Things we like: Matthew Shipp, Carnage Asada

In a month full of free floating anxiety over political churn, now leavened with hope, it's been good to have Matthew Shipp's The Data to live with. A double CD of solo piano improvisations and a capstone to Shipp's body of work for the French label RogueArt, The Data is an impressive late-career statement from a master improvising composer whom I'll confess I still think of as "David S. Ware's piano player," although his career as an artist in his own right now spans five decades. I blame my ignorance on the fact that some of his most productive periods coincided with moments when I was preoccupied with other things. Time, energy, and attention are finite; my loss. So now I'm playing catch-up, aided by my buddy Mike Webber's generous loan of Clifford Allen's thin 2023 study Singularity Codex: Matthew Shipp on RogueArt, published by the label. 

I remember enjoying Allen's scrawl in Signal To Noise (RIP), and in this, his first book, he does a good job of putting Shipp's work for RogueArt in the context of his entire career, starting with the '80s Lower East Side NYC axis that coalesced around Jemeel Moondoc (a name I recall from my NMDS catalogs) and Cecil Taylor, and the artist's interest in spirituality, mysticism, and poetry. (It makes sense that a creative person's work should reflect all of their concerns.) Most valuable are interviews with Shipp's collaborators William Parker, Rob Brown, Whit Dickey, and Joe Morris, as well as Yuko Otomo -- partner of the late poet Steve Dalachinsky, a friend and influence of Shipp's -- label boss Michel Dorbon, and recording engineer Jim Clouse. Then Allen gives a rundown on each of Shipp's RogueArt albums, including the as-yet unreleased Sonic Lust (which finds Shipp and longtime collaborator, tenor saxophonist Ivo Perelman, in a quartet with Mark Helias and Tom Rainey).

Now I'm looking forward to hearing that recording, as well as one that Shipp teased in a recent Facebook post that will add Perelman to the pianist's long-running trio with Michael Bisio and Newman Taylor Baker. There's a lot of Shipp to hear: solo, trio, with Perelman, with his String Trio (William Parker and Mat Maneri), in one-off collabs with icons like Marshall Allen, Roscoe Mitchell, and Nicole Mitchell, among others. Shipp's a towering figure in the jazz piano continuum, still doing world historical work. Dig him now.

Carnage Asada is an L.A. punk band, formed in 1993, that included Dave Travis's electrified cello in their instrumental mix from the get-go, backing George Murillo's gruff-voiced poetics and street life narratives. Hardly your typical punkeroos, but then again, SoCal punk has long had an interface with poetry and jazz, best exemplified by the Minutemen and especially Saccharine Trust (whose guitarist Joe Baiza I saw open for free jazz eminence Peter Brotzmann in 2019). Over the years, Carnage Asada lineups have  included ex-Black Flag frontman-guitarist Dez Cadena, Desert Rock godfather Mario Lalli, and Joe Baiza himself. Intermittently active since the early Aughts, with a couple of unreleased albums in the can, Carnage Asada regrouped for a 25th anniversary blow-out in 2018. 

The band's current lineup teams original members Murillo, Travis, and bassist David O. Jones (who engineered their new album with his son Sebastian Jones) with drummer Steve Reed and ex-Bellrays guitarist Tony Fate. That new full-length, Head on a Platter, their first since 1999's Permanent Trails, contains a dozen tracks of distilled fury that cement the band's legacy and show Murillo to be a perceptive observer of the passing scene -- thankfully recorded and mixed for maximum audibility here, as he roars into his band's maelstrom of sound. The singer says the album's title refers to the normalization of violent images in today's society. The music is suitably hard-edged and rhythmically insistent, with riffs that groove like Stooges-meets-Hawkwind, and touches of psychedelia in the jams that flesh out the stories. 

"Chinese Lady Aluminum Foil," the band's post-pandemic single, conjures a hallucinatory vision of Requiem for a Dream-level psychosis, while its B-side, "Little Fat Princess," makes a convincing argument for not having children that has nothing to do with climate apocalypse. The title track gets a boost from some Latin percussion that propels it forward with a deceptive lightness. "Psychedelic Experiment" describes an encounter with an urban brujo and the resultant psychic journey. "Germs Reborn" tips its hat to the L.A. punk originators, while "Come On Baby" starts out sounding like a Ted Nugent "Stranglehold" burlesque, before morphing into a Beefheartian maze of non-repeating riffs. 

