.

Recorded in Paris in 2017, the record follows Perelman’s usual MO: gather his pals in the studio and record whatever happens.

The Interrogator sounds like manna from heaven for a certain type of rock & roll fan – specifically those that prefer their riffs ‘n’ grooves to be accompanied by a barrage of smart, pointed, funny lyrics.

After improvising a set together at ECM’s fiftieth anniversary concert in 2019, the duo decided to continue their working relationship, culminating in Touch of Time – their first album together.

Fortunately for those of us unfamiliar with Anderson’s ouevre, knowledge of the inspirational source isn’t required.

Whether on tenor or soprano, Matthieu Bordenave favors a plush tone and a winding, almost slithering technique that sounds like it’s searching for the heart of a piece.

The Memphis Blues Box includes twenty disks’ and over 500 songs’ worth of blues recordings from one of the United States’ most important musical cities, almost all from the first half of the twentieth century.

Jazz label Artwork Records has apparently been operating way under the radar, as I hadn’t heard of them until now. That’s especially surprising given their talent roster, including these two piano men.

A mere thirty-four years late, the Veldt’s debut album finally arrives.

As far as pure listening pleasure goes, Invisible Hits hits every mark Datura4’s albums do, and more.

Bassist/songwriter Tony Marsico’s long and varied career stretches back to his membership in pioneering Chicano punk band the Plugz, eventually encompassing work with Bob Dylan, Matthew Sweet, Neil Young, and tons of others.

Recording live in 2006, For Those Who Cross the Seas finds keyboardist and composer Alon Nechushtan assembling a titanic lineup of NYC free and experimental jazz players to perform a pair of longform pieces.

Few labels are as adamant at showcasing free improvisation as ESP-Disk’, but Seven pieces/about an hour/saxophone, piano, drums does more than that: it shines a light on an under-recorded talent.

It’s not only the leader’s own sound that unites the pieces – it’s a shared vision, as clearly every person from whom Pirog asked for tracks got the memo.

During World War II, there were 20,000 concentration camp prisoners rescued by the White Buses, an operation coordinated and organized by the Red Cross. Danish saxophonist Benjamin Koppel feels this is a story we should all remember – hence White Buses: Passage to Freedom, a thematic concept album.

The latest avatar of a recent mini-revival of psych/power/folk pop revival, Eamon Ra shows a great deal of talent and smarts on his second album.

For his fourth solo album, Hershkovits goes it alone, without even a sheaf of scores for company.

As long as Marino treads the boards, old school rock & roll values of melody, riff, and spice will never die.

Though definitely jazz in nature, the band never specifies what kind of jazz.

Taken from two separate dates in August 1964 (plus a bonus track recorded in 1969), these tracks capture the early sixties Bill Evans Trio at its most synchronous.

A Danish jazz summit, the concert captured on Strands brings together three different generations of Denmark-born or based improvisers.

In 2008, trombonist Steve Davis and bass player Peter Washington met up with legendary pianist Hank Jones for a relaxed trio session.

Featuring tunes written before and during the pandemic, Liberated Gesture presents vibraphonist Yuhan Su with an exceptional band of fellow travelers.

Saxophonist Ivo Perelman tends to stick to small ensembles – duos, trios, even solos. So it’s a nice surprise to hear him with a sextet.

Nothing like a good old-fashioned free improv party.

Three albums in, Cologne-based drummer/composer Mareike Wiening has made herself one of those artists – one whose latest record immediately vaults to the top of the buy/pre-order/save list upon announcement.

Liminal Silence, the culmination of a long-standing collaboration between Korean singer Sunny Kim, Armenian keyboardist Vardan Ovsepian, and American guitarist Ben Monder, is an album that defies categorization.

Call it soul jazz, jazz funk, boogaloo, or whatever – there’s something irresistible about a good, danceable groove coupled with improvisational flair.

Last year’s debut For the Love of Fire and Water instantly put the Quintet into the top tier of twenty-first century working groups, and Hear the Light Singing will ensure it stays there.

There’s nothing particularly twenty-first century about Hard Light – no one’s trying to reinvent the wheel here.

Joe Santa Maria is a great example of the new breed of jazz player – one who absorbs musical influences from across the spectrum of music and incorporates them into his own ideas.

When the Horsemen began in the mid-eighties, they were seen as the Flesh Eaters’ country cousins, with Desjardins’ patented noir lyrics set in friendlier, more melodic environs. As time passed, however, the line between the Horsemen and the Eaters blurred considerably, in part due to each band’s Red Rover membership, and that’s still the case here.

It’s funny how what was mainstream in one era becomes underground in another.

Keeping his upward swing going, bassist/composer Billy Mohler returns with his quartet for his third album.

Just two old friends united by talent and a taste for adventure.

Drummer/composer Kate Gentile has led her New York band Find Letter X for several years now, but this is the first studio album from the quartet.

Though a supergroup of sorts, the band isn’t given to grand statements or bombastic showboating.

While going through the papers of the late saxophone giant Lee Konitz, Talmor came across DAT tapes of rough drafts of new Ornette Coleman tunes – so fresh, in fact, that they hadn’t been scored, let alone published, and performed only once.

An expert on his instrument’s possibilities, vibraphonist Simon Moullier takes full advantage of its range on his fourth album Inception.

Drawing on every aspect of Scofield’s playing, from free bop to acid country to swinging blues, and mixing originals with covers, the two disks don’t necessarily have – or need – a throughline.

Recorded in 2017, Spirit presents a live concert performed by saxophonist Oliver Lake, pianist Mathias Landæs, and drummer Kresten Osgood from a show in Lund, Sweden.

As might be surmised from the title, Captivity explores the lives of those incarcerated, specifically those falsely imprisoned, imprisoned for political purposes, given sentences disproportionate to the crimes of which they were convicted, or dying in jail under mysterious circumstances.

Birnbaum takes a dozen pieces from Bach’s The Well-Tempered Clavier and applies jazz aesthetics, especially instrumental improvisation and rhythmic swing.

While a Mingus tune (“What Love”) appears again on its follow-up, our bassist/composer spends the rest of Gnosis on a slate of strong originals.

It’s unfair to say that 1992’s Circular Temple is the album that put pianist Matthew Shipp on the map.

Boston enclave Rum Bar Records may not have hit the notoriety of, say, Bomp! Records yet, but trust us when we say they have the market cornered on high quality power pop, punk, garage rock, and genre-agnostic rock & roll.

Inspired by the cyclical nature of success and failure, especially in the face of hard times, Sickafoose composed an interrelated series of pieces exploring the emotional arc of enduring that cycle.

Eleven songs, thirty-five minutes, eight days of recording.

If you’ve ever imagined Paganini as a pianist performing “Flight of the Bumblebee” after a dozen cups of strong coffee, you’re nearly there.

Also known as the KCB Collective, saxophonist Benjamin Koppel, bassist Scott Colley, and drummer Brian Blade have been a working band for a decade.

Perelman’s clearly searching for the soul balm that comes from absorbing what’s in front of him as sound , taking it into his very pores, digesting it, and letting it inform his own work at a deep level.

Ever research someone and think, “Holy cats, what a life!” Dr. Eddie Henderson can bring about that kind of gasp.

It’s likely no surprise that the title In Solitude, the latest album from bass clarinetist Steven Lugerner’s multi-faceted group SLUGish Ensemble, references the pandemic.

Written at a crucial time, pianist Ben Winkelman’s sixth album Heartbeat captures an emotional whirlwind, with anticipation and dread mixing freely and productively.

When it comes to the latest album from saxophonist James Brandon Lewis and his Red Lily Quartet, the title, quite frankly, says it all.

Last Chance to Learn the Twist is nothing so cliché as a return to form – it’s simply one of this veteran artist’s very best records.

Loud, the duo’s fourth album, features Tim on six-string bass and baritone guitar and Susan on drums, relying on meaty riffs, no-frills songwriting, and the duo’s ragged-but-right harmonizing to carry the performances.

Electronic artist BlankFor.ms (Tyler Gilmore to the ‘rents) joins with jazz piano titan Jason Moran and hugely respected drummer Marcus Gilmore for Refract, an adventure in glitched-out improvisation.

