The Audiozine

Enjoy:

1) Flying Lotus pretty much kills it again live, this time with a band featuring Ravi Coltrane and a few others. The version of Mmmhmm, in particular, lends such a nice new looseness and space to the original without sacrificing the basic mood of the electronic version. I used to think Flying Lotus was a little bit of a Dilla knock-off, a talented flash in the pan -- boy was I wrong.

2) Jason Moran + The Bandwagon = one of the absolute best working groups in music today. I've seen them live twice now. The first time, they relied heavily and intriguingly on a variety of loops and samples around which they'd improvise -- so Adrian Piper talking about art, or the scuffling/skidding sounds of shoes on a basketball court in Lithuania, etc would become points of departure for soulful yet rigorous improvised flights. The second show was rooted much more in the interplay b/w Moran and his bandmates; less flashy and technical, arguably less "visionary", but probably a bit more human and relatable. NPR recorded an excellent set by this group at the Village Vanguard (exactly one night after I saw them), and I can't recommend it strongly enough.

3) Missed this Tyshawn Sorey/Steve Lehman/Todd Neufeld triple threat but am glad to at least have heard this skronky monster by Evan Parker/Derek Bailey/Han Bennink -- recommended by Sorey himself in advance of the aforementioned gig.

4) Bonus: DC peeps, take note.

Yay, a largely positive album review on an influential site that ostensibly should be reaching forward-thinking listeners though at times seems to be a forum for lowbrows pretending to be highbrows while struggling to maintain middlebrow humility! Anyway, thanks Joe Tangari for pushing these sounds, judging by the personnel involved I'm guessing that this is a killer set.

Riposte #1 -- taking Pitchfork to task for both undercoverage and underhyping good stuff.

and

Riposte #2 -- taking old fogeys in the jazz community to task for thinking that young listeners in the internet age (i.e. yrs truly) can't engage a close listen from time to time. I'd actually argue that jazz (and plenty of other music across the rock/experimental/electronic/dance/etc spectra) give us a respite from the constant onslaught of online media; at the same time, those online media give us unprecedented access to deep listening from way further under the radar than print/broadcast media used to afford. Win+Win = WinWin.

How did this happen in the first place? [studio]

How is it actually happening at all? [live]

Tyshawn Sorey (on drums) is just killing it the entire time. And how neat are these harmonies?