Monthly Archives: December 2018

As the second decade of the 21st century inches toward its close, jazz has proven extremely durable as a multifaceted genre. It’s safe to say there’s too much sweet action for one set of ears to absorb, but don’t let Telepatia Liquida get sidelined amongst the riches. It’s the second record by multi-horn man Daniel Carter, clarinetist Patrick Holmes, pianist Matthew Putman, bassist Hilliard Greene, and drummer Federico Ughi, and it offers an avant-free stew with considerable bite that’s deepened with threads of lyricism and moments of substantial beauty. Recorded live a year ago at the Forward Festival in Brooklyn, NY, it’s out December 7 on vinyl, compact disc, and digital through 577 Records.

As is normal in jazz, Daniel Carter has recorded a ton, though it took a while for the tape spools to really get spinning. On the NYC scene since the ’70s, his work on bassist William Parker’s 1980 LP Through Acceptance of the Mystery Peace seems pivotal, as both Carter and Parker, along with trumpeter Roy Campbell and drummer Rashid Bakr, later formed the free improv-based Other Dimensions in Music. Reportedly coming together in the early ‘80s, they didn’t get a record out until 1990 via Silkheart.

It was deeper into the ’90s that things really started to break open for Carter. A big part of the equation was Test, a unit conceived to play outdoors (as in the NYC subway system) that could spray the free scorch like a flamethrower. Along with contributing to records by Matthew Shipp, Zusaan Kali Fasteau, Saturnalia String Trio, DJ Logic, and more with William Parker (including Other Dimensions in Music’s collab with Yo La Tengo), he was also part of Tenor Rising Drums Expanding and the One World Ensemble.

Shortly after the Italian-born drummer Federico Ughi arrived in NYC from London, he and Carter established a sturdy relationship. Having formed 577 Records in 2001, Ughi has released roughly three dozen records since, with over a third featuring the drummer in some union with Carter. That includes The Gowanus Recordings, a quartet session from ’09 (recently reissued on vinyl) where Ughi and Carter are joined by trumpeter Demian Richardson, bassist Dave Moss, and pianist Matthew Putman.

Read More »

VIA PRESS RELEASE | In 2017, members of the creative community announced 7-inches for Planned Parenthood, a curated series of 7-inch vinyl records released as a box set and digital downloads to benefit Planned Parenthood. Musicians, artists, poets, and others took time to contribute to the project, raising awareness of the essential health care Planned Parenthood provides to patients every day, all across the country.

Today, the collective kicks off Vol. 2 – Pt. 1 with a new split single, the A-Side being the previously unreleased song “All I Want” by The National’s Matt Berninger and Stephan Altman featuring Julien Baker. The song made its live premiere this past Friday when Berninger and Altman joined Baker at her sold out boy genius show at LA’s The Wiltern. The release also features Hanif Abdurraqib performing his poem “Defiance, Ohio is the Name Of A Band” as a B-Side. The single’s artwork, titled “Crimson sun, blue heart” is provided by Emma Kohlmann, and created in watercolor and sumi ink. The single will be available for purchase and streaming on December 14th. Stay tuned for more announcements on both the digital and physical version of Volume 2. Visit 7inchesforplannedparenthood.com for more information and to pick up a copy of Volume 1.

On the next phase of the project, Matt Berninger said, “7-inches for Planned Parenthood is essentially an independently run record label devoted entirely to protecting sexual and reproductive rights. Thanks to the huge community of people who helped launch Volume 1, we are very excited to launch Volume 2.”

Read More »

VIA PRESS RELEASE | A selection of Coltrane’s 1963 Impulse! recordings, derived from the original albums Both Directions at Once: The Lost Album, John Coltrane and Johnny Hartman, Dear Old Stockholm, Newport ’63 and Live at Birdland.

In the brief, bright arc that is the career of John Coltrane, 1963 marks a point of transition between past jazz masterpieces and future work, which would transcend the boundaries of the music itself. That year’s recorded output shows movement in many directions: a look back at the past, continued examination of a familiar repertoire, exploration of more traditional formats and a look forward at compositions and approaches that would further extend the reach of jazz.

This set includes Impulse! recordings from 1963 including the recently released Both Directions At Once: The Lost Album, which was recorded by Coltrane’s Classic Quartet on March 6, 1963. The following day, they recorded standards with singer Johnny Hartmann, which was released that year and was a great commercial success for Coltrane. Other recordings come from Live at Newport ’63 and works from Dear Old Stockholm that were recorded in 1963. Also included are recordings from Live at Birdland.

“When I was 7 years-old, I was the only one in my family who listened to vinyl. My mom had held onto about 50 of her favorite records from the ’60s and ’70s and they’d sat on a bookshelf, unplayed, for the duration of my short life thus far. I didn’t even know what the things were, mentally lumping them in with my parents’ outsized collection of cookbooks and Time Life volumes on arcane subjects outside of my childhood universe.”