A first call bassist in both Chicago jazz and classical music, Christian Dillingham proves himself the kind of composer and bandleader who should also top lists with Cascades.

The quartet’s sixth LP Olympico seethes with energy, while also evidencing the kind of refined craft great outfits earn over the course of careers.

With Torn still on board and the addition of keyboardist/electronics guru J. Peter Schwalm, with whom composer Thelen has worked on his Fractal Guitar projects and last year’s duo album _Transneptunian Planets*, Sonar takes on another of Thelen’s side hustles: composing for classical ensembles.

On hEARoes, the threesome eschews firepower (for the most part) for chamber music, as if they’re trying to make up new works for small classical ensembles.

A mover and shaker in the fifties, jazz label Contemporary Records lured saxophone great Sonny Rollins from his home base in New York to Los Angeles to record with West Coast musicians.

Four years after the last Swans album, Gira and crew finally return with The Beggar, another album of grim tidings and aspirational gloom.

Bassist and composer Yosef Gutman Levitt continues his prolific ways with Soul Song, the first album on his new imprint of the same name.

It’s always seemed to be an intense thing for Royal Thunder to make music – the band’s albums practically glow with vivid emotion and acute conviction.

Since leaving the Bad Plus a few years ago, pianist Orrin Evans has simply gone from strength to strength, putting his prodigious talent at the keyboard to the service of strong tunes and surrounding himself with top-flight backing musicians along the way.

Beggars Banquet continues its vinyl reissue series for Love and Rockets with round two: a pair of LPs that never quite found the cache of their predecessors.

Following up the deeply personal Reconnected, an album that explored his Latin and Turkish heritage, trombonist Altin Sencalar opens the doors to the wider world on his third album In Good Standing.

Bassist Vicente Archer has a quarter of a century of sessions and sideperson gigs behind him – oddly (or not), Short Stories is his first album as a leader.

Six years on from the masterful two-disk, one-song album Mirror Reaper, the duo returns with The Clandestine Gate.

Hearkening back to the funky, R&B-heavy fusion of the early seventies – Herbie Hancock/Crusaders division – Golden Mean paint colorful portraits that promote accessibility over complexity for its own sake.

If there’s a better name for a vocal group than Roomful of Teeth, we haven’t heard it.

From the evidence presented here, Boston’s Eddie Japan has never met a pop melody they didn’t like.

Not only has he just put out his memoir Easily Slip Into Another World, but he’s released his latest piece of music The Other One.

She Sees is as adventurous and exciting as any album the iconoclastic musician and composer has made.

Backed by guitarist Guilherme Monteiro, violinist Skye Steele, cellist Christopher Hoffman, bassist Michael Bates, and percussionists Mauro Refosco and Rogerio Boccato, Blake traverses all over the musical map here, incorporating bop, Brazil, tango, folk, and other influences into a distinctive blend all his own.

The keyboardist from Johannesburg’s Mabuta, Bokani Dyer has more to say than can be confined to one outlet.

As the 101st release on his own Orenda label, Polarity serves to both sum up and advance his career thus far.

To celebrate their tenth anniversary as a unit, pianist/composer Omer Klein, bassist Haggai Cohen-Milo, and drummer Amir Bresler threw themselves a birthday party, entitling it Life & Fire.

The threesome’s third LP together, Our Daily Bread keeps faith with the band’s prior explorations of spiritual and free jazz Lovano compositions.

As might be discerned from the title, faith, family, and the enduring relevance of art are on Wilson’s mind.

When it came to making In What Direction Are You Headed?, Farnsworth called on peers and younger players for a session that’s both traditionalist and postmodern.

After a decade of nifty singles, Bay Area quartet the Ironsides finally gets around to making a full-length album.

Saxophonist and NEA jazz master George Coleman has played with more luminaries than most of us have had hot dinners.

For Eventually, Jacob Young decided to record in a format that, amazingly, he’s never tried before: the guitar trio.

A mere dozen years since their last album, pianist Jean-Michel Pilc, bassist François Moutin, and drummer Ari Hoenig reconvene for YOU Are the Song.

In partnership with sitarist Josh Feinberg, Rez Abbasi’s co-created Naya Baaz (“new falcon” in Hindu), a cross-cultural exchange that’s all about serving the tunes.

On their latest release, Nuremberg duo Nick & June seduce listeners into their own private world.

Though not as prolific as, say, Robert Pollard or the late, great Paul K, Thomas Anderson writes more songs than most of us have had hot dinners.

For this record, pianist Renee Rosnes, drummer Allison Miller, bassist Noriko Ueda, and trumpeter Ingrid Jensen welcome saxophonists Nicole Glover and Alexa Tarantino to the fold, though they’re so well integrated it feels like they’ve been there the whole time.

For _DAY_*, Royston gets more specific, traversing twenty-four hours of quarantined pandemic time.

Solo bass records have a special place in jazz history.

What’s more amazing – that heavy psychedelic blues rock is a style that never goes away, or that in the right hands it never gets old?

For We Sick, pianist deVon Russell Gray, saxophonist Nathan Hanson, and drummer Davu Seru recorded in an empty church across the street from the Minnesota State Capitol – a building surrounded by the National Guard due to the murder of George Floyd mere weeks before.

With their catalog now being reissued on collector nerds’ catnip (AKA vinyl), the time is ripe for both newcomers and longtime fans to discover, or rediscover, their distinctive genius.

ECM steps up with the Luminessence series – vinyl reissues from the label’s vast catalog, both common classics and deep cut gems.

Saxophonist Allen Lowe has lived one hell of a music-obsessed life.

As indicated by the title, these performances come from Danish radio, and have not been heard since they were first broadcast in the sixties.

Normal Street continues the journey into the heart of American primitivism and the lowest of low-fi.

Composer and horn player Ben Wendel clearly has a grounding in jazz and classical traditions. But that doesn’t mean he’s stuck in the past, as his latest album All One suggests.

If you’re a trainspotter for either jazz or rock credits, you’re likely to have come across Rachel Eckroth’s name.

As much a conceptual exercise as familial playtime, Hush is an album about sonic intimacy.

Drawing from the ranks of Warrior Soul and the City Kids for a tribute track to Eddie Van Helen, Meyer and friends created Trading Aces, knocking out enough songs for a debut LP in record time.

Though best known as the guitarist for Sting for three decades, guitarist Dominic Miller has another, less bombastic side to him.

The dapper and dynamic trio GoGo Penguin exists outside of any easy genre sticker.

Like Minds, the latest album from saxophonist Wayne Escoffery, focuses on chemistry – particularly the chemistry between old friends and bandmates who’ve played together so often their interplay is beyond telepathic.

The founder of the great Outside In label, Nick Finzer has spent the last decade gracing the jazz racks with a plethora of interesting and exciting musicians.

One thing that often gets overlooked by the punk and power pop heads that follow them is that the label also spotlights a style of blues- and roots-based rock & roll that’s fallen ever further out of fashion as the decades pass.

Both a brilliant bandleader and a consummate sideperson, saxophonist/composer Walter Smith III has been modestly making a mark in the jazz world for nearly twenty years.

Everyone involved hits their marks with practiced ease and long-running passion, showing not only adventurous spirits but a deep-rooted chemistry.

To follow up his debut album L.A. Source Codes, bassist and composer Will Lyle chose a different route than expected: he formed a band.

Drummer/keyboardist Peter Manheim has served admirably in the engine room of cross-genre artists like Resavoir and Tony Glausi, but finally steps out to showcase his own compositions.

Trumpeter/composer/multi-disciplinarian Rob Mazurek assembled the first version of the Exploding Star Orchestra in 2005, and has used the shapeshifting ensemble as a vehicle for whatever musical flights of fancy he deems necessary ever since.

The result is a splendid mutation of avant-garde jazz and string quartet (duo?) sounds that nods to free jazz tradition, but comes off like no one’s vision but Laubrock’s own.

A leading light in experimental jazz, trumpeter/composer Wadada Leo Smith assembled a brand new band for Fire Illuminations, the latest album in his nearly half-century career.

