IT ENDS HERE: My Favorite Albums of 2023

As DJ Heraclitus said, you can’t listen to the same record twice. I was lucky to simply listen to each of these records once (I at least did that), and many of them changed with me when (if?) I came back to them. Anohni’s, though, held my top spot for most of the year and finished there: it’s not a fun record, but this ain’t a fun planet, and I don’t live in a fun state (Missouri), and her album title rings too true around here and so many other places in the world. It’s a reminder to keep fighting, keep living, and keep loving–as well as to knock people off that bridge–and it documents an artist whose singing and writing has grown considerably over the years (the commitment was always there). I might have been influenced by her appearance in two 2023 books on Lou Reed, which caused me to re-examine her early work as well as the Berlin DVD. Anyway, the untamed Niafunke guitarist Bounaly made a strong run at her top spot, even took it for a spell, but that was pure rush instead of a finely honed artistic statement of the times, so…I ended up sticking to my guns. Support trans human beings and fight the heartless to the end.

It was a stunning year for jazz, of all challenging and/or beautiful stripes, and (across genres, too) women continue to make their mark (see next ‘graf). Canto, Chimaera, and Beyond Dragons were among the Top 10 jazz records of the year by anyone, period. The indefatigable Japanese pianist Satoko Fujii (as usual) delivered multiple engaging albums of her own as well as participating in those of others (see the list–they all made it unless I missed one). Make it a 2024 project to investigate her if you’ve yet to.

Jamila Woods took Joni Mitchell to the southside of Chicago. Gina Birch still wears her Docs and plays her bass loud. boygenius are girlgenius. Jessie Ware made us feel good when Roisin Murphy made us feel bad or at best confused. Romy delivered a gorgeous, same-sex-heartbroke (please excuse my awkwardness), late-night electronic telegram. Transformative, liberating lightning hit Corinne Bailey Rae. Big Freedia grew bigger. Kari Faux, Sexxy Red, and–on a different level–K. Michelle handled their shit on the urban streets of the midwest and midsouth. And…oh yeah…Olivia (though could she not have totally rocked OUT on SNL?).

It’s easy to dismiss old soul-blues dudes. I beg of you, LISTEN: 90-year-old Bobby Rush waxed a record that isn’t just good for a nonagenarian–he can still sing, pick, blow, and parse the times with players a quarter of his age–and relative greenhorn Robert Finley handed in a hard-assed, funny, and deep record that Dan Auerbach endowed with just the right touch, do not fear.

Last, this year was the first time I actually witnessed a Top-Tenner play in person. The Columbia Experimental Music Festival went out with a bang, bringing in the titanic tenor of James Brandon Lewis, whose 2-CD For Mahalia / These are Soulful Days (the latter one of the greatest jazz-horn-with-strings performance ever recorded) was the peak of his relatively brief career. We got to see him play with one of his favorite drummers, Chad Taylor, and they ’bout blew the top off of the First Baptist Church of Columbia, Missouri. Speaking of the CEMF, the ending of which has at least temporarily crippled our music scene, its founder Matt Crook somehow found a way to bring the Ukrainian pianist and inventor of continuous music, Lubomyr Melnyk, to town for a solo piano performance in our historic Methodist church downtown. Melnyk debuted a piece called “The Sacred Thousand” at the concert; it had not yet been recorded in the studio. The Bandcamp site for the recently released version says it best: The piece is “[d]edicated to the heroic Ukrainian soldiers who held out against the enormous Russian army for several weeks in the Azov Steel Plant of Mariupol…. it is a spiritual journey into the soul of man… into the Beautiful Depths of our spiritual strength.”

Thank all of you who have visited this blog and worried that I hadn’t bathed in weeks in order to keep up. I have indeed listened to most of these albums at least twice and I vouch for their ability to move you. IF you’re receptive. Happy hollerdays and may 2024 not crush us.

My Final 2023 List

–If an album makes the list, it sounds and feels to me like the equivalent of a Pitchfork 7.5 or better, an All Music 3 ½ stars or better, or an Xgauvian **Honorable Mention or better.
–At this point, one can assume that my Top 20-50 sound to me the equivalent of an A-, but I’m a teacher in my other incarnation, so watch me for grade inflation. It cannot be assumed safely, though, that my Top 10 are all straight A’s.
–After the first 50, my “rankings” are a bit loose—though I’ve been toning them up to represent comparative quality to the degree my sanity is not threatened; similarly, the entirety of my “Excavations and Reissues” I rank pretty loosely other than the Top 10 (in this “final” case).

Items in bold are new to the list I posted at the end of the previous month. I just added a few today—and I’m done.