“That is, until the day my Mom brought home a second-hand record player. She’d bought it on a whim, thinking it’d be fun to give her old records a spin. I watched in rapt attention as she taught me how to pull the vinyl out of its sleeve without scratching it and how to place the needle gently at the edge of the spinning black disc. A scratchy silence burst from her old Pioneer speakers and a new world opened up to me.

Over the following days and weeks, I worked my way through my Mom’s collection, one record at a time: J.S. Bach’s Goldberg Variations, Guantanamera by The Sandpipers, albums by The Kingston Trio, Peter, Paul and Mary, the Limeliters, Glenn Yarbrough, (so much Glenn Yarbrough…). My Mom’s tastes leaned heavily toward the early ’60s folk ensembles. I’d put each record on and then explore the album jacket inside and out, reading every word of the liner notes, transported by the beat poet language and tales from recording studios decades earlier. Sitting cross-legged on the living room carpet, eyes lost in the cover art on my lap, voices from other times sang from the Pioneer speakers and pulled me into imaginary realms of my own making.

After dipping into all of the albums in my Mom’s collection, I found a handful of favorites that I would return to in the months and years to come. Among these, one record stood above all others in my esteem; one record I played over and over with loving obsession: Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band by The Beatles.

Read More »

It’s been four years since Toronto-based singer-songwriter Doug Paisley last released a record. In terms of quality, Starter Home, which is out now through Paisley’s longtime label No Quarter, picks up without a hitch where the man left off, courtesy of a sound that’s substantially country in nature, although sharpness of playing and depth of lyrical content place it head-and-shoulders above the vast majority of the form’s contemporary practitioners. While assuredly part of a long tradition, the familiarity of Paisley’s approach reliably sidesteps worn-out tropes, and if concise, his latest delivers a powerful statement (and please note a purchasing option that offers a bonus 45). It’s great to have him back.

With Starter Home’s opening title track, Doug Paisley wastes no time navigating through a narrative peppered with tough emotional truths. The song concerns home-buying and family life, and more specifically, the hopes and satisfaction, followed by the disappointments and disillusionments, that can occur with the passage of time.

Instrumentally and vocally, it’s pretty much dead solid perfect in how it captures a strain of country music primed at the very least for sturdy popularity if not widespread appeal. Enhancing Paisley’s fluid guitar and vocal warmth, there’s Michael Eckart’s pedal steel and later in the tune, John Sheard’s piano. However, it’s the content of the words that makes it clear how this new batch of tunes is destined to delight a smaller audience.

It’s not just in how the he describes a noisy motorcyclist as an asshole, therefore firmly nixing the radio play he wouldn’t have received anyway. No, it relates directly to how “Starter Home” is the exact opposite of “go down to the honky-tonk” escapism, dealing instead with the cold hard facts of existence and in a manner that steadfastly avoids the clichés that can hinder realism as a musical tactic.

Read More »

Sure, the best and most badass song on Soundgarden’s 1989 LP Louder Than Love (“Hands All Over”) sounds like it was borrowed from The Cult who in turn borrowed it from Led Zeppelin, but who hasn’t fallen in love with a copy of a copy at least once in their life? When these Seattle longhairs appeared on the scene I was convinced they had to signify SOMETHING besides what goes around comes around again, and they do—none of their grunge compatriots did half as good a job at melding Led Zep with pure battering ram noise to create a din that sacrifices such niceties as melody and catchy riffs in favor of sheer sonic bluster.

When push comes to shove Louder Than Love is more than happy to push and shove your ears around, and if it’s a good old-fashioned eardrum pummeling you’re looking for you could certainly do worse. Q magazine named it one of the 50 Heaviest Albums of All Time for good reason. Barbaric riffs of the Jimmy Page variety abound, which is great, but Jimmy Page hooks don’t, which isn’t a good thing at all. Most of these songs just don’t stick with you the way Led Zeppelin songs do, with the remarkable “Hands All Over”—which is perhaps the best Zeppelin rip ever—being the exception. Okay, so the riff that propels “Uncovered” is sticking with me, but that’s because it might as well be a Led Zeppelin riff—put it under the microscope and you’re bound to discover Jimmy Page’s DNA.

Soundgarden’s classic rock influences extend beyond Jimmy Page, Robert Plant, and Company. “Gun” is Black Sabbath heavy, while “Power Trip” reminds me—if nobody else—of the molten psychedelic sludge that Robin Trower was dishing out in the mid-seventies. As for “Loud Love” it sounds like a band whose name is on the tip of my tongue—Mississippi? Lesbian Boy? The Bee Gees? What is obvious from listening to Louder Than Love is that Chris Cornell, Kim Thayil, Matt Cameron, and Hiro Yamamoto spent their formative years sitting around smoking pot and listening to songs that should have been on the Dazed and Confused soundtrack.