With two new releases, Bruce Licher and Independent Project Records continue their exploration of not only the deepest crevasses of their own archives, but the electronic, experimental underground of the American Southwest.

The New Day Bends Light is a good example of what makes the twenty-first century’s contemporary big band scene so exciting.

Future Strangers is the latest album from this SoCal guitar pop group, which means students of the style have a new batch of songs from John Andrew Frederick to emulate.

Sloan sets up a background of electronically altered sounds and rhythm tracks, then brings in his buddies to add melodies and lyrics.

As well-versed in classical music as in jazz, pianist/composer Billy Childs has a touch at the keyboard like few others.

Italian pianist Margherita Fava clearly has no interest in being flashy for flash’s sake.

Australian bassist Christopher Hale befriended Korean master percussionist Minyoung Woo ten years ago, and the pair have been learning from each other ever since.

Having just passed the fiftieth anniversary of his career as an ECM recording artist, Ralph Towner settles in to make his latest statement.

Serving as a sort of adjunct release to last year’s forward step View With a Room, Julian Lage’s The Layers features songs recorded during the same sessions with the same musicians.

Trumpeter Ralph Alessi is one of those major jazz figures who’s never quite hit the button of stardom, yet remains one of the most respected musicians in his field.

Pals due to the former’s renowned Alternative Guitar Summit, outsider guitarists Joel Harrison and Anthony Pirog have worked together for a few years now, and this is what their collaboration has led up to: The Great Mirage.

Bobo Stenson’s career goes back very nearly to the beginning of ECM Records.

Here’s a good way to be prolific: improvise everything.

Portland’s Eyelids sound like they’ve mainlined several generations of tuneful power pop and college rock on their fifth studio album.

Led by guitarist Ryan El-Solh, Brooklyn trio Scree combines ambient jazz, Lebanese folk music, and atmospheric psychedelia into music for walking lonely nights through a desert landscape.

For Corridors, Scott strips things down to the minimum, employing saxophonist Walter Smith III and bassist Reuben Rogers in a chord-less trio.

Few composers in jazz and its adjacencies command as much respect as Vince Mendoza.Few composers in jazz and its adjacencies command as much respect as Vince Mendoza.

The digital-only March On isn’t so much a follow-up as an addendum, featuring music recorded during the March sessions that’s related to what made it on the album.

Guitarist Dave Stryker has been performing with organist Jared Gold and drummer McClenty Hunter for a dozen years. Oddly, Prime is their first full-length record as a trio.

Though he’s established himself as one of Italy’s most important improvisational voices, clarinetist and saxophonist Gianluigi Trovesi has long kept one foot in the world of classical music.

Now in their fifth decade of existence, Australian rock icons The Church continue their evolution on their latest album The Hypnogogue.

Now nearly thirty-five years into their career, Australian improvisational trio the Necks still insist that their initial direction was correct: follow your own instincts and you’ll never go wrong.

Originally released in 1967, D.B. Shrier Emerges chronicles a burst of jazz with feeling that, oddly, became the musician’s only recorded statement.

At eighty years young, bassist Buster Williams has a long and storied history in jazz, playing with Art Blakey, Sonny Rollins, Sarah Vaughn, Chet Baker, Carmen McRae, Chick Corea, Dexter Gordon, Betty Carter, and far too many more to list.

Though this is his first album as a leader, Zach Lober is no late bloomer – he’s had two decades of experiences as a sideperson and composer in the States and Europe.

It’s not hype to say that the jazz scene in London is one of the most exciting musical movements happening in the twenty-first century.

Last seen as a leader with Countdown, an album of standards and covers, vibraphonist Simon Moullier makes his return to the racks with Isla.

Pianist Jean-Michel Pilc is well-known for eschewing setlists in performances, making up the program – and often the music – as he goes along, trusting in his sidepeople to follow.

His range of study encompasses everyone from Charlie Christian and Wes Montgomery to Pat Metheny and Bill Frisell, and it shows in both his performance and his compositions.

Though well known as a composer and a stalwart of the Chicago jazz scene, trumpeter Markus Rutz owns one advantage that trumps everything else: he sounds good.

Swing Your Lanterns channels several spirits from seventies and eighties New York, reflecting Julian’s own versatile experiences.

The appearance of the Chicago group’s second full-length Dion’s Quest is more than welcome.

The guitarist plugs his instrument into synthesizers and boards of electronics, creating a fascinating series of soundscapes that seem to have dropped in from another reality entirely

Pianist Fred Hersch is revered for his compositional, improvisational and technical talents, a jazz musician’s jazz musician. Singer/bassist/songwriter Esperanza Spalding has used her massive talent to bridge the worlds of jazz and, well, everything else.

As well as being a bandleader in his own right, bassist Ander Jormin anchors the long-running Bobo Stenson Trio. Singer, songwriter and violinist Lean Willamark has joined her fellow Swede on numerous occasions, co-leading a quartet with koto player Karin Nakagawa and Jormin’s Stenson Trio rhythm partner, drummer Jon Fält.

Chambers channels melodies and rhythms from South American, Latin American, and African sources, and makes them all come out hard bop.

The Candle and the Flame, the eight solo album from former Go-Betweens co-leader Robert Forster, was made under trying circumstances: Forster’s wife Karin was battling ovarian cancer.

A bassist and composer of some twenty-five years’ standing, Ben Wolfe has attracted as much acclaim for his compositions as for his playing, with a career in chamber music alongside his jazz work.

One of the hidden jewels of the urban Northeast, the Royal Arctic Institute returns with From Coma to Catharsis, a sequel of sorts to its prior EP From Catnip to Coma.

Though better known around his home base of Baltimore than in the rest of the world, guitarist Skip Grasso clearly commands respect.

Dismissing any notion of the conglomeration being a one-off, the quartet returns, with Scott Robinson in place of Allen Lowe, for sophomore effort No Subject.

Scottish drummer Sebastian Rochford was inspired – nay, compelled – to write the music for A Short Diary after the loss of his father, poet Gerard Rochford.

With a ton of jazz veterans and soul luminaries on her resumé, it’s no surprise Lakecia Benjamin comes across as assured and confident in her abilities and her message on Phoenix, her fourth album as a leader.

Though it’s been disputed, it’s said that composer Johann Sebastian Bach preferred the clavichord over the harpsichord or the piano as an instrument for his compositions.

Over the course of forty-odd minutes, the duo make all kinds of noises, from pick scrapes and mouthpiece burps to rumbling fret taps and haunting legato – but rarely do they descend into straightahead noisemaking.

For its fiftieth anniversary, groundbreaking collective Art Ensemble of Chicago staged a special concert in a country near and dear to their hearts.

On Mercy, Cale brings his classical training and avant-garde sense of pop music into the 2020s, collaborating with younger artists and generally making it clear he’s paying attention to modern music without jumping on trends.

Tyler Mitchell may be a longstanding member of the Sun Ra Arkestra, but the bassist also leads his own bands, often with his Arkestra boss Marshall Allen in tow.

Part of the new generation of ECM players taking the label tradition down new trails, Mette Henriette presents her second album.

At 79, piano great Kenny Barron has been around long enough to let over forty years pass since the last time he did an unaccompanied solo album.

While Leibson naturally carries most of the melodic load, Yang interjects her own low-thrumming harmonic ideas, and Cleaver makes his presence felt outside of mere beat-keeping.

His harmonic sophistication and distinctive chord voices take responsibility for the shape and feel of each tune, with his bandmates following his standard.

If there’s a jazz saxophonist more prolific than Ivo Perelman, it’s unclear who that might be.

Baker entered a prolific creative period in the old world, including an ongoing collaboration with German vibraphonist Wolfgang Lackerschmid.

When musicians from disparate genres come together, you never know what you might get.

Barbeau lets it all hang out here, both musically and emotionally, and it leads to Stranger being one of his very best records.

There are lots of multi-instrumentalists out there in Musicland – that’s no surprise. But how many of them are experts in a pair of instruments as disparate as the guitar and the trumpet?