Anohni: My Back Was a Bridge for You to Cross (Secretly Canadian)
Bounaly: Dimanche a Bamako (Sahel Sounds)
James Brandon Lewis: For Mahalia (with Love) (AUM Fidelity 2-CD version)
Jessie Ware: That! Feels Good! (Universal)
Lubomyr Melnyk: The Sacred Thousand (Jersika Records)
Gina Burch: I Play My Bass Loud (Third Man)
boygenius: the record (Interscope)
Robert Finley: Black Bayou (Easy Eye)
Romy: Midair (Young)
Jamila Woods: Water Made Us (Jagjaguwar)
Sylvie Couvousier: Chimaera (Intakt)
Noname: Sundial (AWAL Recordings America)
Buck 65: Punk Rock B-Boy (self-released)
The Mark Lomax II Trio: Tapestry (CFG Multimedia)
Miguel Zenon & Luis Perdomo: El Arte del Bolero, Volume 2 (ArcArtists)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 3—If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich? (New Amsterdam)
100 gecs: 10,000 gecs (Dog Show/Atlantic)
Corinna Bailey Rae: Black Rainbows (Black Rainbows)
Zach Bryan: Zach Bryan (Belting Bronco)
Armand Hammer: We Buy Diabetes Test Strips (Backwoodz Studios)
Big Freedia: Central City (Queen Diva)
Buck 65: Super Dope (self-released)
Ohad Talmor: Back to the Land (Intakt)
The Fugs: Dancing in the Universe (Fugs Records)
Olivia Rodrigo: Guts (Geffen)
Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records)
Hamell on Trial: Bring the Kids (Saustex)
billy woods & Kenny Segal: Maps (Backwoodz Studios)
Gard Nilssen’s Supersonic Orchestra: Family (We Jazz)
Aesop Rock: Integrated Tech Solutions (Rhymesayers)
Mark Turner: Live at the Village Vanguard (Giant Step Arts)
Assiko Golden Band de Grand Yoff: Magg Tekki (Mississippi Records)
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble: Spirit Gatherer—A Tribute to Don Cherry (Spiritmuse)
Wadada Leo Smith: Fire Illuminations (Kabell)
Meshell Ndegeocello: The Omnichord Real Book (Blue Note)
Adriana Calcanhotto: Errante (BMG)
Tyler Mitchell Octet: Sun Ra’s Journey featuring Marshall Allen (Cellar Live)
Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah & Chief Adjuah: Bark Out Thunder Roar Out Lightning (Ropeadope)
National Information Society: Since Time is Gravity (Eremite)
Allen Lowe and the Constant Sorrow Orchestra: In the Dark (ESP-Disk)
Liv.e: Girl in The Half Pearl (Real Life / AWAL)
Angelika Niescier, Tomeka Reid, and Savannah Harris: Beyond Dragons (Intakt)
Jelly Roll: Whitsitt Chapel (Stoney Creek)
Fire! Orchestra: Echoes (Rune Grammofon)
Filipe Catto: Belezas Sao Coisis Acesas por Dentro (Joia Moderna)
Dropkick Murphys: Okemah Rising (Dummy Luck Music)
Susan Alcorn: Canto (Relative Pitch)
DJ Maphorisa & Tman Xpress: Chukela (New Money Gang)
Jason Adasiewicz: Roscoe Village—The Music of Roscoe Mitchell (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
K. Michelle: I’m the Problem (No Color No Sound)
Janelle Monae: The Age of Pleasure (Bad Boy)
Joe McPhee and Bill Orcutt: A Mouth at Both Ends (ISSUE)
Matana Roberts: Coin Coin Chapter Five—In the garden (Constellation)
Kari Faux: REAL BITCHES DON’T DIE (drunk sum wtr records)
Brandy Clark: Brandy Clark (Warner)
Ashley McBryde: The Devil I Know (Warner Nashville)
Sexxy Red: Hood Hottest Princess (Open Shift)
Poli & The Gwo Ka Masters: Abri Cyclonique (Real World)
Bobby Rush: All My Love for You (Deep Rush / Thirty Tigers)
Irreversible Entanglements: Protect Your Light (Impulse! / Verve)
Jaimie Branch: Fly or Die Fly or Die ((world war)) (International Anthem)
Yaeji: With a Hammer (XL Recordings)
Bettye LaVette: LaVette! (Jay-Vee)
London Brew: London Brew (Concord)
William Hooker: Flesh & Bones (Org Music)
Tyshawn Sorey: Continuing (Pi Recordings)
J.D. Allen: This (Savant)
Ryoko Ono & Satoko Fujii: Hakuro (label unknown)
Rodrigo Campos: Pagode Novo (YB Music)
Kali Uchis: Red Moon in Venus (Geffen)
Kelela: Raven (Warp)
Isach Skeidsvoll: Dance to Summon (Ultraani Records)
Killer Mike: Michael (Loma Vista)
Emil Amos: Zone Black (Drag City)
Marina Sena: Vicio Inerente (Sony)
Young Fathers: Heavy Heavy (Ninja Tune)
Maria Jose Llergo: Ultrabella (Sony)
David Mirarchi: Ink Folly, Orchid Gleam (Unbroken Sounds)
Superless: Superless (Oyvind Jazzforum)
Algiers: Shook (Matador)
Buselli – Wallarab Jazz Orchestra: The Gennett Suite (Patois Records)
Lewis Capaldi: Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent (Vertigo Berline)
Low Cut Connie: Art Dealers (Contender)
Tyvek: Overground (Gingko)
corook: serious person (part 1) (Atlantic)
Ice Cold Bishop: Generational Curse (Ice Cold Entertainment)
Allen Lowe and The Constant Sorrow Orchestra: America—The Rough Cut (ESP-Disk)
Tri-County Liquidators: cut my teeth (Hitt Rex)
ensemble 0: Jojoni (Crammed Discs)
JLin: Perspective (Planet Mu)
Henry Threadgill: The Other One (Pi)
Zoh Amba & Chris Corsano & Bill Orcutt: The Flower School (Palilalia)
Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids: Afro-Futuristic Dreams (Strut)
Amanda Shires & Bobbie Nelson: Loving You (ATO)
aja monet: when the poems do what they do (drink sum wtr)
Dlala Thukzin: Permanent Music 3 (Dlala Records EP)
Knoel Scott (featuring Marshall Allen): Celestial (Night Dreamer)
Steve Lehman & Orchestre National de Jazz: Ex Machina (Pi)
Emmet Cohen & Houston Person: Houston Person—Masters Legacy Series, Volume 5 (Bandstand Presents)
Peso Pluma: GENESIS (Double P)
Chappell Roan: The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (KRA)
Elijah Shiffer: Star Jelly (self-released)
Grupo Frontera: El Comienzo (Grupo Frontera)
Ember: August in March (Imani)
Kevin Sun: The Depths of Memory (Endectomorph Music)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #10—Inland (Hammer)
Withered Hand: How to Love (Reveal)
Lafayette Gilchrist: Undaunted (Morphius)
Taj Mahal: Savoy (Cheraw S.C.)
Haviah Mighty: Crying Crystals (Mighty Gang)
Willie Nelson: I Don’t Know a Thing About Love—The Songs of Harlan Howard (Legacy)
Morgan Wade: Psychopath (Ladylike)
Shabazz Palaces: Robed in Rareness (Sub Pop)
Parannoul: After the Magic (Poclanos/Top Shelf)
Felo Le Tee & Mellow & Sleazy: The Ill Wise Men (New Money Gang)
The Necks: Travel (Northern Spy)
Lori McKenna: 1988 (CN Records / Thirty Tigers)
Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Hell to Pay (Black & Wyatt)
KAYTRAMINE: KAYTRAMIUNE, Amine, & KAYTRANADA (CLBN)
Various Artists: Red Hot & Ra—Nuclear War (Red Hot Org)