"Norteno" and "Septiembre," both sung in Spanish (with trumpeter Dan Clucas adding mariachi spice to the former), exist at the intersection of Chicano and punk culture -- similar to the one inhabited by Tejano punks Pinata Protest -- while "Two Brothers from East L.A." is a bittersweet recounting of a barrio kid's perilous existence. "Blood of Thorns" takes us all the way to the precipice of despair and back -- if just barely. Murillo sings like he's lived all of these songs, and the music behind him is every bit as gritty and real. No streaming or preorder link so far, but presumably such will appear by the August 23 release date. As my "lapsed" Catholic wife says, "We live in hope because to live in despair would be a sin." Amen.

Denton, 7.17.2024

This has not been a month for writing. The stack of record reviews I intended to write will have to wait, as the whole month, starting the weekend of the 4th, political news has been a series of gut punches and triple combinations. It seems frivolous to be scribbling about music at an historical moment like this one. But, you can't be a gloomy depressive all the time, so last Sunday I toddled up to li'l d to sit on a writer's panel at KUZU-FM's Revolution Record Convention, during which I found a place to divest all of our VHS tapes (Rubber Gloves), and was invited to read at a Recycled Books event on the 25th. I'll be the sacrificial local opener with touring poets Darryl Gussin (Razorcake editor), James Norman, and Walker Rose. How fortunate am I. 

And last night was Molten Plains, and it has been my custom to write a report on each installment of our region's most consistently engaging experimental music showcase, so I am honor bound to do so now, even as a participant-observer. For last night was an Improv Lotto, where 15 musicians were teamed up in ad hoc ensembles and played 10-30 minute sets without preparation. Molten Plains co-curator Ernesto Monteil invited me via Facebook message from Venezuela, where he's visiting family, and I surely could not refuse (although I hadn't played out since Stoogeaphilia folded the tent in 2019 and hadn't done improv since Terry Horn moved to China around the same time). 

At the appointed hour, Ernesto's co-curator Sarah Ruth Alexander, assisted by Aaron Gonzalez, drew names from a hat for a quartet, a duo, and three trios. Then the bands set up, played, and tore down in the sequence they were picked, assisted by sound tech extraordinaire Aubrey Seaton. Due to the unique circumstances, I didn't manage to shoot any photos after the first set, and my buddy Mike Webber obligingly took pics of the one set I couldn't have photographed.

The first set featured Molten Plains veterans Rachel Weaver and Sarah Jay on electronics and treated vocals, Fort Worth guitar eminence Frank Cervantez (Suiciety/Sub Oslo/Wire Nest), and multi-instrumentalist Stefanie Lazcano (Pearl Earl). Weaver and Jay established the hypnotic foundation for the music, Cervantez listened attentively and wove his way in and around their groove and electronic artifacts, and Lazcano was the MVP of the set, switching between wooden flute, fuzz bass, and didgeridoo to provide the terrain features on the soundscape.

The trio that followed was set up on the floor to put them closer to the legless piano that usually resides in the Rubber Room. Princess Haultaine III began the set with a surprising, Cecil Taylor-esque assault that was surprisingly musical. Haultaine's a self-taught and unbridled pianist, but their aggressively energetic performance was also highly expressive. Percussionist Miguel Espinel (Monte Espina, Oil Spill, Bog) is a mainstay of Molten Plains events, and he provided his usual carefully considered statements. The tough job went to guitarist Will Kapinos (Jet Screamer, Dim Locator), fresh from playing a reunion show with the Baptist Generals. How would he integrate his sounds with the non-idiomatic improv? Kapinos took his time, then entered with some sparse dissonance and used a lot of space along with his arsenal of effects to explore some of the same sonic terrain as Randy Hansen in the Apocalypse Now soundtrack and Jeff Beck in his obscure but great soundtrack for the Aussie TV show Frankie's House. When Haultaine and Espinel swapped instruments, things careened into free jazz territory before reaching a satisfying resolution. My favorite set of the night.

