First released in 1969, after guitarist Jimmy Dawkins had served a long apprenticeship as a sideman in the Chicago electric blues scene, Fast Fingers remains one of the finest pure electric blues albums of its era. Dawkins proves to be a solid songwriter and an able singer, although the best moments on the album invariably come when he tears off a casually perfect, deeply soulful, but never showy electric solo. Highlights include the stomping instrumental "Triple Trebles," featuring an outstanding Dawkins solo over a funky horn-driven rhythm, and the mellow, laid-back opener, "It Serves Me Right to Suffer."

Holly Herndon operates at the nexus of technological evolution and musical euphoria. Holly’s third full-length album 'PROTO' isn’t about A.I., but much of it was created in collaboration with her own A.I. ‘baby’, Spawn.
For the album, she assembled a contemporary ensemble of vocalists, developers, guest contributors (Jenna Sutela, Jlin, Lily Anna Haynes, Martine Syms) and an inhuman intelligence housed in a DIY souped-up gaming PC to create a record that encompasses live vocal processing and timeless folk singing, and places an emphasis on alien song craft and new forms of communion…

In 1973, Argentinean saxophonist Gato Barbieri contemplated a move to a more commercially viable, accessible sound, one that appealed to both North and South American audiences. He moved from the jazz vanguard toward it's exotic center (and finally into the commercial world altogether) with a number of records, including this one, which explored the various rhythms, melodies, and textures of Afro-Cuban and Latin American sounds. Bolivia features Barbieri immediately prior to his Impulse recordings that resulted in the celebrated four-chapter Latin America series.

Not An Exit is a 2019 album by Truth Club. This comes courtesy of the fine folks at Tiny Engines.

While it's true that the first chapter in Gato Barbieri's musical life – at least on records – had been that of an explorer, from his vanguard outings on ESP with Don Cherry and Dollar Brand to his showcasing the music of his native Latin America on Impulse, Fania, and Flying Dutchman as it intersected with modern jazz, it is the third chapter that concerns this release. Barbieri became deeply interested in commercial music and its possibilities for Latin jazz and the funk and salsa scenes in the early and mid-'70s.

Trece años de jazz y 12 "Joan Chamorro presenta…”, en este caso a Carla Motis, que entró a formar parte de la Sant Andreu Jazz Band en el 2008, con 11 años, y que ha sido la única guitarrista que ha formado parte de la banda. A modo de Freddie Green en la bigband de Count Basie, Carla Motis, discretamente, durante todos estos años, ha dado un sonido especial a la sección rítmica. Su tiempo, cada día que pasaba, era más sólido, sus "compings” apoyaban a los solistas que iban emergiendo y ella se mantenía en un segundo plano, pero con una gran aportación rítmica y harmónica.

Timeless, Florian Pellissier Quintet journey through jazz from Paris to New York. A rule of the game is to find the flavor of New Yorkers groups from the 60′s to mix with European musicians of the time. Organic, inspired, it would take ten years of concerts and two albums to reach the goal: “Biches Bleues” promises to be a gateway album, a hidden passageway between eras, a scientific miracle. A sax, trumpet, piano, bass and drums, no artifice, a simple sound, acoustics and especially Pierre Dachery, the sound engineer magical ears.

12-track covers album from the former Smiths' frontman. Covers by the likes of Carly Simon, Joni Mitchell and Roy Orbison are included. He also enlisted several special guest performers, including Billie Joe Armstrong (Green Day), Ed Droste (Grizzly Bear), Ariel Engle (Broken Social Scene) and Sameer Gadhia (Young the Giant).

As in years past, all of our top ten CDs received a 10/10 rating from both the English and French-language sites (and from anyone else with the taste and discernment to agree with us). A few words about our choices: 2009 was a "Haydn Year," and we have two selections of particular merit: Zhu Xiao Mei's marvelous disc of piano sonatas on Mirare, and the Auryn Quartet's Op. 17 string quartets for Tacet. This set deserves special mention, as the complete cycle is shaping up to be far and away the finest yet recorded. If you thought that the great Haydn quartets started with Op. 20, then you must hear this release.