Rome Streetz: Wasn’t Built in a Day (Big Ghost)
Hein Westgaard Trio: First as Farce (Nice Things)
The Urban Art Ensemble: “Ho’opomopono” (CFG Multimedia 16-minute single)
Itamar Borochov: Arba (Greenleaf)
Rodrigo Amado / The Bridge: Beyond the Margins (Trost)
ANTiINDSTRY: Numinous Interference (Muteant Sounds)
Islandman (featuring Okay Temiz and Muhlis Berberoglu: Direct-to-Disc Sessions (Night Dreamer)
Edward Simon: Femeninas (ArtistShare)
Trio San (featuring Satoko Fujii and Taiko Saito): Hibiki (Jazzdor)
Kill Bill—The Rapper: Fullmetal Kaiju (EXO)
Speaker Music: Techxodus (Planet Mu)
Andy Fairweather Low: Flang Dang (The Last Music Company)
ARO40: On the Blink (Aerophonic Records)
Bob Vylan: Bob Vylan Presents the Price of Life (Ghost Theatre)
Bombino: Sahel (Partisan)
Son Rompe Pera: Chimborazo (AYA Records)
Rough Image: Rough Image (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Ingrid Laubrock: The Last Quiet Place (Pyroclastic)
Victoria Monet: Jaguar II (Lovett Music)
Homeboy Sandman: I Can’t Sell These Either (self-released)
Havard Wiik & Tim Daisy: Slight Return (Relay)
Various Artists: Red Hot & Ra—SOLAR Sun Ra in Brasil (Red Hot Org)
Rob Mazurek & Exploding Star Orchestra: Lightning Dreamers (International Anthem)
Kaze & Ikue Mori: Crustal Movement (Circum/Libra)
DJ Black Low: Impumelelo (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Belle and Sebastian: Late Developers (Matador)
Satoko Fujii & Otomo Yoshihide: Perpetual Motion (Ayler Records)
feeble little horse: Girl with Fish (Saddle Creek)
Rocket 88: House of Jackpots (12XU)
L’Rain: I Killed Your Dog (Mexican Summer)
DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ: Destiny (Spells on the Telly)
Nasty Facts: Drive My Car (Left for Dead)
Taiko Saito: Tears of a Cloud (Trouble in the East)
JPEGMAFIA x Danny Brown: Scaring the Hoes (self-released)
Rodrigo Campos & Romulo Froes: Elefante (YB Music)
Kalia Vandever: We Fell in Turn (AKP Recordings)
Water from Your Eyes: Everyone’s Crushed (Matador)
Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind)
Amaarae: Fountain Baby (Golden Angel/Interscope)
Blondshell: Blondshell (Partisan)
Satoko Fujii: Torrent (Libra Records)
Javon Jackson: “With Peter Bradley”—Soundtrack and Original Score (Solid Jackson)
Doja Cat: Scarlet (Kemosabe)
Tianna Esperanza: Terror (BMG)
YMA & Jadsa: Zelena (Matraca)
Palehound: Eye on the Bat (Polyvinyl)
J Hus: Beautiful and Brutal Yard (Black Butter)
Das Kondensat: Anderen Planeten (Why Play Jazz)
Iris DeMent: Workin’ On a World (FlariElla)
David Murray, Questlove, and Ray Angry: Plumb (J.M.I.)
Tyler Childers: Rustin’ in the Rain (Hickman Holler)
Baaba Maal: Being (Atelier Live/Marathon Artists)
Ed Sanders: The Sanders – Olufsen Poetry and Classical Music Project (Olufsen)
Bob Dylan: Shadow Kingdom (Columbia)
City Girls: Raw (Quality Control/Motown)
Grrrl Gang: Spunky (Kill Rock Stars)
Lana Del Rey: Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd (Polydor)
Teenage Jesus and The Jean Teasers: I Love You (Triple J Unearthed)
Caroline Davis: Alula—Captivity (Ropeadope)
Kiko El Crazy: Pila’e Teteo (Rimas)
Romulo Froes & Tiago Rosas: Na Goela (YB Music)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #9—Targeted (Hammer Recordings)
James Brandon Lewis: Eye of I (Anti-)
Sofia Kourtesis: Madres (Ninja Tune)
DJ Manny: Hypnotized (Planet Mu)
Josephus and The George Jonestown Massacre: Call Me Animal—A Tribute to the MC5 (Saustex)
Joanna Sternberg: I’ve Got Me (Fat Possum)
Tracey Nelson: Life Don’t Miss Nobody (BMG)
Etran De L’Air: Live in Seattle (EP) (Sahel Sounds)
Ricardo Dias Gomes: Muito Sol (Hive Mind)
Ice Spice: Like…? (10K Projects / Capitol Records EP)
otay:onii: Dream Hacker (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Sylvie Courvoisier & Cory Smythe: The Rite of Spring—Spectre d’un songe (Pyroclastic)
Money for Guns: All the Darkness That’s in Your Head (CD Baby)
Nourished by Time: Erotic Probiotic 2 (Scenic Route)
Walter Daniels: “From Death to Texas” / “Seems Like a Dream” (Spacecase Records 45)
Nakimbembe Embaire Group: Nakimbembe Embaire Group (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Shirley Collins: Archangel Hill (Domino)
Karol G: Manana Sera Bonito (Universal Music Latino)
Tinashe: BB/ANG3L (Nice Life)
Hollie Cook: Happy Hour in Dub (Merge)
Andrew Cyrille: Music Delivery / Percussion (Intakt)
Kate Gentile: b i o m e i.i (Obliquity)
Yves Tumor: Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (Warp)
Dan Ex Machina: Ex’s Sexts (self-released)
Open Mike Eagle: another triumph of ghetto engineering (AutoReverse)
Yonic South: Devo Challenge Cup (Wild Honey)
Rudy Royston: Day (Greenleaf Music)
Chien Chien Lu: Built in System—Live in New York (Giant Step Arts)
Pangaea: Changing Channels (Hessle Audio)
Lewsberg: Out and About (Lewsberg / 12XU)
Basher: Doubles (Sinking City)
That Mexican OT: Lonestar Luchador (Good Talk)
Daniel Villarreal: Lados B (International Anthem)
Staples Jr. Singers: Tell Heaven (EP) (Luaka Bop) Note: the vinyl gets you more great minutes of testifying.
Brandee Younger: Brand New Life (Impulse!)
Babe, Terror: Teghnojoyg (self-released)
Heinali: Kyiv Eternal (Injazero)
Vinny Golia Quartet: No Refunds (Unbroken Sounds)
Kresten Osgood / Bob Moses / Tisziji Munoz: Spiritual Drum Kingship (Gotta Let It Out)
The Art Ensemble of Chicago: From Paris to Paris (Rogue Art)
Clarence “Bluesman” Davis: Shake It For Me (Music Maker Foundation)
The War and The Treaty: Lover’s Game (Mercury Nashville)
Mendoza Hoff Revels: Echolocation (AUM Fidelity)
Aroof Aftab, Vijay Iyer & Shahzad, Ismaily: Love in Exile (Verve)
Asher Gamedze: Turbulence and Pulse (International Anthem)
Normal Nada the Krakmaxter: Tribal Progressive Heavy Metal (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Natural Child: Be M’Guest (Natural Child Music)
Tanya Tucker: Sweet Western Sound (Fantasy)
Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group: Roman Norfleet and Be Present Art Group (Mississippi Records)
David Dove & Joe McPhee: Where’s the Wine? (C.I.A. Records)
Various Artists: 10 (Music from Memory)
Nellie McKay: Hey Guys, Watch This (Hungry Mouse)
Everything But the Girl: Fuse (Buzzin’ Fly)
Tomas Fujiwara’s Triple Double: March On (self-released)

