Freddie's Dead
Jan/01/2009 *
tribute
* permalinkage
'Taps'
for Freddie Hubbard
By WILL FRIEDWALD of the Wall Street Journal
In the 70 years that he was with us, Freddie Hubbard, who died on Dec. 29, was known primarily for one thing: playing the trumpet harder, faster and with more pure chops than virtually anyone else who ever picked up the horn. Hubbard was regaled as the most prolific, the most prodigious, the most celebrated, and probably the longest-lasting trumpet king of what came to be known as the hard bop era, performing a style of jazz that has exerted a disproportionately large influence on the young jazzmen of the Marsalis generation and beyond.
Yet over the course of his productive career, the iron-lipped Mr. Hubbard did a great many things brilliantly: He was working with avant-garde musicians (John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy) almost from the beginning, and later made a pile for himself in the burgeoning field of jazz-rock fusion; he could play ballads with exquisite, heart-breaking tenderness; as a composer, he had an extraordinary track record of tunes that were widely played (and even sung) by other musicians. He did a lot of things but still remained known for playing hard-bop or soul-jazz style trumpet better than almost anybody.
(Visit Radio Free Fundi for a podcast-tribute of Hubbard and his most memorable moments in the studio and on stage; link below to continue reading.)click here to read more...
By WILL FRIEDWALD of the Wall Street Journal
In the 70 years that he was with us, Freddie Hubbard, who died on Dec. 29, was known primarily for one thing: playing the trumpet harder, faster and with more pure chops than virtually anyone else who ever picked up the horn. Hubbard was regaled as the most prolific, the most prodigious, the most celebrated, and probably the longest-lasting trumpet king of what came to be known as the hard bop era, performing a style of jazz that has exerted a disproportionately large influence on the young jazzmen of the Marsalis generation and beyond.
Yet over the course of his productive career, the iron-lipped Mr. Hubbard did a great many things brilliantly: He was working with avant-garde musicians (John Coltrane, Ornette Coleman, Eric Dolphy) almost from the beginning, and later made a pile for himself in the burgeoning field of jazz-rock fusion; he could play ballads with exquisite, heart-breaking tenderness; as a composer, he had an extraordinary track record of tunes that were widely played (and even sung) by other musicians. He did a lot of things but still remained known for playing hard-bop or soul-jazz style trumpet better than almost anybody.
(Visit Radio Free Fundi for a podcast-tribute of Hubbard and his most memorable moments in the studio and on stage; link below to continue reading.)click here to read more...
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Looking back...
Dec/12/2008 *
music
reviews *
permalinkage
Favorite Jams of
2008
as selected in an alley by members of the SBWS
DJ Fundi
Top 10 Tier
Fleet Foxes "Sun King" + self-titled
Al Green "Lay It Down"
Gnarls Barkley "The Odd Couple"
Stephen Malkmus "Real Emotional Trash"
Erykah Badu "New Amerykah"
Cat Power "Jukebox"
Flying Lotus "Los Angeles"
Girl Talk "Feed the Animals"
Bon Iver "For Emma, Forever Ago"
Q-Tip "The Renaissance"
Second 10 Tier
DJ/rupture "Uproot"
"The Very Best" mixtape by Esau Mwamwaya & Radioclit (available for free download at http://www.myspace.com/theverybestmyspace.)
The Roots "Rising Down"
Jamie Lidell "Jim"
Dusk + Blackdown "Margins Music"
The B-52's "Funplex"
Bob Dylan "Tell Tale Signs" (B-sides, outtakes, rarities, etc.)
Toumani Diabate "The Mande Variations"
Neil Young "Sugar Mountain : Live at Canterbury House 1968"
Quantic "Flowering Inferno"
Honorable mentions: Orchestra Baobab, Santogold, Amadou & Mariam, Nina Simone boxset
Best concert experiences of 09: Bassnectar in B'ham, Fleet Foxes at WWU, Horning's Hideout bluegrass festival in OR, John Scofield in Vancouver
Biggest disappointments: Beck, My Morning Jacket, Thievery Corporation & Michael Franti
Click here to listen to a Rhapsody playlist based on the SBWS Favorite Songs of 2008 lists.
More lists after the jump...
click here to read more...
as selected in an alley by members of the SBWS
Robin Pecknold of the Fleet Foxes at WWU.
DJ Fundi
Top 10 Tier
Fleet Foxes "Sun King" + self-titled
Al Green "Lay It Down"
Gnarls Barkley "The Odd Couple"
Stephen Malkmus "Real Emotional Trash"
Erykah Badu "New Amerykah"
Cat Power "Jukebox"
Flying Lotus "Los Angeles"
Girl Talk "Feed the Animals"
Bon Iver "For Emma, Forever Ago"
Q-Tip "The Renaissance"
Second 10 Tier
DJ/rupture "Uproot"
"The Very Best" mixtape by Esau Mwamwaya & Radioclit (available for free download at http://www.myspace.com/theverybestmyspace.)
The Roots "Rising Down"
Jamie Lidell "Jim"
Dusk + Blackdown "Margins Music"
The B-52's "Funplex"
Bob Dylan "Tell Tale Signs" (B-sides, outtakes, rarities, etc.)
