Jazz in Elsewhere
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Lyn Stanley: London Calling; A Toast to Julie London (CD Baby)
29 Mar 2019 | 2 min read
Julie London – who died in 2000 age 74 – was what Hollywood folks used to call “a looker”. And she was. She went from elevator operator to the silver screen on the basis of her striking beauty and how much the cameras – still and movie – loved her. She wasn't much of an actress however (she was in the excellent film-noir The Fat Man of '51 with Rock... > Read more
Go Slow/Nice Girls
Chucho Valdes: Jazz Bata 2 (Mack Avenue/Southbound)
27 Mar 2019 | <1 min read
This great Cuban pianist turned 77 last year and could reflect on a remarkable career in which he was acclaimed internationally, has won Grammys and founded the enormously successful Irakere band. And on this outing with an acoustic quartet featuring the vocals and bata drums of Dreiser Durruthy Bombale he takes his distinctive, frequently percussive and jigsaw-puzzle playing to music which... > Read more
El Gulje
Daniel Herskedal: Voyage (Edition/digital outlets)
22 Mar 2019 | 1 min read
Jazz tuba is not rare but certainly uncommon: among the great players are Bob Stewart who played on a dozen or so albums with Arthur Blythe; Howard Johnson for whom tuba is among his artillery and who has appeared on albums by just about everyone from Mingus and Dexter Gordon to the Band and Lennon; and British session man Herbie Flowers. Daniel Herskedal is Norway's most pre-eminent... > Read more
Batten Down the Hatches
Jan Preston: Play It Again Jan (janpreston.com)
3 Mar 2019 | 1 min read
Greymouth-raised singer/pianist and composer Jan Preston may have been classically trained but her career in New Zealand saw her best known as a member of the innovative Red Mole Cabaret theatre troupe, Midge Marsden's Country Flyers band and in Coup D'Etat alongside then-former Hello Sailor member Harry Lyon. Her repertoire expanded from soundtracks and classical into boogie, jazz and... > Read more
Lazy Boogie
Mark de Clive-Lowe: Heritage (RopeADope/digital outlets)
18 Feb 2019 | <1 min read
Expat New Zealand pianist/composer Mark de Clive-Lowe here explores his Japanese/European heritage in music which peels off from the hip-hop-influenced jazz he made his name with in New Zealand. On Heritage, while still using contemporary electronics, sits at the keyboard with his group – recorded live in the Blue Whale club in Los Angles and in a North Hollywood studio – for... > Read more
Niten-Ichi
ONE WE MISSED: Onyx Collective: Lower East Suite; Part Three (Big Dad)
21 Jan 2019 | 1 min read
This muscular trio (with guests) first came to Elsewhere's attention only late last year on the belated jazz tribute to Sgt Pepper where they delivered a usefully different treatment of Harrison's Within You Without You which connected to the more experimental end of American jazz. As the title here tells you, we come to this suite – which appeared in the middle of last year –... > Read more
2AM at Veselka
Various Artists: A Day in the Life, Impressions of Pepper (Impulse!)
17 Dec 2018 | 1 min read
Jazz musicians are renown for their sense of time, although – if this album is any measure – perhaps not for their timing. Arriving fully 18 months after the 50th anniversary of the Beatles' Sgt. Pepper's – and coinciding with the exceptional remaster/reissue of their follow-up The Beatles (aka The White Album) and the Christmas rush – this stellar interpretation of... > Read more
Good Morning Good Morning (Shabaka and the Ancestors)
ONE WE MISSED: Charlie Haden and Brad Mehldau; Long Ago and Far Away (Impulse!)