Excavations and Reissues

Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens: Music Inferno—The Indestructible Beat Tour 1988-89 (Umsakazo Records)
Kashmere Stage Band: Texas Thunder Soul 1968-1974 (Now-Again)
The Replacements: Tim—Let It Bleed Edition (Rhino)
Various Artists: Piconema–East African Hits On The Colombian Coast (Rocafort Records)
Les Rallizes Denudes: Citta ’93 (Temporal Drift)
Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached (New Land Records)
The Jazz Doctors: Intensive Care & Prescriptions Filled 1983-84 (Cadillac Records)
Walter Bishop, Jr.: Bish at the Bank—Live in Baltimore (Cellar Live)
Various Artists: Yebo! Rare Mzansi Party Beats from Apartheid’s Dying Years (BBE)
Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra: 60 Years (The Village)
Os Tincoas: Canto Coral Afrobrasiliero (Sanzala Cultural)
Various Artists: Ecuatoriana (Analog Africa)
Leon Keita: Leon Keita (Analog Africa)
Hiroshi Yoshimura: Surround (Temporal Drift)
Balka Sound: Balka Sound (Strut)
Sonic Youth: Live in Brooklyn (Silver Current)
John Coltrane: Evenings at The Village Gate (Impulse!)
Various Artists: Playing for The Man at The Door (Smithsonian Folkways)
Les Rallizes Denudes: BAUS ’93 (Temporal Drift)
Gabe Baltazar: Birdology (Fresh Sounds)
Hiatus Kaiyote: Choose Your Weapon (Flying Buddha / Sony Masterworks)
Dream Dolphin: Gaia—Selected Ambient & Downtempo Works (1996 – 2003) (Music from Memory)
Various Artists: The Soul of Congo – Treasures of the Ngoma label (1948-1963) (Planet Ilunga)
Sonny Stitt: Boppin’ in Baltimore—Live at the Left Bank (Jazz Detective)
Ihsan Al-Munzer: Belly Dance (BBE)
Dredd Foole & The Din: See God 1985-1986 (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
Johnny Griffin: Live at Ronnie Scott’s, 1964 (Gearbox)
Nina Simone: You’ve Got to Learn (Verve)
William S. Burroughs: Nothing Here But the Recordings (Dais Records)
Eddie & Ernie: Time Waits for No One (Mississippi Records)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 1 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 2 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
The Southern University Jazz Ensemble: Goes to Africa with Love (Now-Again)
Roy Campbell / William Parker / Zan Matsuura: Visitation of the Spirits—The Pyramind Trio Live, 1985 (No Business)
Sonny Rollins: Live at Finlandia Hall, Helsinki 1972 (Svart)
Various Artists: The Best of Revelation Records 1959-1962 (NarroWay)
Shizuka: Heavenly Persona (Black Editions)
Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom: Daytime Viewing (Unseen Worlds)
Dorothy Carter: Waillee Waillee (Palo Alto Records)
Various Artists: Blacklips Bar—Androgyns and Deviants / Industrial Romance for Bruised and Battered Angels 1992-1995 (Anthology Recordings)
Wes Montgomery: Maximum Swing (Resonance)
Various Artists: Con Piano, Sublime—Early Recordings from the Caribbean 1907-1921 (Magnificent Sounds)
Various Artists: Space Echo—The Mystery Behind the Cosmic Sound of Cabo Verde Revealed! (Analog Africa)
Ibrahim Hesnawi: The Father of Libyan Reggae (Habibi Funk)
RP Boo: Legacy Volume 2 (Planet Mu)
Les Raillizes Denudes: ’77 Live (Temporal Drift)
Alon Nechushtan: For Those Who Cross the Seas (ESP-Disk)
Eddie Lockjaw Davis and Shirley Scott: Cookin’ With Jaws and The Queen (Craft)
Professor James Benson: The Gow-Dow Experience (Jazzman Records)
Little Bob and The Lollipops: Nobody But You (Mississippi Records)

Integrated List Solutions: 2023’s Best Discs With a Month to Go

RIP Shane MacGowan.