Toumani Diabate "The Mande Variations"
Neil Young "Sugar Mountain : Live at Canterbury House 1968"
Quantic "Flowering Inferno"
Honorable mentions: Orchestra Baobab, Santogold, Amadou & Mariam, Nina Simone boxset
Best concert experiences of 09: Bassnectar in B'ham, Fleet Foxes at WWU, Horning's Hideout bluegrass festival in OR, John Scofield in Vancouver
Biggest disappointments: Beck, My Morning Jacket, Thievery Corporation & Michael Franti
Click here to listen to a Rhapsody playlist based on the SBWS Favorite Songs of 2008 lists.
More lists after the jump...
click here to read more...
Flying Lotus
Dec/12/2008 *
music
reviews *
permalinkage
Steven Ellison is a tall, soft-spoken twenty-five-year-old who works under the name Flying Lotus. As part of a peer network, with outposts in Los Angeles, Montreal, and Glasgow, Ellison is helping to lead a small group of producers toward a new strain of hip-hop. He has been signed to the highly regarded London-based label Warp, which made a name in the nineties by releasing esoteric electronic recordings by Autechre and Aphex Twin. Ellison and his contemporaries have come up with a fusion of the extreme detail allowed by software programming (fractal spidering of sounds, a backdrop of crackles, and prickling, feverish rhythms no human hands could play) and the bedrock thump of hip-hop, the grounding beat that has bled into almost all pop music in the world. Ellison’s Flying Lotus releases this year—an album titled “Los Angeles” and a series of EPs—are a good index of how one branch of hip-hop is going to move into the next decade, detaching itself from traditional hip-hop rhyming and forming new splinter genres.
To listen to Flying Lotus' "Essential Mix" for BBC Radio One, visit Radio Free Fundi.
To listen to Flying Lotus' remix of Radiohead's "Reckoner, click right here.
click here to read more...
more Foxes...
Oct/10/2008 *
permalinkage
Due to popular
demand from Podcast Cafe listeners who are loving
the Fleet Foxes as much as I am, I dug
out a BBC Radio 2 show featuring the Foxes in the
studio, playing a few tunes and being interviewed.
As a bonus, I added on two unreleased studio tracks
to the end of the podcast. You can download or
stream it over at the
Live Archive.
Also, a dude who was at the sold-out Bellingham show last weekend contacted me to say he too was at the show, sitting in the front row, videotaping portions of the concert. The main difference is he got great footage. Check it out:
click here to read more...
Also, a dude who was at the sold-out Bellingham show last weekend contacted me to say he too was at the show, sitting in the front row, videotaping portions of the concert. The main difference is he got great footage. Check it out:
click here to read more...
Fleet Fox Mania!!
Oct/10/2008 *
music
reviews *
permalinkage
I've been listening to both Fleet Foxes albums a ton over the past 2 months or so -- especially am fond of the debut EP "Sun Giant," and on that release, I am insatiably hooked on the tunes "Mykonos" and "Innocent Son." I liked this band plenty-- their comforting sound, unique songwriting, creative instrumentation and especially the CSNY-esque vocal harmonies -- but after seeing them live last night here in Bellingham....well, now it is serious. Freekin' A: they sounded good -- strong, clear, rousing, and the power of their harmonies sung live, with the full bellows of their lungs, was almost startling. The venue they played in -- the Performing Arts Center on the campus of Western Washington University -- was designed for the ultimate sound -- it is often used for classical and other acoustic performances. The Foxes filled the whole space -- which was packed to the rafters with mostly students, but folks of all ages too -- with a warm, reverberating sound that I could literally feel resonating in my chest. Because I went to the show solo, I was able to score a seat in the front row center, so was on the front lines of their performance.
They talked quite a bit between songs -- conversations with old friends they knew in the audience, gently poking fun at the Society for Creative Anachronisms (Dungeons & Dragons, but in real life), Bruce Springsteen and college kids -- and mentioned several times they felt uncomfortable playing a college auditorium, as opposed to a club, with the crowd invisible to them because of the lighting.
"I wonder if, like, you're all a college class studying us, and everybody knows it but us," a Fox wondered. From then on, the crowd shouted "A+!" or "extra credit!" when they played a particularly good song or told a good joke.
Another thread of conversation through the performance was the lead singer, who was donning a too-small, uncomfortable-looking red jacket, talking about a wardrobe malfunction. "I'm wearing this red jacket because I lost all of my other clothes," he sighed. Later he wondered aloud, "How did I lose all my clothes?"
Anyways, you can download or stream a live Fleet Foxes concert from this past summer over at the Live Archive (thanks NPR!) I have video of them performing the excellent song "Mykonos" in Bellingham posted at YouTube and a few photos over at Flickr.
The sound on this video is pretty shoddy -- the music was loud, I was in the front row, my camera is cheap -- but the vocal harmonies at minutes 2:00 and 3:25 sound rather marvelous.
This one here features lead singer Robin Pecknold singing s song solo and unplugged. Only problem was that my memory card filled up about halfway through the song! Obviously, my pirating skills need some work -- AAAAaaaaaarrrrrrRRRrrr!
Even more videos and stuff after the jump...
click here to read more...
Little Superstar vs. Herbie Hancock
Oct/10/2008 *
whatever
* permalinkage