Next up was a duo which teamed another pair of Molten Plains vets: cellist Kourtney Newton (Sounds Modern, Bitches Set Traps) and electronic musician Randall Minick (Python Potions). Newton's a virtuoso who uses every part of the cello to generate sounds, melodically and rhythmically, using arco, pizzicato, and percussive attacks. She gives the lie to the trope that classically trained musicians can't improvise. Minick is ever attuned to the requirements of the moment, and modulated his volume to match the acoustic instrument. Gradually, the two developed a spirited dialogue that included deep groove elements and Newton's use of a musical saw. An intriguing example of spontaneous composition in action.

The next trio featured another interesting combination of elements: Polly Pawgette (Bobo, Sybil) on voice, electronics, and electric clarinet, Katie Kidd (Pog) on amplified fuel drum (shades of early Scott Asheton!) and effects, and Austinite Lacey Lewis (Heavy Stars, The Sophies) on vibraphone. Pawgette established the sound bed and occasionally took flight on clarinet, Kidd added a raw industrial edge not often heard in this venue, and Lewis furnished the melodic thread that provided continuity to the others' explorations. 

Now comes the part I've been dreading (not really). I was in the trio that closed the evening, with Molten Plains mainstay Aaron Gonzalez (Akkolyte, Yells At Eels) on standup bass and vocals and Julio A. Sanchez (Heavy Baby Sea Slugs) on guitar. I'd played with Aaron once before, in Kamandi at 6th Street Live in Fort Worth, was it really 18 years ago? -- a gig I remember mainly for the hail of broken drumsticks from Clay Stinnett and Darren Miller, and the animalistic noises a guy standing right in front of the stage was making. On this occasion, Aaron muted his normally extreme extroversion, and (bless him) kept it simple for the rock guys. Julio, having opted for the house Twin rather than the direct box he originally planned to use, came out guns blazing, and I immediately discerned my role in this scenario: be the drummer. (When in doubt, play rhythm guitar!) I also rendered props to days gone by with a little RF interference action using a couple of portable electric fans -- thanks for the idea, T. Horn! -- and did a mini-feedback meltdown a la the li'l Stooge band playing "Little Doll" to end a set. When it was over, Aaron asked, "How long was that?" I said I figured ten minutes. Later, my buddy Mike told me it was about 20. Listen, I have come unstuck in time...

Now, Back to silence back to minus with the purple sky behind us / In these metal ways.

Fort Worth, 6.29.2024

To cap a live music-rich week, we headed to the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth to catch Sounds Modern's Surreal Rhythms: music to celebrate Surrealism and Us. (The exhibition Surrealism and Us: Caribbean and African Diasporic Artists Since 1940 will run through July 28. We'll have to come back on a Friday, when gallery admission is free, to check it out.) Of the eleven musicians performing, it was notable that seven were players we've seen at experimental and improv performances in Denton and Dallas. Inspired by the fusion of European and Afro-Caribbean elements in the exhibition, Sounds Modern director-flautist Elizabeth McNutt chose three pieces that take adventuresome approaches to tonality and rhythm. 

Puerto Rican born Angelica Negron is a recent composer-in-residence with the Dallas Symphony, and her Quimbombo -- named for a stewed okra dish that enslaved Africans brought to Puerto Rico -- is built around a rhythmic pattern from bomba, an African-based dance style. Played by a quartet of Patrick Overturf on percussion, Mia Detwiler on violin, Kourtney Newton on cello, and McNutt on flute, it employs the melodic instruments in a percussive manner, and has the performers use their voices to mimic the vocal gestures of bomba dancers. At times, the effect they achieved reminded me of a percussion-heavy piece from Henry Threadgill's Too Much Sugar for a Dime. Particularly striking was a unison passage by McNutt and Overturf (on vibraphone), which Newton accompanied by beating time on the face of her cello -- something we've also seen her do in improvising contexts.