16 Dec 2018 | <1 min read | 1
Recorded live in 2007 at a church in Mannheim, this recording only became available late this year – four years after bassist Charlie Haden's death at 76. Haden and pianist Brad Mehldau – thirtysomething years Haden's junior – had enjoyed a comfortable friendship, and a performance and recording association. That ease in each other's company is evident in their supportive... > Read more
My Old Flame
Manins/Samsom/Benebig/Lockett: Shuffle (Rattle)
10 Dec 2018 | 2 min read
First a word about the cover, and in fact all the Rattle covers. Right from their first releases the cover art and presentation of albums on Auckland's Rattle label – which cover classical, jazz, taonga puoro and more – have been classy affairs: engaging artwork and design, useful liner notes and, after a few releases, the gatefold hardback format. Their few forays... > Read more
Hungry Pig Shuffle
JOHN COLTRANE: RESURRECTED, RE-DISCOVERED, REISSUED. AGAIN (2018): Some new favourite things once more
26 Nov 2018 | 5 min read
It is interesting – and perhaps disappointingly instructive – to note that the two jazz album this year which have gained the widest attention have been of music from over 40 years ago by artists who have been dead for decades. Yet neither the John Coltrane album Both Directions at Once: The Lost Album of previously unheard recordings from '63 – not originally conceived of... > Read more
Your Lady
Christian Sands: Facing Dragons (Mack Avenue/Southbound)
25 Nov 2018 | 1 min read
Those who read the band names on albums by Gregory Porter and Christian McBride will recognise the keyboard player's name on this. Christian Sands is not on McBride's latest album New Jawn (also on Mack Avenue) but probably that's because he was away recording this follow-up to his Reach debut of last year with a flexible line-up of players around of his trio (bassist Yasushi Nakamura and... > Read more
Samba de Vela
Unwind: Orange (Rattle, CD+DVD)
22 Nov 2018 | <1 min read
The Unwind trio are bassist/educator Paul Dyne, pianist/writer Norman Meehan and saxophonist/international citizen Hayden Chisholm. That is quite an accumulation of jazz talent and, recorded at Orange Studios in Christchurch, these 10 pieces frequently attest to the ethos that less can be so much more. The three Meehan-penned openers for example are measured 2am ballads which are a very... > Read more
Miracle
CHARLES MINGUS RE-DISCOVERED, AGAIN (2018): The black saint of jazz past, and in the present
19 Nov 2018 | 3 min read
As with pop and rock, jazz artists go in and out favour with audiences. At Elsewhere we've essayed the case of Charles Lloyd and Dave Brubeck for example. Some certainly remain fixed in the firmament: John Coltrane and Charlie Parker for example. Others – Miles Davis perhaps the most obvious example – people pick and choose the period they prefer. Some like Sun Ra, Ornette... > Read more
Cecile McLorin Salvant: The Window (Mack Avenue/Southbound)
23 Oct 2018 | 1 min read
One of the finest, most entertaining, deeply moving and musically interesting concerts of jazz (and elsewhere) was by Cecile McLorin Salvant at the Auckland Town Hall in March, which we reviewed here. As you may see, this remarkable and award-winning singer (French mother, Haitian father, raised in Miami) has a wonderful musical reach from deep old blues and chanson to swinging jazz, show... > Read more
Wild is Love
Kamaal Williams:The Return (Black Focus/Border)
22 Oct 2018 | 1 min read
The title on this debut solo album by London keyboard player/composer Kamaal Williams probably refers to the sudden disbanding of the duo Yussef Kamaal (with drummer Yussef Dayes) and his wish to quickly pick up the remit of soulful and funky jazz with one ear on the fusion era and astral-inclined instrumentals and the other on the energy of hip-hop (as brought into play here by the exceptional... > Read more
LDN Shuffle
John Scofield: Combo 66 (digital outlets)
7 Oct 2018 | 1 min read
It must be strange to one day be a hot young guitarist and then a mere four decades on from your debut wake up and find yourself age 66. John Scofield (just “Sco” to everyone it seems) has filled in those decades with some exceptional work and played alongside many of the greats (Miles Davis, Joe Lovano, Charlie Haden among dozens) and recorded for Enja, Gramavision, Blue Note,... > Read more
I'm Sleeping In
Yellowjackets: Raising Our Voice (Mack Avenue/Southbound)
1 Oct 2018 | <1 min read
LA's Yellowjackets have been making a kind of fusion jazz – sometimes erring towards MOR jazz-lite, less frequently to a more soul/r'n'b sound – for well over 30 years and have witnessed a large number of players passing through the ranks. In fact only keyboard player Russell Ferrante has gone the full distance. The current quartet edition also features Luciana Souza on... > Read more
Strange Time
Antipodes: Good Winter (Rattle)
28 Sep 2018 | 1 min read
The name of this sophisticated, snappy and keenly intelligent jazz ensemble refers to the fact its members are from separate hemispheres; New Zealand and Australia, and Europe. Worlds apart geographically but music transcends such distance and their clever arrangements for the sextet of rhythm section, guitar, piano, sax and trumpet pull towards a centre in post-bop, sometimes swinging... > Read more
Deep Thought
Johnson/Dreyer/Lockett: Any Last Requests (digital outlets)
24 Sep 2018 | 1 min read
Well, you have to be a very seasoned and confident trio to play in New York City and let the audience request material from the Great American Songbook . . . because that ain't no Fake Book but a wide and deep well of standards numbering in excess of 100. Expat drummer Mark Lockett (who has subsequently returned home) is part of this trio – with US bassist Jakob Dreyer and saxophonist... > Read more
Wojtek Mazolewski Quartet: Polka, Deluxe Edition (Whirlwind/Southbound)
16 Aug 2018 | 1 min read
Some clarification in anticipation of an immediate turn-off. This is not an album of polka music. Perhaps the heavily tattooed hands of young Polish bassist and bandleader Mazolewski might have alerted you to that anyway. Or the mohawk sported by pianist Joanna Duda on the inner sleeve. Also this is a slightly expanded reissue of an edgy but approachable jazz album which was first... > Read more