Recorded at a 1980 concert in Munich, Urban Bushmen not only provides an excellent summation of the Art Ensemble of Chicago's work since 1966, but also substantiates the group's reputation for putting on intense and inspired shows. The album centers around three extended pieces: reed player Joseph Jarmen's "Theme for SCO," the group's "Urban Magic," and reed player Roscoe Mitchell's "Uncle." Over the course of these multi-part "suites," the group effectively blurs the lines between jazz and free jazz, deftly working through New Orleans' marches, turbulent hard bop, highlife/reggae rhythms, and minimalist sound sculptures; while Jarmen, Mitchell, and trumpeter Lester Bowie come up with consistently varied and surprising solo/tandem contributions.

Born on November 13, 1973 in Philadelphia, Ari Hoenig, was exposed at an early age to a variety of musical experiences. His father is a conductor and classical singer, his mother a violinist and pianist. Accordingly, at 4 years of age, Ari began studying the violin and piano. He began playing drums at age twelve, and by age fourteen he was honing his skills with other young jazz musicians at Philly clubs such as Ortlieb’s JazzHaus.

The Swiss heavy metal veterans EMERALD present their 8th studio album “Restless Souls”. It is an evolutionary continuation of the last release “Reckoning Day” from 2017 and showcases the band as a stable unit in its best form ever. The boys and girl remain true to their signature sound and offer once again a wide variety of styles on the album: There are groovy metal anthems like “Freakshow”, fast speed/thrash songs like “Digital Slavery”, “The Wicked Force” and “Heaven Falls Down”, epic melodic metal pieces like “Cad Goddeu”, “Valley Of Death”, “My Final Stand” and “Restless Soul”, a beautiful power ballad (“Set Me Free”), a swivel towards hard rock (“Superhero”) and a nod to Iron Maiden (“Son Of Sam”). Lyrically, the album is very diverse as well: The topics range from fantasy and horror, politics and history to social criticism. Since the whole line-up of EMERALD was involved in the songwriting process right from the start, as opposed to the previous album, the songs on “Restless Souls” have a more compact, elaborated feel to them. The production was once more handled by legendary Swiss producer V.O. Pulver who manages to combine the warm sound of 80’s metal with the power of modern production standards.

Hausegger’s compositions encompass a great many vocal works including songs, two operas, the symphonic poems Barbarossa and Wieland der Schmied, and his main work, the massive Nature Symphony. Composed in 1911 for full orchestra the work includes a chorus set to text by Goethe.

Mutations is not only Vijay Iyer's debut album for ECM, but also the first recording he's issued since winning a MacArthur Foundation "genius" grant in the fall of 2013. As a recording, it is certainly among his most provocative. There are no traces of his Hindustani or Carnatic jazz explorations, his athletic post-bop or modal works, or even his explosive readings of modern pop. This is a showcase for Iyer the composer. Even the set opener, a solo piano reading of "Spellbound and Sacrosanct, Cowrie Shells and the Shimmering Sea," which appeared on Memorophilia–his 1995 debut–showcases its harmonic subtleties and formal construction over improvisation – though it's certainly there. The album's title is actually a ten-part suite for piano, string quartet, and electronics originally composed and premiered in 2005; it has been evolving ever since.

Verve/A&M's reissue of Chet Baker's 1977 album You Can't Go Home Again features the trumpeter/vocalist supported by an all-star band that includes guitarist John Scofield, tenor saxophonist Michael Brecker, and alto saxophonist Paul Desmond in his final recording session. Former Miles Davis sidemen Tony Williams and Ron Carter also add an organic touch to the proceedings and a warm contrast to the electric pianos and Moogs that flow through Don Sebesky's arrangements. Alternate takes of the title track and others including "I'm Getting Sentimental Over You/You've Changed," "The Best Thing for You," and "If You Could See Me Now" make this double-disc set a more complete look at one of Baker's most important latter-day albums.