PREJUDICES:

I don’t trust critics’ positive evaluations of art when they’re mostly grounded in politics (of one sort or another). Yet I am frequently guilty of it here.
Related: For much of my life I have thought women were clearly the superior of the two traditionally recognized genders. My wife has helped me sustain that viewpoint; the last seven years of public mad, toxic explosions has convinced me we are equally flawed. Just sayin’: if the upper reaches of my list are dominated by women, it’s not because I’m still guided by romantic notions.
I love jazz right now more than any other major genre. Within that larger genre, I find experimental and free jazz more interesting than its other subgenres. It engages my mind and skin more regularly than other kinds of music. That said, it’s really hard to rank such records. I could spend another hour rearranging my favorite experimental and free jazz records, and I’d change that arrangement again this afternoon. In addition, it’s been a GREAT (and scintillatingly varied) year for those.
Few country records are on my list. I’m not resistant to that genre; I just insist on distinctly unique singing (it’s a tradition) and interesting lyrics. I was weaned on George, Merle, Willie, Dolly, Lorretty, and Tammy–what can I say?
As a writer, I “come out of” punk, garage rock, and rock when it rolled–my first writing “gigs” were with punk zines. Over the last decade, a group of friends on Facebook have given me a great crash course (if a crash course can last a decade) in busting out of that particular popular/semipopular music pen, though I still like galloping around in it. It could be, as a result, that I am too eager to enthuse about intriguing poptimistic sounds. Also, some eyebrows might jump at the exclusion from the list of a certain mega-phenomenon in light of that admission. I still struggle with blandness, even impressively mounted and executed blandness. Oh, and about my punk-pen-past: if the band Dredd Foole & the Din is unfamiliar to you, change that (see “Excavations and “Reissues”).
I like music made by melanated people more than the pale offerings. I don’t think about it beforehand–it just turns out that way. Sue me.

TRUNCATED OBSERVATIONS–PAIRINGS!:

–So-called “desert blues”? Folks, if you don’t know about it or have never gotten on the train, it’s not too late to hop on, and your first stop should be Bounaly’s glowing-orange-hot wailing guitar record Dimanche a Bamako. All hail the Sahel Sounds label. Next stop: Bombino’s Sahel.

–Prolific rappers? From Canada? Yep–it’s old news. BUT…Buck 65’s placed two releases in my Top 25 records of the year, and I had to think and listen awhile before I moved one of those out of the Top 10. Crisp beats, consistently engaging words, and a confident flow. I want to pose a question to aficionados: Buck 65 or Homeboy Sandman, if you could only take one of these fecund MCs’ oeuvres to a desert island?

–Brazilian music: I forgot a prejudice! I start out leaning forward when I put on a new Brazilian record, especially if it’s been touted by Rod Taylor of the Brazil Beat blog. And this year my Top 40 (so far) contains two great and VERY DIFFERENT–yet uniquely Brazilian–releases: Adriana Calcanhotto’s addictive samba-with-Waitsian-rhythmic-flecks Errante and Filipe Catto’s dark-toned tribute to the departed tropicalia legend Gal Costa, Belezas Sao Coisis Acesas por Dentro. Note 1: Catto’s album and Anohni’s still-chart-topping My Back Was a Bridge for You to Cross is a terrific pairing as well.

The Updated List

–If an album makes the list, it sounds and feels to me like the equivalent of a Pitchfork 7.5 or better, an All Music 3 ½ stars or better, or an Xgauvian **Honorable Mention or better.
–It can be assumed that my Top 30-40 sound to me the equivalent of an A-, but I’m a teacher in my other incarnation so watch me for grade inflation. It cannot be assumed safely, though, that my Top 10 are all straight A’s.
–After the first 50, my “rankings” are a bit loose; similarly, the entirety of my “Excavations and Reissues” I rank pretty loosely other than the Top 3. Also, I usually jigger the rankings every month upon reflection.
–Items in bold are new to the list I posted at the end of the previous month.

Note 2: I’ve repeatedly pored over this month’s list and rearranged it, after some re-listening and simple reflection. My Top 50 is approaching as much permanence as I’m capable of, though Bounaly’s record so thoroughly kicked my ass last night it may take the top spot. We also have four weeks to go….