Read More »

VIA PRESS RELEASE | Ten interlocking love stories, one big (mostly) happy ending…

Love Actually is one of the best romantic comedies of the last two decades, capturing, in poignant, bittersweet fashion, all of the complexity of modern love. One reason why Richard Curtis’ 2003 film succeeded with critics and audiences alike (and still plays on cable and even in theaters all the time) was its incredible cast: Hugh Grant, Emma Thompson, Keira Knightley, Colin Firth, Liam Neeson, Laura Linney, Billy Bob Thornton, Andrew Lincoln, Rowan Atkinson…the list goes on.

But another very important reason was its score; as Curtis writes in the personal note we’ve included in the package, “Without its music, Love Actually wouldn’t work at all. I know—because I saw the film without the music, and it’s a shocker.” Indeed, the high wattage star power of the actors in Love Actually is matched by its musical artists: The Beach Boys, Maroon 5, Kelly Clarkson, Norah Jones, Dido, Eva Cassidy, Joni Mitchell, The Pointer Sisters, and more (plus a bonus Christmas-themed track from Otis Redding)!

For its maiden release on vinyl, we’ve created a new, gatefold jacket and pressed up 1,000 copies in white vinyl.

The state of California produced a compelling batch of ‘70s punk treasures, and high in their number is the work of the Avengers. A key component in San Francisco’s initial wave, by 1979 they were done, with the majority of the band’s releases surfacing post-breakup. Avengers first appeared in ’83, subsequently drifting in and out of availability while undergoing assorted CD expansions; the core LP is the group’s essential document and by extension is a mandatory acquisition for punk collectors.

The definitive lineup of the Avengers, specifically Jimmy Wilsey on bass (replacing Jonathan Postal), Danny Furious on drums, Greg Ingraham on guitar, and Penelope Houston on vocals, only issued one EP while extant, though they were still quite busy during their relatively brief reign and impressively so given the lack of hospitable venues for the new music. The payoff for the Avengers’ tenacity was a warm-up slot at The Sex Pistols’ last show, sandwiched between the Nuns and the headlining spectacle, the event taking place at San Fran’s Winterland Ballroom in January of ’78. Reportedly besting the Pistols (the recorded evidence bears this out), the opportunity seemed to cultivate disillusionment in the band, especially in Furious, though it was Ingraham who quit a year later, his spot filled by Brad Kent (of D.O.A., Pointed Sticks, Subhumans etc). The Avengers dissolved in June of ’79, a few months prior to the arrival of their sophomore 12-inch.

Avengers, or The Pink Album as it’s sometimes referred, corrals both EPs with added material of the same vintage to succinctly detail their enduring worthiness. Opening with the debut for Dangerhouse, the LP immediately makes the strongest possible case for the four-piece as one of the finest US punk acts of the pre-HC era. For many the mantra of punk perseveres as “young loud and snotty,” but it’s those delivering the ingredients with a heaviness spawned from relentless determination (a.k.a. practice) that sit at the head of the class; beginning with exquisite guitar clamor, “We Are the One” brings heft, velocity, and an uncompromising vocal presence to the convulsions of ‘77’s rock revolution.

Read More »

The Golden Age of American Noise Rock (which this historian situates between the late 1980s and early 1990s) was a grand time to be a pervert. Bands like Cows, Killdozer, Halo of Flies, and the Melvins were spreading clamor, ugliness, and moral depravity across the land, and if you were like me you were as happy as a pig in shit.

Austin, Texas’ The Jesus Lizard were celebrated (and critically acclaimed) mainstays on the noise rock circuit, and they personified all of the best (worst?) aspects of the genre. Outré and outright revolting subject matter? Check. A relentlessly pounding sound designed to make mush of your cerebral cortex? Check. Deranged live performances featuring a psychotic lead singer? Check.

That said, The Jesus Lizard were never my favorites; indeed, I never had much use for ‘em at all. No, I was a Cows and Killdozer guy. The bugle-playing and unhinged live antics of Shannon Selberg set Cows high above the noise rock throng, while Michael Gerald’s demented (and highly literate) storytelling and Mouse Who Roared vocals, which were set atop a deep rototiller groove, made Killdozer the blackly hilarious piece of heavy machinery ever to steamroll human ears.

But The Jesus Lizard have their charms, and they’re on full display on 1991’s Goat. Produced by the ubiquitous Steve Albini, Goat is loud, pummeling, and chockfull of sordid lyrical content that is guaranteed to leave you feeling slightly queasy. Case in point: the run amok “Lady Shoes,” on which David Yow channels unholy voices while telling a simply horrifying tale involving a masturbating daddy, a homicidal maternity ward nurse, and a doctor who takes a shit in his own hand and then applies it as lipstick. It’s a real crack-up.

Read More »