Anthony Branker doesn’t even play an instrument here; he’s the composer and director of these nine pieces performed by Ralph Bowen/ts-ss, Pete McCann/g, Fabian Almazan/p, Linda Oh/b and Rudy Royston/dr. The liberating part of this concept is that no musician…
Month: October 2016
A PAIR OF SIXES…Blue Dog: Dogbrain, Marcos Pin: Broken Artist
Here are a couple of guitarists that should get your interest. The band Blue Dog is lead by guitarist-synther Jay Ward, and along with Tommy Mandel/B3 he brings guest vocalists, bassists and trumpet players along for an intimate ep. You…
THE LAST OF A KIND…Bobby Rush: Porcupine Meat
There used to be something called “The Chittlin’ Circuit.” It was a tour of various mid-lower class towns that liked the music basic, bluesy and a bit on the rough side. Guys like Bobby Rush made a living on those…
Steve Raybine: Cool Vibes
Uptempo grooves and R&B horns are the rule of the day for vibist Steve Raybine’s album. He teams up with all star bassist Steve Gomez along with Nate Van Fleet/dr, Jeff Scheffler/g, Doyle Tipler/g and a horn section of Tipler/tp,…
ART CLASS FOR MUSICIANS…Michael Mlatkovich: Mortality, Myrnofant’s Kiss
Here’s some free form music from trombonist Michael Vlatkovich… Michael Vlatkovich brings his trombone to team up with the unique mix of David Mott’s baritone sax, Jonathan Golove’s electric cello and Christopher Garcia’s drums for eight free thinking originals. The…
Bossacucanova: The Best Of Bossacucanova
The team of Marcelinho Dalua, Alexandre Moreira and Marcio Menescal mix together electronic programmings, keyboards, bass and vocals to bring classic bossa nova to modern sensibilities. Vocalists such as Cris Delanno, Roberto Mescal and Wilson Simoninha have rich sounds and…
Sara Serpa & Andre’ Matos: All the Dreams
Here’s an intimate meeting between vocalist/keyboardist Sara Serpa and guitar-bassist Andre’ Matos. Together, they deliver soft pastels of sound through voice and instrument. Serpa’s singing ranges between wordless tender floating cirrus clouds as on “Calma” with some extra textures of…
Si Cranstoun: Old School
This album by Si Cranston is a true guilty pleasure. As the title suggests, the album takes you back to the days of early rock, R&B and rockabilly, when the common denominator between all three was that thing called “swing.”…
OLDIE BUT A GOODIE…Peter Case: Peter Case
30 years ago, Peter Case released his first solo album, with the production of T-Bone Burnett and contributions from the likes of Roger McGuinn, Rusty Anderson, Jim Keltner, Jerry Marotta/dr, Van Dyke Parks and Mike Campbell. The album got him…
EASY PICKINGS…Al Caiola and Don Arnone: Mr. “Guitar” and Mr. “Y”, Al Caiola: High Strung/Cleopatra
Once upon a time, in a galaxy far far away, people actually played the guitar to create soft and seductive moods, and not just to show off how loudly or quickly they could thrash the strings. Here are two albums…