Anohni: My Back Was a Bridge for You to Cross (Secretly Canadian)
Bounaly: Dimanche a Bamako (Sahel Sounds)
Gina Birch: I Play My Bass Loud (Third Man)
James Brandon Lewis: For Mahalia (with Love) (AUM Fidelity 2-CD version)
boygenius: the record (Interscope)
Buck 65: Punk Rock B-Boy (self-released)
Olivia Rodrigo: Guts (Geffen)
Jamila Woods: Water Made Us (Jagjaguwar)
Romy: Midair (Young)
Noname: Sundial (AWAL Recordings America)
Jessie Ware: That! Feels Good! (Universal)
Robert Finley: Black Bayou (Easy Eye)
The Mark Lomax II Trio: Tapestry (CFG Multimedia)
billy woods & Kenny Segal: Maps (Backwoodz Studios)
Miguel Zenon & Luis Perdomo: El Arte del Bolero, Volume 2 (ArcArtists)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 3—If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich? (New Amsterdam)
100 gecs: 10,000 gecs (Dog Show/Atlantic)
Corinna Bailey Rae: Black Rainbows (Black Rainbows)
Adriana Calcanhotto: Errante (BMG)
Big Freedia: Central City (Queen Diva)
Buck 65: Super Dope (self-released)
Ohad Talmor: Back to the Land (Intakt)
Gard Nilssen’s Supersonic Orchestra: Family (We Jazz)
Aesop Rock: Integrated Tech Solutions (Rhymesayers)
Mark Turner: Live at the Village Vanguard (Giant Step Arts)
Assiko Golden Band de Grand Yoff: Magg Tekki (Mississippi Records)
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble: Spirit Gatherer—A Tribute to Don Cherry (Spiritmuse)
Wadada Leo Smith: Fire Illuminations (Kabell)
Tyler Mitchell Octet: Sun Ra’s Journey featuring Marshall Allen (Cellar Live)
Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah & Chief Adjuah: Bark Out Thunder Roar Out Lightning (Ropeadope)
National Information Society: Since Time is Gravity (Eremite)
Allen Lowe and the Constant Sorrow Orchestra: In the Dark (ESP-Disk)
Armand Hammer: We Buy Diabetes Test Strips (Backwoodz Studios)
Hamell on Trial: Bring the Kids (Saustex)
Liv.e: Girl in The Half Pearl (Real Life / AWAL)
Jelly Roll: Whitsitt Chapel (Stoney Creek)
Fire! Orchestra: Echoes (Rune Grammofon)
Filipe Catto: Belezas Sao Coisis Acesas por Dentro (Joia Moderna)
Dropkick Murphys: Okemah Rising (Dummy Luck Music)
Ashley McBryde: The Devil I Know (Warner Nashville)
Kari Faux: REAL BITCHES DON’T DIE (drunk sum wtr records)
Jason Adasiewicz: Roscoe Village—The Music of Roscoe Mitchell (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
William Hooker: Flesh & Bones (Org Music)
Tyshawn Sorey: Continuing (Pi Recordings)
Yaeji: With a Hammer (XL Recordings)
Bettye LaVette: LaVette! (Jay-Vee)
Brandy Clark: Brandy Clark (Warner)
Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records)
Janelle Monae: The Age of Pleasure (Bad Boy)
Zach Bryan: Zach Bryan (Belting Bronco)
London Brew: London Brew (Concord)
J.D. Allen: This (Savant)
Ryoko Ono & Satoko Fujii: Hakuro (label unknown)
Rodrigo Campos: Pagode Novo (YB Music)
Kali Uchis: Red Moon in Venus (Geffen)
Bobby Rush: All My Love for You (Deep Rush / Thirty Tigers)
Kelela: Raven (Warp)
Les Raillizes Denudes: Citta’ ’93 (Temporal Drift)
Isach Skeidsvoll: Dance to Summon (Ultraani Records)
Killer Mike: Michael (Loma Vista)
Emil Amos: Zone Black (Drag City)
Marina Sena: Vicio Inerente (Sony)
Shabazz Palaces: Robed in Rareness (Sub Pop)
Young Fathers: Heavy Heavy (Ninja Tune)
Maria Jose Llergo: Ultrabella (Sony)
Irreversible Entanglements: Protect Your Light (Impulse! / Verve)
Jaimie Branch: Fly or Die Fly or Die ((world war)) (International Anthem)
David Mirarchi: Ink Folly, Orchid Gleam (Unbroken Sounds)
Superless: Superless (Oyvind Jazzforum)
Algiers: Shook (Matador)
Buselli – Wallarab Jazz Orchestra: The Gennett Suite (Patois Records)
Lewis Capaldi: Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent (Vertigo Berline)
Tyvek: Overground (Gingko)
corook: serious person (part 1) (Atlantic)
Ice Cold Bishop: Generational Curse (Ice Cold Entertainment)
Allen Lowe and The Constant Sorrow Orchestra: America—The Rough Cut (ESP-Disk)
Tri-County Liquidators: cut my teeth (Hitt Rex)
ensemble 0: Jojoni (Crammed Discs)
JLin: Perspective (Planet Mu)
Sexxy Red: Hood Hottest Princess (Open Shift)
Henry Threadgill: The Other One (Pi)
Zoh Amba & Chris Corsano & Bill Orcutt: The Flower School (Palilalia)
Idris Ackamoor & The Pyramids: Afro-Futuristic Dreams (Strut)
Amanda Shires & Bobbie Nelson: Loving You (ATO)
aja monet: when the poems do what they do (drink sum wtr)
Knoel Scott (featuring Marshall Allen): Celestial (Night Dreamer)
Steve Lehman & Orchestre National de Jazz: Ex Machina (Pi)
Emmet Cohen & Houston Person: Houston Person—Masters Legacy Series, Volume 5 (Bandstand Presents)
Peso Pluma: GENESIS (Double P)
Chappell Roan: The Rise and Fall of a Midwest Princess (KRA)
Elijah Shiffer: Star Jelly (self-released)
Grupo Frontera: El Comienzo (Grupo Frontera)
Ember: August in March (Imani)
Kevin Sun: The Depths of Memory (Endectomorph Music)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #10—Inland (Hammer)
Withered Hand: How to Love (Reveal)
Lafayette Gilchrist: Undaunted (Morphius)
Meshell Ndegeocello: The Omnichord Real Book (Blue Note)
The Fugs: Dancing in the Universe (Fugs Records)
Taj Mahal: Savoy (Cheraw S.C.)
Haviah Mighty: Crying Crystals (Mighty Gang)
Willie Nelson: I Don’t Know a Thing About Love—The Songs of Harlan Howard (Legacy)
Morgan Wade: Psychopath (Ladylike)
Parannoul: After the Magic (Poclanos/Top Shelf)
Felo Le Tee & Mellow & Sleazy: The Ill Wise Men (New Money Gang)
The Necks: Travel (Northern Spy)
Lori McKenna: 1988 (CN Records / Thirty Tigers)
Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Hell to Pay (Black & Wyatt)
KAYTRAMINE: KAYTRAMIUNE, Amine, & KAYTRANADA (CLBN)
Rome Streetz: Wasn’t Built in a Day (Big Ghost)