Next up was A Tres Voces, composed by 2021 Pulitzer Prize winner, Cuban born Tania Leon, and played by a string trio of Detwiler, Newton, and violist Mike Capone. It was thrilling to hear the blended textures of the three bowed strings -- sometimes churning, sometimes singing -- and some virtuosic passages from Detwiler, and to see Newton using her thumb to play some wide-interval double stops 

Julius Eastman's Stay On It is a piece with an interesting history. The composer, a gay Black New Yorker and a familiar of Terry Riley and Frederick Rzewski, once told an audience that its genesis came from a desire to "[bring] the beat into the concert hall," and indeed, Stay On It is propelled by a Cuban son clave rhythm. Eastman's original score -- which, according to a 2015 article by Matthew Mendez, was "piecemeal and highly approximate" -- was lost and had to be reconstructed from a 1973 recording and conversations with musicians who originally performed it. Part of the composer's intent was to draw from the spontaneity of improvising traditions. The work is minimalist, but not mechanical. 

Sounds Modern's version is based on analysis of the original recording and a video of a live performance, as well as Cornelius Dufallo and Chris MacIntyre's reconstructed score, and Mendez's article -- an admirable feat of musical archaeology. At the Modern today, it was played by the full ensemble of eleven musicians, with Andrew May's violin and Matthew Frerck and Kory Reeder's double basses joining Detwiler, Capone, and Newton's strings, Mel Mobley joining Overturf on percussion, Stephen Lucas's piano, Sarah Ruth Alexander's voice, and McNutt's flute.

Stay On It began with Lucas playing a simple ostinato, which Overturf picked up on vibraphone and the other instruments gradually joined in, adding variations which almost imperceptibly began to drift metrically before a series of breaks, morphing and changing until May briefly conducted to pull the ensemble back together. The process was repeated several times, with a different musician conducting each time (Alexander's "STOP...in the name of love" was an amusing variation). Then the ensemble settled into a two-chord vamp, over which Alexander sang the text from a poem Eastman wrote to accompany the piece. Lucas played an unaccompanied coda, joined at the end by Overturf on tambourine. Like Jacques Tati's Playtime, Stay On It is a wide-screen event, filled with multiple ongoing events that can feel overwhelming at times, with the omnipresent clave beat to keep things moving.

This free concert series has been one of the best-kept secrets in Fort Worth, but attendance at today's performance indicated that maybe the word is getting out. You can watch video of the concert here.

Denton, 6.26.2024

Our second time this week at Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios was a different vibe than on most Molten Plains nights because of the all-ages rock show out on the patio. Big crowd, nicely diverse, and probably a great night for the bar staff. The first two Molten Plains sets were in the Rubber Room, where the audient-performer ratio was around 1:1 when we arrived. The eight-member Improvised Magic Ensemble was dispersed throughout the room: Dusty Rhoades (red guitar), Michael Briggs (electronics under the lights), Will Frenkel (cello by the main speaker), Andrew Dunlap (standup bass), Mike Fleming (guitar in the corner), Staci Stacis (apps, small animals, and bandages), Sarah Jay (voice and electronics), and Miguel Espinel (percussion and violin, mourning the loss of his beloved cat Tiger).

Their performance was a ten-minute timed improvisation, cued by Sarah Ruth Alexander (whose Molten Plains co-curator Ernesto Monteil was absent, visiting family in Venezuela), and an object example in how to do improv: everyone listening and responding, taking turns pushing their sounds to the fore, no one hogging the air, attending and stopping on cue. It's a truism (that's often true) that improv is more fun to play than it is to listen to. I have been a participant and a receiver of lots of meandering drone-fests. But this ensemble truly was magic, and showed that such need not be the case. 

Next up was the duo of Andrew May on violin (subbing for his partner, flautist Elizabeth McNutt) and cellist Kourtney Newton. I've seen both musicians play in a variety of contexts (including Sounds Modern, Trio du Sang, and Bitches Set Traps), but this set was really something special. Later, Newton told me that they'd planned three scored pieces, but in the event, they opted to extemporize, and played an improv duet that was so finely rendered that I thought it must have been composed, with shifts of tempo and dynamics and lots of textured dialogue. Every time these strong players put bow to string, they give the lie to the notion that classically-trained musicians can't improvise. A second stunning surprise for the evening.

