RIYL: The Jazz Crusaders, George Duke, Joe Sample
Jazz pianist Ramsey Lewis shows no sign of slowing down. Now in his mid-70s, Lewis not only continues to be active in the jazz world, he keeps writing and recording new material along the way. Lewis’ latest, and his debut on Concord Jazz, Songs from the Heart: Ramsey Plays Ramsey, is just that – Lewis playing his own material. It’s either tracks he had been previously commissioned to write for ballet or for other artists such as Turtle Island Quartet, or just his own creations to be performed with his trio. And this record, with Ramsey on piano, Larry Gray on bass and Leon Joyce on drums, while simple in instrumentation, is complex in every other way. It’s also the kind of record you might play on a rainy weekend afternoon to forget about all of your troubles, or maybe about everything else you were supposed to get done. Lewis has a way of dynamically creating moods with each piece, and it doesn’t matter if you’re a jazz aficionado or just a weekend jazz warrior (we suspect most of our readers are the latter), you can’t help but appreciate Ramsey Lewis’ music like a fine wine. In fact, uncorking a bottle after putting it on isn’t a bad idea, either. (Concord Jazz 2009)
If you are sick of the state of the music business, if you need some new music that sounds truly new, if FM radio bores you to tears and even the blog-rock CDs showing up on every music site’s “best of” list lets you down because it all sounds like half-practiced, overproduced slacker junk played by snotty people you wouldn’t invite to parties at your place…please go and buy this box set. The culmination of the two-year Radiolarians project, The Evolutionary Set is the career pinnacle of MMW, jazz-rocking experimentalists who are neither jazz nor rock, but “avant-groove.” Kind of an thinking-fan’s instrumental Phish, this trio started with an idea in 2007: Write some proto-jams, briefly rehearse them, take them on tour, develop them live, and then record the finished project. It spawned three ridiculously tight, sometimes funky, sometimes rockin’, sometimes ambient-noodling numbers that sound like nothing you’ve heard. It doesn’t hurt that these guys not only have played together almost two decades, but that they’re exceptional players. The box set includes the three Radiolarians albums, a double-vinyl set, a DVD documentary, a remixes disc, and a live album. It’s intelligent jazz, it’s primitive rock. It’s funky stuff. It’s an updated 2009 version of the strangely beautiful Miles Davis period that included the records On The Corner and A Tribute to Jack Johnson. It’s everything indie music’s all about, and while the major labels and commercial radio won’t touch this stuff, you should. (Indirecto Records, 2009)