Hein Westgaard Trio: First as Farce (Nice Things)
The Urban Art Ensemble: “Ho’opomopono” (CFG Multimedia 16-minute single)
Itamar Borochov: Arba (Greenleaf)
Rodrigo Amado / The Bridge: Beyond the Margins (Trost)
ANTiINDSTRY: Numinous Interference (Muteant Sounds)
Islandman (featuring Okay Temiz and Muhlis Berberoglu: Direct-to-Disc Sessions (Night Dreamer)
Edward Simon: Femeninas (ArtistShare)
Trio San (featuring Satoko Fujii and Taiko Saito): Hibiki (Jazzdor)
Susan Alcorn: Canto (Relative Pitch)
Kill Bill—The Rapper: Fullmetal Kaiju (EXO)
Speaker Music: Techxodus (Planet Mu)
Andy Fairweather Low: Flang Dang (The Last Music Company)
ARO40: On the Blink (Aerophonic Records)
Money for Guns: All the Darkness That’s in Your Head (CD Baby)
Matana Roberts: Coin Coin Chapter Five—In the garden (Constellation)
Bombino: Sahel (Partisan)
Rough Image: Rough Image (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Ingrid Laubrock: The Last Quiet Place (Pyroclastic)
Victoria Monet: Jaguar II (Lovett Music)
Homeboy Sandman: I Can’t Sell These Either (self-released)
Havard Wiik & Tim Daisy: Slight Return (Relay)
Rob Mazurek & Exploding Star Orchestra: LightningDreamers (International Anthem)
Kaze & Ikue Mori: Crustal Movement (Circum/Libra)
DJ Black Low: Impumelelo (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Belle and Sebastian: Late Developers (Matador)
Satoko Fujii & Otomo Yoshihide: Perpetual Motion (Ayler Records)
feeble little horse: Girl with Fish (Saddle Creek)
Rocket 88: House of Jackpots (12XU)
L’Rain: I Killed Your Dog (Mexican Summer)
DJ Sabrina the Teenage DJ: Destiny (Spells on the Telly)
Nasty Facts: Drive My Car (Left for Dead)
Taiko Saito: Tears of a Cloud (Trouble in the East)
JPEGMAFIA x Danny Brown: Scaring the Hoes (self-released)
Kalia Vandever: We Fell in Turn (AKP Recordings)
Water from Your Eyes: Everyone’s Crushed (Matador)
Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind)
Amaarae: Fountain Baby (Golden Angel/Interscope)
Blondshell: Blondshell (Partisan)
Satoko Fujii: Torrent (Libra Records)
Javon Jackson: “With Peter Bradley”—Soundtrack and Original Score (Solid Jackson)
Doja Cat: Scarlet (Kemosabe)
Tianna Esperanza: Terror (BMG)
YMA & Jadsa: Zelena (Matraca)
Palehound: Eye on the Bat (Polyvinyl)
J Hus: Beautiful and Brutal Yard (Black Butter)
Das Kondensat: Anderen Planeten (Why Play Jazz)
Iris DeMent: Workin’ On a World (FlariElla)
David Murray, Questlove, and Ray Angry: Plumb (J.M.I.)
Tyler Childers: Rustin’ in the Rain (Hickman Holler)
Baaba Maal: Being (Atelier Live/Marathon Artists)
Ed Sanders: The Sanders – Olufsen Poetry and Classical Music Project (Olufsen)
Bob Dylan: Shadow Kingdom (Columbia)
City Girls: Raw (Quality Control/Motown)
Grrrl Gang: Spunky (Kill Rock Stars)
Lana Del Rey: Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd (Polydor)
Teenage Jesus and The Jean Teasers: I Love You (Triple J Unearthed)
Caroline Davis: Alula—Captivity (Ropeadope)
Kiko El Crazy: Pila’e Teteo (Rimas)
Romulo Froes & Tiago Rosas: Na Goela (YB Music)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #9—Targeted (Hammer Recordings)
James Brandon Lewis: Eye of I (Anti-)
Sofia Kourtesis: Madres (Ninja Tune)
DJ Manny: Hypnotized (Planet Mu)
Josephus and The George Jonestown Massacre: Call Me Animal—A Tribute to the MC5 (Saustex)
Joanna Sternberg: I’ve Got Me (Fat Possum)
Tracey Nelson: Life Don’t Miss Nobody (BMG)
Etran De L’Air: Live in Seattle (EP) (Sahel Sounds)
Everything But the Girl: Fuse (Buzzin’ Fly)
Tomas Fujiwara’s Triple Double: March On (self-released)
Ice Spice: Like…? (10K Projects / Capitol Records EP)
otay:onii: Dream Hacker (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Sylvie Courvoisier & Cory Smythe: The Rite of Spring—Spectre d’un songe (Pyroclastic)
Nourished by Time: Erotic Probiotic 2 (Scenic Route)
Walter Daniels: “From Death to Texas” / “Seems Like a Dream” (Spacecase Records 45)
Nakimbembe Embaire Group: Nakimbembe Embaire Group (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Shirley Collins: Archangel Hill (Domino)
Karol G: Manana Sera Bonito (Universal Music Latino)
Tinashe: BB/ANG3L (Nice Life)
Hollie Cook: Happy Hour in Dub (Merge)
Andrew Cyrille: Music Delivery / Percussion (Intakt)
Kate Gentile: b i o m e i.i (Obliquity)
Yves Tumor: Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (Warp)
Dan Ex Machina: Ex’s Sexts (self-released)
Open Mike Eagle: another triumph of ghetto engineering (AutoReverse)
Yonic South: Devo Challenge Cup (Wild Honey)
Rudy Royston: Day (Greenleaf Music)
Chien Chien Lu: Built in System—Live in New York (Giant Step Arts)
Pangaea: Changing Channels (Hessle Audio)
Lewsberg: Out and About (Lewsberg / 12XU)
Basher: Doubles (Sinking City)
That Mexican OT: Lonestar Luchador (Good Talk)
Daniel Villarreal: Lados B (International Anthem)
Staples Jr. Singers: Tell Heaven (EP) (Luaka Bop) Note: the vinyl gets you more great minutes of testifying.
Brandee Younger: Brand New Life (Impulse!)
Babe, Terror: Teghnojoyg (self-released)
Heinali: Kyiv Eternal (Injazero)
Vinny Golia Quartet: No Refunds (Unbroken Sounds)
Kresten Osgood / Bob Moses / Tisziji Munoz: Spiritual Drum Kingship (Gotta Let It Out)
The Art Ensemble of Chicago: From Paris to Paris (Rogue Art)
Clarence “Bluesman” Davis: Shake It ForMe (Music Maker Foundation)
The War and The Treaty: Lover’s Game (Mercury Nashville)
Aroof Aftab, Vijay Iyer & Shahzad, Ismaily: Love in Exile (Verve)
Asher Gamedze: Turbulence and Pulse (International Anthem)
Normal Nada the Krakmaxter: Tribal Progressive Heavy Metal (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Natural Child: Be M’Guest (Natural Child Music)
Tanya Tucker: Sweet Western Sound (Fantasy)