Moving to the big room, after timely pause we were treated to a performance by BS Noise Control -- a sort of offshoot of BS Pain Control -- that was an engaging foray into Dada performance art. At first, the room was filled with folks who were cooling off from the show on the patio; I'm not sure whether or not sound tech extraordinaire Aubrey Seaton put dance music on the sound system to clear the room, but that was the net effect. BS Noise Control's lineup included BS Pain Control members Sarah Ruth Alexander on voice and electronics and Denton-to-Philadelphia transplant Brian Nothin on voice and guitars, with the added wildcard of Aaron Gonzalez on bass and voice. 

Among the antics that ensued were a conduction by Sarah Ruth that reminded me of what Frank Zappa was doing on side one of Weasels Ripped My Flesh, some riffing on the phrase "heavy metal _____," and a bit of ersatz C&W. Audience members who were familiar with the bits joined in like a midnight Rocky Horror crowd. Things culminated in "Herniated Disco," a reference to Aaron's recent medical woes (I was impressed that this was the second time in three days I saw him play a full set standing up -- except when he crawled down the steps during this piece) that featured disco music on the sound system, the trio dancing in the aisles, and an inadvertent crossover crowd of mostly young women from the rock show who were seemingly attracted by the danceable beats. Brian Nothin is a great physical comic, whose gawky presence reminds me a little of Kid Daniel from the Fort Worth Cats.

Last but not least was the first Rubber Gloves performance in three years by Vaults of Zin, Denton's purveyors of zeuhl (think heavy, aggressive psych-metal) and brothers in arms with the Fort Worth-based axis of Yeti-The Great Tyrant-Pinkish Black. I'd seen video of them awhile back and commented to Jon Teague (drummer in the three aforementioned Fort Worth bands, now living in Albuquerque) that "I saw video of this band and the drummer hits just like you!" Indeed, Rob Buttrum has the same slightly behind-the-beat, controlled violence with economy of movement as JT -- when Rob hit his kick and cymbals, I half expected to see my old Stoogeaphilia bandmate onstage. 

Shane Hutchinson plays a five-string bass that belonged to the late Yeti-TGT bassist Tommy Atkins, and he hits what we used to call the "Fort Worth brown note" the way Tommy did and Miguel Veliz (Sub Oslo, Suiciety) still does. When Hutchinson sings, he roars in a manner that summons the memory of the anguished vox on Yeti's post-Doug Ferguson outing Volume, Obliteration, Transcendence. (Shane was in a band that played on the very last Yeti show at the Wreck Room; we have different memories of who else was on the bill -- he says Kylesa, I say Graves At Sea. Perhaps JT will adjudicate this.) 

Over the top, in more ways than one, Stephen Lucas plays a synth that shrieks like a voice in terror. A thrilling sound; Stephen says they want to write new material and then record, but they still have copies of their Kadath cassette for those like me who are late to the party.

Next Molten Plains is scheduled for July 17 and it will be an improv lottery. As always, more surprises are in store.

Denton, 6.23.2024

(All photos by Mike Webber)

An eclectic bill at Rubber Gloves Rehearsal Studios last night. I was familiar with the trio of titanic Tennessee tenor wunderkind Zoh Amba, whirlwind drummer Chris Corsano, and noise-rocker turned electric American primitive guitar master Bill Orcutt from their recording The Flower School, and had seen 2/3 of them in the past year (Amba twice at Molten Plains Fest, in a trio with Aaron and Stefan Gonzalez and a duo with Joe McPhee; Corsano in a duo with Chris Pitsiokos at The Wild Detectives). A friend of mine caught them in L.A. a couple of nights earlier and was duly impressed. I was particularly looking forward to seeing Orcutt, whom I'd missed when he came through Gloves a couple of years ago.

Everything about Orcutt's playing defies expectations. He plays a Telecaster through a Fender amp (had to borrow a smaller one when his Twin malfunctioned during sound check) with a booster, but gets a much darker, warmer tone than one generally associates with that instrument, and such sustain! He has what must be the strongest wrist vibrato I've ever observed -- cat can shake them strings. And his technique is all hammers and pull-offs, using lots of open strings on his unique 5-string instrument (he leaves the 5th string off and tunes the low E up to G, then uses a capo). 