Guitarist/singer/songwriter Richard Dawson is part of a long line of British eccentrics.

In a way the West Coast counterpart to Boston’s Rum Bar Records, Burbank’s Big Stir also pledges its troth to gimmick-free guitar pop and rock & roll, with an emphasis on the former.

The pair hit it off when working together as part of drummer Tim Horner’s group, and their chemistry, both with each other and with Cuenca, is evident in this relaxed set of songs.

The term “chamber jazz” has fairly wide-ranging connotations – just check out the catalog of ECM Records. But Chamber Made, the latest album from clarinetist Darryl Harper, takes the sobriquet literally.

Working with producer Alicia Vanden Heuvel, Janko and her band make a record that sounds utterly out of time, with a simple, stripped-down arrangement style that eschews production slickness for soul.

Though he’s not invoked as much as he used to be, it’s worth remembering that Ahmad Jamal is a major jazz figure, both in terms of popularity and cultural impact.

The Los Angeles singer/songwriter/guitarist has made it to album #14 without causing much of a ripple on the surface of popular acclaim, and given the high quality of his work, that’s both a shame and a mystery.

Though not as focused as the Sonar records or as risky as the string quartet album, in some ways Thelen’s Fractal Guitar series represents his aesthetic at its most pure.

As both men favor melodic construction over unrestricted blowing, together they create a program that, while technically impressive, is more purely musical than anything else.

It’s hard to keep up, let alone find the brightest diamonds, so here’s a quick round-up of some of the best of their recent releases.

Trumpeter/keyboardist Nicholas Payton is that rare musician who knows exactly how to balance two callings – reverence for the ancestors and the urge to move forward and keep the music’s evolution going.

The quartet made three albums of punky, fuzz-banged power pop that deserved more than to be relegated to the dollar bins.

Though probably best known for his work with Pharoah Sanders, Ravi Coltrane, Louis Hayes and Trey Anastasio, bassist/composer Dezron Douglas is a fine bandleader in his own right.

Guitarist Bruce Licher continues rolling out the reissues on his re-galvanized Independent Project Records label with the release of archival material from his much beloved band Savage Republic.

Fefer comes up with strong tunes that take advantage not only of his full-boded, almost creamy tone, but the special skills of his quartet.

Filtering their sunny birthplace roots through the hard rocking urbanity of their current hometown, California-to-Detroit immigrants Hayley and the Crusher kick the appropriate jams out on fourth LP Modern Adult Kicks.

Mata Atlântica is a rainforest on the coast of Brazil, and is one of the most species-rich biotopes on Earth – as well as one of the most endangered, with 90% of it already destroyed. Mata Atlântica is also a musical project assembled by co-producer and co-composers Mathias Derer and Markus Reuter.

His run with the Trio sadly came to a sudden end with his 2008 death via a scuba-diving accident, but it turns out his musical career wasn’t over yet. Discovered in the music he left behind was a fully recorded and mixed solo piano album.

There can be something magical about stripping music down to just an instrument and a voice, without the enhancement (distraction?) of a full-blown arrangement.

Never one to rest on his laurels, guitarist Bill Frisell follows up not just 2020’s excellent Valentine, but also his consistent work as a sideperson and bandmate, with the new quartet record Four.

Entropy is the Mainline to God is the first full-length album under the Veldt name since 1998. And it’s a doozy.

Though trained in jazz, with a master’s degree from the Manhattan School of Music, guitarist Olli Hirvonen doesn’t confine himself solely to bebop on his fourth album Kielo.

Vocalist/songwriter Sarah Elizabeth Charles exists in a creative space in between genres on her solo album Blank Canvas.

Sort of a summit of jazz professors, Another Life puts pianists and composers Dan Cavanagh and James Miley together with drummer John Hollenback to see what happens.

Bassist and composer Timothy Norton doesn’t stint on ambition for his first album as a leader: Visions of Phaedrus is inspired by Plato’s Phaedrus.

What’s the difference between a jazz band and a jam band?

Legendary drummer and bandleader Paul Motian cast a long, long shadow with his eclectic work over the course of his sixty-decade career.

The Off-Off Broadway Guide to Synergism is a masterful piece of work that reminds us that great composers still draw nourishment from their inspirations.

Two generations of Cuban jazz pianists come together for Front Street Duets.

Saxophonist Ivo Perelman is one of the most prolific players in music, any music. Not only does he record frequently, but the results are often multi-disk sets.

Inspired equally by bebop and an eighteenth century French Christian cult, Seances puts the players through Dunn’s paces on a set of knotty, dynamic compositions with a new twist.

Veteran Norwegian bassist Arild Andersen is well known not only for his expert, tasteful playing, but also for his extraordinary compositions. For Affirmation, however, he’s taking a different road.

The duo’s sixth LP together, The Strange Case of Persephone Nimbus is their most ambitious yet. (Just look at the cover.)

For Anime Mundi, Nagano strips her support down to a trio, but without stinting on the space-filling sound she essayed last time.

Ron Carter is undeniably one of the titans of jazz. Though best known for his stint in Miles Davis’ Second Great Quartet in the 1960s, the bassist has racked up hundreds, if not thousands, of recordings and performances with jazz musicians far and wide, including dozens of his own albums as a leader.

Joined, as usual, by pianist Matthew Shipp and bassist Brandon Lopez, Dickey adds a new face to his ensemble: saxophonist Tony Malaby.

Russian/Ukrainian composer *Evgueni Galperine*pulls his artistic sources from a few different areas – the advanced harmonics of Shostakovich, the dramatic tension of Tchaikovsky, the lush minimalism of Arvo Pärt – and molds it into his own distinctive point of musical view.

Eschewing power pop, Barr looks to different, more sophisticated forms of American pop music as inspiration.

Guitarist Doug Wamble has always had one foot in jazz and the other in the blues, and his latest album Blues in the Present Tense continues his successful crossbreed.

Born in Berlin and based in the U.S., pianist Benjamin Lackner has led several ensembles throughout the years, including his eponymous trio.

As with the originals, the Montreal-to-New York musician keeps the performances riff- and tune-oriented, using his prodigious technique for short bursts of feeling, just like a good blues guitar solo.

Former (?) Connection singer Brad Marino has spent the last couple of years conquering the power pop world, but for Basement Beat he’s going for something slightly different.

There are a few reasons to be excited about Songs of Ascent, the latest project from jazz trumpeter and composer Dave Douglas.

As both a leader and a prolific session musician, alto saxophonist Bobby Watson has had a long and productive career since attending the University of Miami at the same time as Pat Metheny and Jaco Pastorious.

Portuguese jazz singer Maria Mendes finds a distinctive blend that combines elements of her past and her present on Saudade, Colour of Love, recorded live in Amsterdam.

Born in New Jersey and based in Montreal, pianist Taurey Butler plays in a style that bespeaks a couple of other locales: New York and New Orleans.

Amazingly for a jazz pianist, John Escreent has recorded eight previous albums, but Seismic Shift is his first with a trio.

Originally released at the turn of the Reagan years, Dead Kennedys’ incendiary debut Fresh Fruit For Rotting Vegetables is a certifiable American punk rock classic – no question.

For bassist and composer William Parker, the term “universal tonality” means, simply, “if we’re all breathing together, we’re singing together.”

Consistency, thy name is Thumbscrew.

Recorded in 2011 at Roulette’s as part of Thomas Bruckner’s Interpretations series of events, Evocation features a trio of master improvisers embodying the essence of spontaneous composition.

The second release in Charles Lloyd’s “Trio of Trios” project, following Chapel from a couple of months ago, Trios: Ocean puts the alto saxophone great in the mix with guitarist Anthony Wilson and pianist Gerald Clayton.

Due to contemporary superstardom, musicals based on their work, frequent licensing in movie and TV shows, think pieces that continue to pop up, endorsement by musicians with whom they have nothing in common stylistically, and constant radio play over the decades, it’s safe to say that ABBA never really went away.

The combination of jazz musicians with electronic artists has always had a checkered history.

It took eight years, but bassist/composer Noah Garabedian finally follows up his 2014 leader debut Big Butter and the Eggmen with Consider the Stars Beneath Us,

Jazz fans know Acuña from his early work accompanying Cuban bandleader Pérez Prado and his stint with jazz fusion icons Weather Report, for whom he played drums or percussion on two of their seminal albums, Black Market and the bestselling Heavy Weather.

Fries lays heavily into his sense of melody here, letting his lyrical riffs and creamy chording lead the way.

Squint would be a difficult record for anyone to follow up, but Lage does it with style on View With a Room.

Mercyland had smarts, tunes and a cool sound.

For her latest album Unánime , however, Amed makes a concerted effort to explore the world of Latin music – not just the music she grew up with in Argentina, but also that from Brazil, Peru, Cuba and flamenco.

Saxophonist Jon Irabagon’s latest album Rising Sun is an American journey, taking the experience of some of the States’ most beautiful country and reconfiguring it into jazz.

Singer/guitarist Dave W. and bassist/singer Ego Sensation return to their breakthrough for The Revenge of Heads On Fire, a reboot that gives the record new life.

Hersch has made duo recordings a significant part of his career, with his latest endeavor The Song is You featuring Rava as his partner in a series of standards and originals.

Joined by drummer Nasheet Waits and bassist Eric Revis, improvised music vets both, Jeff Parker lets his hair down stylistically on Eastside Romp, and indulges in a good old-fashioned blowing session.

Charles Stepney is one of those artists whose name may not be common currency, but whose music is at the bedrock of sounds everyone’s heard.

Veterans like trumpeter Sean Jones and singer Kurt Elling join up-and-comers like trombonist Kalia Vandever and saxophonist Roxy Coss to perform a variety of compositions in the lush big band style.

It’s the Hollywood rule that every success gets a sequel, and sure enough, we have Music in Film: The Sequel.

Before he found semi-fame with Salad Boys, New Zealand singer/guitarist Joe Sampson fronted grungy trio T54.

Roxy Music caps their fiftieth anniversary year with a reissue of The Best of Roxy Music, a 2001 single compilation that has never been on vinyl before.

Though she’s a first call violinist and composer and leads a typical string quartet lineup on VEER Quartet, don’t assume Sarah Bernstein is a classical musician.

Young saxophonist Adam Larson is still in the phase of his career where he’s paying tribute to his idols and mentors, so he makes it obvious with his album titles.

An outgrowth of musicianly friendships and idle time during the pandemic best spent writing and recording music, Night Crickets brings together singer/songwriters/multi-instrumentalists David J (from Love & Rockets and Bauhaus) and Darwin Meiners (who records solo as Darwin) with drummer Victor DeLorenzo (Violent Femmes) for a sort of alternative rock supergroup.

Cowherd’s no speed demon, preferring to play rippling lines that let the songs unfold, rather than charge forward, which clearly suits Blade and Patitucci perfectly.

Though there’s little here that would rattle the windows, that doesn’t mean there isn’t plenty going on, with complex tunes, intricate arrangements and strong ensemble playing.

Saxophonist and composer Miguel Zenón has long been at the forefront of modern jazz – synthesizing post bop and Latin jazz in ways his peers and predecessors have hinted at, but never fully realized as well as he has.

Mining a rich vein somewhere between avant-garde jazz and minimalist classical music, Battle Trance creates pieces full of vivid textures and hidden details.

Inspired by the way the social commentary in Mingus’ music reflects ongoing societal aches and pains, Philion directs a mini-big band, frontloaded with saxophones, trumpets and trombones, on a set of eight Mingus classics and deep cuts.

Oddly never quite as celebrated as his inspirations and peers, drummer Al Foster nonetheless became a key rhythmic collaborator for a dream list of bandleaders.

This fortieth anniversary edition is the first time Chronic Town has appeared en toto on shiny compact disk. Go figure.

Face à Face unites Phillips with Hungarian electronicist György Kurtág jr., son of the eponymous composer, for a series of improvised duets.

In the sweepstakes for longest time between albums, bassist Neil Swainson finally follows up his 1987 debut 49th Parallel with this year’s Fire in the West.

Sweden’s Mammoth Volume made a trio of quirky, prog-infused stoner rock records in the late nineties and early ‘aughts, earning itself critic’s darling status in a field not normally known for that label.

Casting a wide net, Keezer brings a swath of influences – hard bop, fusion, postbop, third stream – to his music.

Ultimately what this session comes down to is pure fun – these guys clearly enjoy their musical interaction, playing everything with a relaxed intensity.

Grammy-winning trumpeter and composer Brian Lynch continues his Songbook series with Vol. 2: Dance the Way U Want To, a reclamation of his back catalog through remakes and reinvention.

Singer, songwriter and all-round music impresario Tim Bowness operates in a fairly unique artistic area.

Drummer Billy Drummond has long been a rhythm keeper’s rhythm keeper, the demand for which might explain why he hasn’t headlined a recording since 1996.

The solo guitar extravaganza Electric Git Box draws on songs from throughout his career, from his 1976 debut Clarity, Circle, Triangle, Square to 2019’s WHENUFINDITUWILLKNOW.

Led since their 2014 inception by guitarist/vocalist Matt Dudzik, these guys probably can’t cross the street without sneering at oncoming traffic, but they know from hooks.

Boston singer/songwriter Abbie Barrett likes good, catchy songs and guitars. In what style those things come together depends entirely on what the tune demands – even if that’s several things at once.

With In Tense, his second album as a leader, Raghavan has staked a claim as one of modern jazz’s most interesting composers and bandleaders.

How many times have we seen a person in their twilight years, still doing it, whatever it is, and making us think, “Man, I hope I still have that much fire at their age.” Well, folks, please welcome Sheila Jordan to the stage.

San Antonio’s long-running Krayolas didn’t attract the power pop tastemakers back when the genre flourished in the eighties, never seeming to break out of their region until thirty-odd years later.

The next generation of Orange Country rock.

Thirty-six years on from his last LP, Foster, re-signed to Blue Note, issues his (very) long awaited ninth album Reboot.

Over four decades into their existence, veteran jazz fusion combo Yellowjackets deserves to release a track called “Resilience.”

Despite first impressions from the band’s name, Philadelphia duo Grassy Sound does not play bluegrass.

The band’s second album since returning from the dead in 2017, Transmissions From Mothership Earth doesn’t rework the formula as much as reiterate that it still functions properly.

Enlisting master guitarist Ben Monder and ex-Yellowjackets bassist Jimmy Haslip as co-producer, the New Orleans-born/New York-based Despommier takes a trip through the catalog of Swedish composer Lars Gullin, whose work he encountered in Italy in 2005.

For her first solo album, AACM member Armstrong presents The Antidote Suite, a soundtrack to the Black Index art exhibit at the University of California Irvine (where Armstrong also happens to be a PhD candidate).

Norwegian drummer Gard Nilssen, sideperson to Macej Obara and Mathias Eick and leader of Acoustic Unity and the Supersonic Orchestra, follows in the footsteps of a legacy – specifically that of late Norse drum legend Jon Christensen.

Rising from the ashes of the much-missed Astra, who released a pair of psychedelic proto-prog albums in the early 2010s, Birth, well, pretty much picks up where Astra left off on its first full-length album Born.

A mainstay of the Canadian rock scene, singer/songwriter/guitarist Ian Blurton led Tornonto’s beloved and influential postpunk/alt.rock act Change of Heart, before shifting to more straightforward hard rock with C’Mon.

Galvanized by his return to San Francisco after a decade in NYC and named after the word for the smell of earth after rain, Petrichor blends Redier’s influences – jazz, classical, stride – into a seamless whole.

British power trio Josiah was a reliable stoner/hard rock force in the early 2000s without ever really hitting stardom, even in that world.

Bassist Brian Bromberg boasts a career going back over four decades, starting as low-ender for saxophonist Stan Getz and going on to a long career in smooth jazz, fusion and straightahead jazz.

Putting aside his own work, Mesmerism finds Sorey alongside his friends Aaron Diehl on piano and Matt Brewer on bass for an engaging spelunk in the Great American Songbook.