The hazard of this instrumentation is that sometimes guitar and tenor occupy the same frequency range, and when Amba dug in and blew from the bottoms of her feet, Orcutt was swallowed by the sound, but she was mindful of her position in relation to the mic and tried to regulate her volume that way. From what I saw last night and on previous occasions, her rep as a flamethrower does her no justice. She can testify like tongue-speakers Ayler, Sanders, Lowe, and Wright, but the real hallmark of her sound is a lyrical and very human song, marked by her distinctive vibrato and based on simple folkloric melodies in the same way Ornette's was based on the blues. 

Corsano is a wonder behind the trap set, always in motion, always listening intently and responding instantly to what his bandmates are doing. As I've said before, you can see how fast he thinks. Never overplaying, always intelligently musical. Orcutt announced this was the last night of their tour, "Back in Denton with the Dentonites," and there was a slight sense of fatigue in the musicians as their set went on. When sound from the concurrent show in the Rubber Room bled through the walls, Orcutt smiled, "Gotta love it," and started something aggressive. A passing train inspired all three players to respond, and kind of put paid to their set. "We're done," Orcutt said, and they were.

Lisa Cameron told me that Orcutt had requested Unrelenting Psoriasis on this bill after they opened for him on a previous occasion, and it kind of makes sense when you remember Bill once played in Harry Pussy. Besides the Austin-based Cameron (who drove up after playing a set with Joshua Thomson and Ingebrigt Haker Flaten the night before) on drums and electronics, the lineup included Denton mainstay Rick Eye (Flesh Narc, Gay Cum Daddies, Bukkake Moms) doing a lot of pickup toggle switching on guitar and Aaron Gonzalez (Kolga, Akkolyte) on fuzz bass and vocals, summoning the shade of the Gunslingers from France (whom I once saw levitate the Chat Room in Fort Worth). 

Watching them, I was reminded of a conversation I'd had earlier with a drummer of my acquaintance, to whom I'd suggested that the drummer always has to be the best musician in a band (which they denied -- "No, too much pressure!"). I've seen Cameron in a few different settings, mostly improv, and I know her history goes back 40 years to stints with Brave Combo and Roky Erickson, among many others. But I never heard her play as full-on as she did last night, and her lightning and thunder elevated the other musicians and gave form to their cacophony. At times she sounded like Elvin and Rashied doing their twin-volcanoes-erupting thing on Trane's Meditations, at others I detected the hint of a shuffle as she locked in with Aaron's furious chords. It made the set a stunner.

Opening set was a series of live soundtracks to animated shorts selected by Chad Withers. I'd seen things like this before, but never with the cohesion that this set of musicians was able to pull off. Perhaps it was because the four -- Andrew Dunlap (Captain Moon and the Silver Spoons) on standup bass and voice, Randall Minick (Python Potions) on synth, Kristina Smith on accordion and voice, and Rachel Weaver (Python Potions) on electric guitar and voice -- had previously played together in various configurations, but I could have sworn that their improvisations were scored, so focused was their attention and so in tune were they with each other. Both Minick and Weaver assured me after the fact that what we heard was extemporaneous, with only one practice and some discussions ahead of time. When I see stuff that I don't understand but I know is real, I call it magic. And it seems to happen all the time at Gloves. So there.

Miles Okazaki's "Miniature America"

This new recording by guitarist-composer Miles Okazaki -- out July 19 on admirable artist-owned indie Cygnus Recordings -- is quite extraordinary, and it's taken me a few pleasurable spins to wrap my head around. 

Because it's inspired by visual art (sculptures by Ken Price, wall drawings by Sol Lewitt) and text (a radically edited page from Immanuel Kant's Critique of Pure Reason, randomized final lines from poems) and co-produced with esteemed record-man David Breskin (Modney, Dan Weiss, Ches Smith), it's impossible for me not to view it as part of a continuum with previous art-inspired work Breskin has done with Bill Frisell (Richter 858), Nels Cline (Dirty Baby), Kris Davis and Craig Taborn (pieces played at the Museum of Modern Art here in Fort Worth in response to sculptures in the museum's collection). Unlike producers who focus on capturing what went down in the room -- a strategy I usually prefer -- Breskin likes to feed artists prompts to spark their creativity. 