On its third LP Turf Ascension, Bubblemath makes no bones about its preferred musical methods, opening with “Surface Tension,” a seventeen-minute epic of shifting time signatures, speculative fictive lyrics and, most importantly, ear-catching melodies.

For its second LP Brown Leather, New York City’s rollicking Sweet Things have undergone some alterations.

During the pandemic the clarinetist developed a new artistic vision, centered on blowing his horn while manipulating electronics live, and it’s that aesthetic he documents here.

Having shifted from the iconoclastic rock & roll of their early/mid-seventies work to a slicker, adult-oriented (and commercially viable) new wave pop, Roxy Music had set aside many of their quirks and most of its adventurousness to become a group of working professionals, rather than a gang of rock radicals.

It sounds like hype, but it’s the truth: there’s no one like Steve Tibbetts.

Given the reputations of Knuffke’s cohorts here, one might expect free jazz cacophony. And while there are plenty of spontaneous compositions here, everyone here keys in on the presence of melody, making even the more rollicking free improvisations accessible to the unacclimated.

On World Construct, his umpteenth album in a career so prolific there’s no point counting, the jazz giant is in top form with his latest trio.

Composer Todd Marcus has two things that immediately set him apart: he’s one of the very few bandleaders to focus on the bass clarinet as his main instrument, and he draws on his Egyptian American heritage for textures not usually found in the jazz idiom.

The brainchild of the late drummer and Corrosion of Conformity co-founder Reed Mullin and HR guitarist Jason Browning, Righteous Fool added Mullin’s erstwhile COC bandmate Mike Dean on bass during the stoner punk icons’ hiatus, and Righteous Fool was born.

Unless you were a dedicated reader of the British music press circa 1991-1993, you’ve probably never heard of Fabulous.

A mere eighteen years old, pianist Joey Alexander already has five albums, three Grammy nominations and performances for two presidents on his resumé. Origin earns a special place in his discography, however.

Is Ramon a thoughtful, intricate study of queer relationships in twenty-first century culture, or is it just an excellent pop record? The answer, unsurprisingly, is both.

An outgrowth of the lauded National Youth Orchestra of the United States of America, NYO Jazz is, obviously, the organization’s jazz outreach arm, recruiting hardworking and prodigious 16-19 year olds to keep the flame of one of America’s greatest contributions to culture burning.

Drummer Keith Hall has a diverse resumé: Betty Carter, Sir Roland Hanna, Kenny Wheeler, Janis Siegel, New York Voices, TRI-FI and several years with singer/saxophonist Curtis Stigers.

The second in a planned seven-volume series dedicated to Eastman’s compositions, particularly those not performed in his lifetime, Julius Eastman, Vol. 2: Boy Joy showcases the earmarks of the composer’s style.

Though music eventually overtook his interest in superheroics, his childhood infatuation remains a creative inspiration.

Void Patrol combines the talents of saxophonist Colin Stetson, guitarist/electronicist Elliott Sharp and Medeski Martin & Wood drummer Billy Martin, at the behest of Alarm Will Sound percussionist Payton MacDonald.

The Berklee-trained musician blends his two disciplines – jazz and classical – into a series of musical poems paying tribute to Odesa’s landmarks and historical occurrences alike.

Grasso continues his journey through pre-hard bop jazz with Be-Bop!, concentrating on the work of Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker.

Four albums in, Roxy Music was about to enter its most commercially successful phase – but with a twist.

Though more for completists than casual Baker fans, Live in Paris is a worthy addition to the Baker catalog.

Singer/songwriter Tom Baker knows how to make loud, roots-informed, bar band rock & roll tunes that catch your ear, nod your head and, when you’re not looking, tear up your eye.

Anyone even slightly familiar with jazz knows that Charles Mingus was a genius.

When Watertown first came out in 1970, Frank Sinatra fans didn’t know what to make of it – which, in retrospect, seems odd.

Though German composer, musician and sound designer J. Peter Schwalm and Swiss guitarist, composer and Sonar bandleader Stephan Thelen are well known for their consistent journeys into the outer limits, somehow the pair have not collaborated until now.

Considering the embarrassment of riches that was the Minneapolis alternative rock scene in the eighties and nineties, it was inevitable that some cool acts would get lost in the shuffle. Enter the Clams.

As Pond Life, his seventh album as a leader, proves, when given his head he’s very much a notable creative force.

A master carpenter with a master’s in poetry, singer/songwriter Thomas Dollbaum does indeed keep one foot in the real world and the other in the ephemeral on his debut Wellwood.

A beloved icon at home, South African jazz pianist Nduduzo Makhathini made a big splash outside of his country last year with Modes of Communication: Letters From the Underworlds. He follows it up with the even stronger In the Spirit of Ntu, a record that’s one of the best blends of jazz and African music this side of Randy Weston.

Rumbling out of Albuquerque, New Mexico, stoner rockers Blue Heron makes a strong impression on their debut LP Ephemeral.

The songs on Nuna encompass a State of the Piano recital.

For his fourth album #CubanAmerican, Miami pianist Martin Bejerano continues his quest to infuse his father’s Cuban heritage with North American jazz.

For his latest album Bluesthetic, trombonist/composer Steve Davis recruits a gang of old friends, many of whom he’s been playing with for decades.

In the jazz world, it’s not unusual for players of a certain caliber and renown to assemble for supersessions. Minus the hype it would bring in the rock and pop worlds, these kinds of sessions can often be relaxed affairs featuring old and new friends, united by love of the music and mutual respect.

Roxy Music’s groundbreaking first two albums would be hard to follow up by anyone, let alone the band that created them.

Outside of some fusion groups, there aren’t that many jazz artists that use the studio and its gear as an instrument. On Assembly, his seventh album, trombonist Jacob Garchik and his band of trusty sidekicks aim to change that.

Born in Tel Aviv, reborn through the sonic mantra of Indian ragas, and born again in New York City, saxophonist Oded Tzur explores the cosmopolitan nature of spiritual jazz on his fourth album Isabela.

A veteran of ensembles led by trombonist Steve Davis, trumpeter Jeremy Pelt and saxophonists Julieta Eugenio and JD Allen, drummer Jonathan Barber also leads his own band, Vision Ahead.

Drummer and composer Chase Elodia spent the pandemic reading books on media theory, which lead to his debut album Portrait Imperfect.

Armed with eight players, a widescreen compositional vision and a propensity toward musical freedom, Toronto ensemble Eucalyptus gets busy the moment “Infinity Bananas,” the first track on the band’s sixth album Moves, begins its spin.

Church made Darling Please alone in his basement following the death of his beloved brother and bandmate Mike, a terrible occurrence that drenches the songs in bruised emotion, whether or not they directly address the situation.

All covers albums should be this good.

Joined by guitarist/producer Lee Meadvin, bassist Nick Dunston, pianist Paul Cornish and drummer Connor Parks, Vandever unfolds her pieces at a deliberate pace, never jumping straight in, but never letting lanquidity take over.

Though he’s been recording albums under his own name since 1978 (and as a sideman since 1974), guitarist John Scofield, astonishingly, has never recorded an album of unaccompanied guitar.

The loosely linked quintet of songs explore space, as indicated by the title, but it’s not just the cosmic variety.

Something Here Inside is a warm love letter to the Great American Songbook.

Faced with only the loosest of structures, the musicians used their improvisatory skills and deep understanding of their partnership to create songs that ebb and flow like water over the ocean bed, seemingly shifting at random, but in reality following an internal logic.

Presented in Resonance’s usual sterling packages, with extensively researched booklets in each, both Morning Glory and Inner Spirit are musts for any Bill Evans fan.

One of the many journeyman supergroups populating the arena rock circuit in the 1970s, Detective never quite found the success it deserved.

Cellist Erik Friedlander has been out front of the vanguard of his instrument’s potential for decades.

One of the finest records released so far in 2022, Post- is a collaboration between two stalwarts of twenty-first century contemporary classical music: pianist David Friend and composer Jerome Begin.

Pianist Eri Yamamoto, bassist William Parker, drummer Steve Hirsh and woodwindist Chad Fowler congregated to cut loose and see what happened, and what happened was remarkable.

Named in tribute to late trumpeter Kenny Wheeler (after a Wheeler tune from the album Angel Song), Kind Folk has grown into a formidable force.

Unsurprisingly, Riches to Rags sounds a lot like mid-eighties Replacements, with melodic songs, bar band energy, Leonard’s whiskey-toned rasp and Stinson’s distinctive hard pop flash guitar.

We can’t say for sure how multi-instrumentalist, composer and bandleader Michael Leonhardt felt when his fifteen-year-old dachshund Normyn passed away. But on his latest album The Normyn Suites, he’s trying to tell us.

Recorded in 1972 and in the vaults until now, the two-disk Live at Room at the Top features Adams at the titular Edmonton club backed by the Tommy Banks Trio, with Banks on piano, Bobby Cairns on bass and Tom Doran on drums.

Since the arrival of the Beatles and the Kinks sixty years ago, the UK seems just stuffed to the shores with guitar-led pop bands with a batch of cool tunes. Add Stourbridge’s Amoeba Teen to the list.

The half-dozen songs on Any Information, the band’s fourth release, celebrate classic rock power and subvert it with a sensibility that avoids machismo.

Part of the diverse and electrifying twenty-first century London jazz scene, drummer/composer Jas Kayser makes her leader debut with Jas 5ive.

Marvin Gaye’s What’s Going On is pretty much unassailable.

Singleton doesn’t walk the fine line between post bop and free jazz – he gleefully, gracefully dances atop it.

It’s easy to wonder why 50 Foot Wave needs to exist, since two-thirds of the band (singer/guitarist Kristen Hersh and bassist Bernard Georges) also comprise two-thirds of alternative rock pioneers Throwing Muses.

With Balance, Berlin saxophonist Fabian Willmann inaugurates not only his career as a leader, but also brand new Swiss label Clap Your Hands.

Familiar Places, the fourth album by Danish piano trio Little North, could be used as a model for a certain strain of jazz.

Born in Louisiana but based in in Brooklyn, singer/songwriter Zachary Cale blends rural and urban on his seventh album Skywriting.

The beginning of 2022 brings not one, but two new projects, each with two very different quartets.

For the Love of Fire and Water, the latest album from the rightly acclaimed pianist/composer Myra Melford, makes a statement on two fronts.

Over the past two decades, Norwegian jazz pianist Tord Gustavsen and his trio have quietly become some of ECM’s biggest stars on the Scandinavian side.

While his two studio albums to date haven’t broken any new ground in the turbocharged fusion sweepstakes, they have celebrated the pure joy of ripping it up on one’s instruments and keeping the good vibes going as aggressively as possible.

With a sensibility informed by horror flicks and Satanism, especially the variety of both found in the underground pop culture of the seventies, leader/drummer Tas Danazoglou leads his band of devilish brigands through a set of songs so scuzzy they irrevocably stain any rag that tries to clean them.

We’ll admit it: it seems kind of ridiculous to review Roxy Music at this point.

Commissioned by the City of Gent and the Handelsbeurs Theater to pay tribute to Jan van Eyck’s Ghent Altarpiece, the song cycle draws deeply from an overtly spiritual library, including the Latin Mass, the poetry of Christine de Pisan and, yes, one of the Psalms.

Gerald Clayton’s last album for Blue Note was the joyous concert record Happening: Live at the Village Vanguard, which served as a clearing of the decks. That means it’s time for a Major Artistic Statement, which the pianist/composer delivers with Bells of Sand.

The first album from the Hellacopters in fourteen years kicks off with exactly the kind of bang you’d want from this reunited Swedish action rock institution.

Her twenty-fifth record Life is Beautiful continues down the path on which she’s most comfortable: melodic hard bop and third stream compositions performed masterfully with her stalwart rhythm section.

Not just a compilation and collaboration featuring an international cast of musicians interpreting the black jazz tradition, Black Lives: From Generation to Generation is also a statement about racism, its continuing prevalence and impact on twenty-first century Earth, and what to do to combat it.

Starting from a place of classical piano, the duo add electronics courtesy of Begin’s sound library for a set of songs that honor the traditional and the contemporary.

Return From the Stars spotlights an exceptionally strong set of Turner originals played by a remarkable band.

Veteran pianist Jean-Michel Pilc regularly takes the stage with no setlist or plan and delivers a captivating set of jazz improvisation, and Alive: Live at Diése Onzé, Montréal is no exception.

Bassist Michael Bisio prefers to ride the edge when he makes music, sometimes taking it like a bucking bronco and sometimes coaxing it into minding his vision.

The Panamanian native creates his own international jazz ensemble the Global Messengers, pulling players from the Berklee Global Jazz Institute for the cosmopolitan statement Crisálida.

Perhaps the vibraphonist of the moment, Joel Ross sublimates his oft-stunning technique on his instrument on his third album The Parable of the Poet in favor of emphasizing his skills as composer and bandleader.

Decades of varied adventures come together on Eubanks Evans Experience, the debut album by the duo of guitarist Kevin Eubanks and pianist Orrin Evans.

Scribing another chapter in the book Garage Rock Will Never Die, Velvet Starlings gets with it on debut LP Technicolour Shakedown.

Inspired in particular by native composers Milton Nascimento and Toninho Horta, Keberle and his new band Collectiv do Brasil lean into the country’s penchant for refined euphony.

Quickly following up last year’s understated gem Serenade to Highland Park, guitarist Doug MacDonald expands his lineup for Overtones.

One of the most interesting and fruitful ongoing projects in jazz, the In Common series from saxophonist Walter Smith III and guitarist Matthew Stevens brings together a new set of players for every album.

Spurred on, like so many others, by the lack of live activity during the pandemic, the Australian legends got down to business writing and recording new songs for their first album in a dozen years.

With Allhallowride, arch Londers the Monochrome Set enter their fifth decade of recording, and no worse for wear from the passage of time.

We Weren’t Here, the band’s sixth LP, serves as an unofficial twentieth anniversary disk, and it’s more than worthy of any extra attention that accolade might bring.

Nar, the fourth album from jazz singer Christiane Karam, means “fire” in Arabic – a title directly related the 2020 bombing of Beirut native Christiane Karam’s home city.

The pandemic affected everyone – there’s no question about that (though plenty of denial). For artists, though, that pain often turned into beauty.

Spontaneous composition is a challenge to any jazz player, but it’s an especially difficult proposition when the musicians aren’t a working band.

Recorded in the first summer of lockdown, Screen Time finds guitarist/songwriter Thurston Moore in a contemplative mood.

Led by guitarist John Leon (formerly of Roky Erickson’s ‘aughts backing band and Austin psych rockers Summer Wardrobe) and drummer Lyle Hysen (late of Das Damen and NYC hardcore legends Misguided), the Royal Arctic Institute functions as sort of a Northeastern counterpoint to California’s desert soundscapers Scenic.

Would it be too much of a cliché to say that pianist Andrew Boudreau brings the Northeastern territories of North America to life on Neon, his leader debut?

Last year, music fans of a certain taste (and, let’s be honest, age) were thrilled to note the resurrection of Independent Project Records, the label founded by Savage Republic and Scenic leader Bruce Lichter.

Trumpeter and composer Avishai Cohen makes some of the most enigmatic, beautiful and downright interesting music in modern jazz.

Born in Madrid but centered in New York City, pianist Marta Sanchez keeps a limb in both locations on her sixth album SAAM.

While Jackson’s penchant for straightforward melodic expression works well within the standards, he really shines on his own compositions.

On his latest album Ethereal Kings, Swiss-born and Chicago-based jazzer Samuel Mösching is a one-man fusion machine.

Danish composer Anders Koppel taps into the immigrant story with Mulberry Street Symphony, an impressive work performed by his son, alto saxophonist Benjamin Koppel, accompanied by bassist Scott Colley, drummer Brian Blade and the Odense Symphony Orchestra.

With a name and album title like these, you’d probably expect some sort of extreme metal or thrashcore. Led by bassist and composer Moppa Elliott, MOPDTK is instead a New York jazz band of long standing.