I'll admit to being aware of Okazaki primarily as "the guy who recorded Thelonious Monk's entire canon for solo guitar" (WORK, 2018), but he's also recorded two trilogies of albums, MIRROR for Sunnyside (2009-2012) and Trickster for Pi (2017-2019). Since 2021, he's run the Cygnus label with drummer Dan Weiss; their double album Music for Drums and Guitar was the label's premiere release. While there's great guitaring aplenty on Miniature America -- including use of a quarter-tone instrument on "The Cavern" and fretless on "Whack A Mole" -- and an all-star band to boot, the real story here is the innovative compositional strategies Okazaki employs. 

Much of the work, the composer says, was done in post-production: "We made dozens of different little episodes. Dense blocks of sound. I took them home and carved away at them until just the minimum remained, and then played along." The sumptuously illustrated booklet that accompanies the CD provides some clues to his methods, including score examples. You can hear what Okazaki's talking about most clearly on "Lookout Below," where he plays rapid-fire unisons with a revolving cast of other instruments or voices. The rhythmic flow on "Wheel of Cloud" and "A Clean Slate" is provided by sequences of band members reciting the final lines from poems. On "Pulsation Station," Okazaki's guitar negotiates the territory between two groups playing at different speeds.

A thread running through the album is the melody which Matt Mitchell plays on piano over the crowd chatter -- which reappears pristine on "A Clean Slate" -- of opener "The Cocktail Party," trombonist Jacob Garchik essays over Okazaki's chords on "The Cavern," a choir of Ganavya, Jen Shyu, and Fay Victor sings on "The Firmament," and Ganavya solos on "In the Fullness of Time." 

Speaking of that all-star band, besides the aforementioned worthies, Miniature America is also graced by the contributions of vibraphonist Patricia Brennan (whose septet record Breaking Stretch drops September 6 on Pyroclastic), Caroline Davis on alto (whose recent collab with Wendy Eisenberg, Accept When, is a fave at mi casa), Anna Webber on tenor and flute (whose Shimmer Wince on Intakt from last year I need to hear), and Jon Irabagon (Mary Halvorson, Mostly Other People Do the Killing) on mezzo-soprano, sopranino, and slide sax. A fine bunch, whose collaborative spirit helped make this breathtaking album a reality. 

Things we like: Nasheet Waits, Tarbaby

Not long ago, I got to watch the livestream on sfjazz.org of Dave Holland's New Quartet. Holland's probably on more records I love than any bassist but Charlie Haden, solely on the basis of his work with Miles Davis, Sam Rivers, and Anthony Braxton. He and his band played a well paced set of new material (which I can't wait to hear recorded). It was nice to hear pianist Kris Davis playing shimmering Chick-with-Miles stuff on electric, and working in a bop-adjacent idiom I hadn't heard her in before, as well as a new Davis original that had a Monk-via-Dolphy feel. Altoist Jaleel Shaw said a lot on his horn, with a distinctively light sound. 

But the band member I couldn't take my eyes off was Nasheet Waits, who played a little like Tony Williams used to in the '70s (those tom rolls!), but with a looser-limbed swing. So when not one but two new Waits recordings materialized in my inbox, I was primed to listen. Both albums drop June 28 and are part of Giant Step Arts' Modern Masters and New Horizons series (co-curated by Waits and trumpeter Jason Palmer).

New York Love Letter (Bitter Sweet) is only Waits' third album as a leader in a career dating back to the early '90s, including stints with Max Roach's M'BOOM and Jason Moran's Bandwagon. The album features Waits in a quartet with vibist Steve Nelson (who's also worked with Dave Holland, in the bassist's late '90s-early Aughts quintet and big band), tenor man Mark Turner (a veteran player whose Live at the Village Vanguard was released on Giant Step Arts in 2022), and bassist Rashaan Carter. The program consists of two Waits originals, alongside one composition each by his former employers Moran and Andrew Hill, and two by John Coltrane. All the pieces reflect aspects of Waits' experience of NYC: growing up, becoming part of the jazz scene, and enduring pandemic isolation there. The band was recorded live at Central Park's Seneca Village (historically the first free Black settlement in New York) in 2021 and at Hunter College in 2022.