Las Vegas quarter Shanda & the Howlers grab a gallon of early-60s Motown and another of 50s rock & roll for a walking, rocking time capsule on third album It Ain’t Easy.

The Individual Beings embodies the idea of a student taking what he’s learned from a master, applying it to his own notions, and coming out with a distinctive and characteristic statement.

Though best known for his work with the quirky jazz trio The Bad Plus, pianist Ethan Iverson is, at heart, a traditionalist.

Since 2004, musician/mechanical engineer Tristan Shone, AKA Author & Punisher, has worked steadily to reclaim the original definition of industrial music, composing and performing his songs on homemade creations he calls “drone machines” and “dub machines.”

After a couple of records exploring his instrumental diversity, British keyboardist Kit Downes pares down to the classic piano trio format for Vermillion.

Though he has an impressive sideperson CV (Miles Davis, John Coltrane, Freddie Hubbard, McCoy Tyner, not to mention a bucketful of R&B dates), saxophonist Azar Lawrence also has records as a leader going back to 1974’s spiritual jazz classic Bridge Into the New Age.

Though he was free of the cancer he’d been fighting for years by that point, Fish knew he was nearing the end as he finished his twelfth studio album, and made sure he left a hell of a legacy behind.

The album asks the question: how do we find peace when we’re under constant bombardment?

Following a brief reunion around Omnivore’s reissue of the band’s 1985 debut Town + Country and lead vocalist Jimmer Podrasky’s musical reactivation after twenty-odd years, a new album from the Rave-Ups was inevitable.

After gigging and recording as a sideperson for the last five years or so, young pianist Mathis Picard makes his full-length solo debut with Live at the Museum.

Having gotten his introduction out of the way with 2020’s Omega, the usual explosion of talent a hotly tipped young musician is obligated to display on a debut record, alto saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins returns with its follow-up, The 7th Hand.

Like his former boss Sun Ra, who pushed jazz to its outer limits but always made time for the old-school Fletcher Henderson arrangements he loved, Mitchell swings wide here, as comfortable with squealing free jazz as with swinging bebop.

The group’s well-traveled but effective blend of shimmering jangle, wide-eyed psychedelia and dreamy grunge favors sound over subject, which makes it the perfect music from which listeners can extract their own context.

Parisien presents a program of sturdy compositions given vibrant life on his latest album Louise.

Tenor Time transports you to a late night set at your favorite jazz club.

There’s free improvisation, and then there’s Cecil Taylor.

Slap Bang Blue Rendezvous may be almost ninety minutes long, twice as long as some wags think it should be, but the length works in the band’s favor, as they’re not a bummer in the bunch.

Guitarist Oz Noy is best known for bluesy fusion records. For Riverside, however, he’s teamed up with his pals Ugonna Okegwo (bass) and Ray Marchica (drums) for a set of standards.

Veteran heavy hitters bring all of their talents to bear on Ode to O, their second album together at the OGJB Quartet.

As a supplement to last year’s American debut Ten Easy Pieces, Laj plucked tracks from previous recordings to compile RetroSpectacle.

Capturing a 2018 performance opening for Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds at the titular fest, Live at Montreux Jazz Festival presents Anna von Hausswolff at her most enthralling.

As with all of Matthews’ other work, Ever Since Ever Since, the trio’s second LP, swims confidently in the 70s end of the power pop pool, happily indulging in the sweet melodies/tough attack modus operandi .

For Hex, Madrid instrumental rock quartet Toundra decided to go big, rather than go home.

With a keen sense of melody and ambition to write about subjects beyond cars, girls and rock & roll, Santander, Spain’s Pulsebeats are on their way to that milestone.

Breath By Breath, his latest, is inspired by two things: his personal meditation practice and his emergence from lockdown.

A collaboration between freefloating funk ensemble Scary Pockets and keyboardist Larry Goldings, Scary Goldings lays the groove down hard on the combo’s fourth collaboration in four years.

The German saxophonist, singer and composer has been best known for her jazz work up until now, but here the notion of a singular style of music gets obliterated.

Once the wünderkind of organ trio jazz, multi-instrumentalist Joey DeFrancesco is now a veteran of more than three decades on the scene.

It’s difficult these days for bands to craft this kind of heaviosity, of which there are oceans, with any real distinction. But Blue Heron does it on the first try.

Trombonist Phil Ranelin isn’t a name that springs to the lips when talking about classic horn players, despite a career going back to the early seventies, playing with everyone from Freddie Hubbard to Wayne Kramer, and leading several bands, the most famous of which is the long-running Tribe.

Consisting mostly of standards, plus a couple of originals, the record sways and swings old school, paying tribute to influential pickers like Jim Hall and Joe Pass as much as to the Los Angeles area after which it’s named.

Essentially a meditation on the evolution of civilization, this set of tunes melds traditional European classical forms with noisier, dissonant sounds suggesting the whiplash energy of twenty-first century urban life.

Singer/songwriter John Magee has been knocking around the Boston music scene since the early nineties and the first single by his band Sugarburn. But for the past couple of decades he’s been the engine running Scrimshanders, a late period alt.country band that recalls the best of the genre.

Alto saxophonist Adam Nolan likes his music fresh – so fresh, in fact, that he prefers free improvisation to pre-planned composition.

Parisian ensemble Ghost Rhythms opens its sixth album with a sound you don’t usually hear on one of its records: a human voice.

Recorded in 1967 and just now discovered and issued, Ave B Free Jam captures a group of musicians mostly at the very beginning of their careers.

True to the title, Mabern takes on the catalog of iconic saxophonist and composer John Coltrane, backed by saxists Vincent Herring and Eric Alexander, trombonist Steve Davis, bassist John Webber and drummer Joe Farnsworth.

As it slides towards it forty-fifth anniversary, ROVA (AKA the ROVA Saxophone Quartet) shows no signs of easing up, let alone slowing down, on latest album The Circumference of Reason.

Though based in Dallas, Texas, the hearts of the members of Brasuka live in Brazil.

For its third album since its 2013 reunion (and sixth overall), L.A. trio Failure modifies its approach while retaining its strengths.

Clearly inspired by prenaturally skilled popsters like Harry Nilsson, Brian Wilson and, most obviously Emitt Rhodes, whose “Promises I’ve Made” closes the record, Gabbard centers his songs around piano, vocal harmonies, and an eager sense of cautious optimism.

An unprecedented collaboration between major jazz labels, Relief aims to raise money for struggling musicians by collecting new and previously unreleased tracks from several well-known jazz artists.

Joined as headliner by his poet/dancer spouse Patricia Nicholson, Parker enters an explicitly political arena here – unsurprisingly for artists of color.

As far as Handsome Jack is concerned, the music of the twenty-first century doesn’t matter.

It’s the Canadian ace’s concerts that still produce awed whispers amongst his followers, and A Time For Love: The Oscar Peterson Quartet Live in Helsinki, 1987 documents a great one.

Longtime readers of this magazine/website will recognize the name Jeff Elbel, as he has written his fair share of pieces for The Big Takeover. But he’s also an accomplished singer/songwriter, as evidenced by his eighth album The Threefinger Opera.

Organized by Antietam leader Tara Key, His Majesty’s Request began as a benefit album to raise money for Wink O’Bannon’s treatment. But the guitarist died before the project could be completed, and now it exists in support of two music-related Louisville charities.

As musician, composer, bandleader, artistic director of the Newport Jazz Festival and host of NPR’s Jazz Night in America, bassist Christian McBride is practically the face of contemporary jazz.

The Black Watch’s bounty of quality songs continues with Here & There, the L.A. band’s fourth release in the past two years.

The group’s second album Apophenian Bliss picks up right where the first one left off: with a blaze of bristling (baritone) guitar noise, spaced-out keyboard storms, bluesy bass thud and kit-punishing drum athletics.

Saxophonist Ivo Perelman has long had a special relationship with the piano. He expands on that concept with Brass and Ivory Tales, a nine-disk box set of improvisations with nine different pianists that took the saxist seven years to complete.