On Moran's "Snake Stance," Turner displays some of his Warne Marsh influence, and Nelson takes a scintillating solo, while Waits propels things along assertively. Hill's "Snake Hip Waltz" continues the herpetological theme (which Waits relates to "a quality you really have to inhabit being a resident of NYC") and gives the soloists a wending melody to work their way around. The live recording captures all the nuances of Waits' percussive attack. 

"Moon Child," the first Waits original, is a quietly ruminative piece, inspired by its composer's Greenwich Village childhood, with Nelson out front for the theme and a luminous solo. "The Hard Way" musters ferocious energy, appropriate for a piece inspired by the railroading of the Central Park Five (one of whom now serves on NYC's City Council). The tempo slows to let Turner and Nelson wring all they can from the changes, then Waits takes off on a polyrhythmic wonder of a solo, leading into "AW," a gently lyrical theme dedicated to both Seneca Village founder Andrew Williams and Waits' son August. 

Of the Coltrane tunes, "Liberia" invokes the spirit of Pan-Africanist leader and Harlemite Marcus Garvey, opening with cymbal sounds like the creaking of a slave ship, giving way to Turner's reading of Trane's modal melody before the leader kicks the band into gear. With solos all around, it's an album high spot. Finally, the "Central Park West" here might supplant the reharmonized take on Jack DeJohnette's Special Edition as my favorite version of the tune. The warmth and intimacy of Turner's rendition, followed by Nelson's pianistic response and Turner's closing remarks, brings closure to the date.

Tarbaby is a trio -- active since the late '90s and frequent collaborators with saxophone elder Oliver Lake -- that teams Waits with pianist Orrin Evans and bassist Eric Revis. Philadelphian Evans has performed and recorded extensively over the last quarter century, including stints with the Mingus legacy bands, The Bad Plus, and his own Captain Black Big Band. I'm familiar with Los Angeles native Revis from his City of Refuge album for Clean Feed with Andrew Cyrille and Kris Davis; I need to check out his 2020 album Slipknots Through a Looking Glass on Davis' Pyroclastic label. You Think This America is Tarbaby's sixth album and first live date, recorded at NYC's Hunter College.

The selection of material demonstrates how the musicians in Tarbaby are both rooted ("stuck," if you like) in tradition, while also pursuing their own ideas and visions. Opening track is Ornette Coleman's "Dee Dee," from the Golden Circle, Volume 1 album. The trio on that record is one of the best ways to hear OC's voice unfettered; it's interesting to hear how Evans weaves a matrix of harmony around the simple, sing-song melody. "Comme Il Faut" comes from Crisis! -- the first Ornette record I heard -- and hews closer to the original, particularly in the rhythm section action. Tarbaby stays in a free jazz bag to close the album with Sunny Murray's "Tree Tops."

David Murray's syncopated waltz "Mirror of Youth" (from the titanic saxophonist's collaboration with poet Saul Williams, Blues for Memo), draws on Evans and Waits' experience playing the tune with the composer, with bassist Revis adding his own spin to the interpretation.  Andrew Hill's "Reconciliation" dances obliquely, in Monkish fashion. The cover of the Stylistics' '70s soul hit "Betcha By Golly Wow" is both a nod to Evans' Philly roots and a recognition of the songcraft of writers Thom Bell and Linda Creed. (Tarbaby has previously recorded songs by Prince and the Bad Brains.) I'd never previously noticed the similarity between Jimmy Cox's venerable "Nobody Knows You When You're Down and Out" and D'Angelo's "The Door" until this version, which Evans embroiders in uptown fashion, shadowed by Revis at every turn.

Tarbaby's originals feel of a piece with the revamped classics. On Evans' Latin-tinged "Red Door," for instance, the composer's solo plays around with time before a deft pizzicato interval from Revis and a tumbling solo from Waits. The pianist's "Blues (When It Comes)" is an abstract modal piece marked by relentless forward motion, driven by Waits' crisp propulsion and Revis' brisk walking (including his solo), ending with an exchange of solos between piano and drums. And Evans takes Waits'  ballad "Kush" (previously recorded on 2012's The Ballad of Sam Langford for Hipnotic) down some blues and gospel-ish corridors. 

Both of these records have much to offer, and show the ongoing vitality of jazz tradition. They also mark Giant Step Arts as a label to watch.