Excavations and Reissues

Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens: Music Inferno—The Indestructible Beat Tour 1988-89 (Umsakazo Records)
Kashmere Stage Band: Texas Thunder Soul 1968-1974 (Now-Again)
The Replacements: Tim—Let It Bleed Edition (Rhino)
Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached (New Land Records)
Walter Bishop, Jr.: Bish at the Bank—Live in Baltimore (Cellar Live)
Various Artists: Yebo! Rare Mzansi Party Beats from Apartheid’s Dying Years (BBE)
Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra: 60 Years (The Village)
Os Tincoas: Canto Coral Afrobrasiliero (Sanzala Cultural)
Various Artists: Ecuatoriana (Analog Africa)
Leon Keita: Leon Keita (Analog Africa)
Hiroshi Yoshimura: Surround (Temporal Drift)
Balka Sound: Balka Sound (Strut)
Sonic Youth: Live in Brooklyn (Silver Current)
John Coltrane: Evenings at The Village Gate (Impulse!)
Various Artists: Playing for The Man at The Door (Smithsonian Folkways)
Gabe Baltazar: Birdology (Fresh Sounds)
Hiatus Kaiyote: Choose Your Weapon (Flying Buddha / Sony Masterworks)
Dream Dolphin: Gaia—Selected Ambient & Downtempo Works (1996 – 2003) (Music from Memory)
Various Artists: The Soul of Congo – Treasures of the Ngoma label (1948-1963) (Planet Ilunga)
Sonny Stitt: Boppin’ in Baltimore—Live at the Left Bank (Jazz Detective)
Ihsan Al-Munzer: Belly Dance (BBE)
Dredd Foole & The Din: See God 1985-1986 (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
Johnny Griffin: Live at Ronnie Scott’s, 1964 (Gearbox)
Nina Simone: You’ve Got to Learn (Verve)
William S. Burroughs: Nothing Here But the Recordings (Dais Records)
Eddie & Ernie: Time Waits for No One (Mississippi Records)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 1 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 2 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
The Southern University Jazz Ensemble: Goes to Africa with Love (Now-Again)
Roy Campbell / William Parker / Zan Matsuura: Visitation of the Spirits—The Pyramind Trio Live, 1985 (No Business)
Sonny Rollins: Live at Finlandia Hall, Helsinki 1972 (Svart)
Various Artists: The Best of Revelation Records 1959-1962 (NarroWay)
Shizuka: Heavenly Persona (Black Editions)
Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom: Daytime Viewing (Unseen Worlds)
Bob Dylan: Time Out of Mind Stripped Naked (Columbia)
Various Artists: Blacklips Bar—Androgyns and Deviants / Industrial Romance for Bruised and Battered Angels 1992-1995 (Anthology Recordings)
Wes Montgomery: Maximum Swing (Resonance)
Various Artists: Con Piano, Sublime—Early Recordings from the Caribbean 1907-1921 (Magnificent Sounds)
Various Artists: Space Echo—The Mystery Behind the Cosmic Sound of Cabo Verde Revealed! (Analog Africa)
Ibrahim Hesnawi: The Father of Libyan Reggae (Habibi Funk)
RP Boo: Legacy Volume 2 (Planet Mu)
Les Raillizes Denudes: ’77 Live (Temporal Drift)
Alon Nechushtan: For Those Who Cross the Seas (ESP-Disk)
Eddie Lockjaw Davis and Shirley Scott: Cookin’ With Jaws and The Queen (Craft)
Professor James Benson: The Gow-Dow Experience (Jazzman Records)
Little Bob and The Lollipops: Nobody But You (Mississippi Records)

Happy Hour in Excelsior Springs: Not Feeling Tardy Delivering My Favorite Records of 2023, January 1 – September 1

Comin’ atcha from one of Al Capone’s old haunts! Nicole’s gettin’ a CBD massage in this haunted hotel’s famous spa, we got kicked out of the pool for some reserved loud wedding strutting, and I’m sippin’ Blue Moons to the tune of my $100 worth of Bandcamp Friday investments. School’s in for me, so with three freshman comp classes and tutoring, I haven’t even been able to read–man, when that happens, I’m like Antaeus without his feet on the ground. BUT…I made it, smellin’ like chlorine and all.

Suite Sweets:

*In 2009, at 75, Bobby Rush played a show at the school I taught at, to an audience composed mostly of our black students, their parents, and even grandparents. Though it fell into my lap, I still had to do some legwork; in the end, it’s one of my Top 3 greatest experiences as an educator. AT 89, Rush just delivered his best album since Live at Ground Zero and Folkfunk (if anyone’s keeping track)–a team-up with Willie awaits, and I am not joking. Their people need to think about it.

*I was starting to think Noname was too good to wax rap records, and that’s a statement of respect. I am glad to see her back in the game, elegant, concise, and powerful.

*The year’s most gorgeous jazz album might be Miguel Zenon’s second record of boleros.

*St. Louis’ best rock and roll band (Americana, if you prefer) is Money for Guns. They just released their very best record, so if you still recognize those two genres, you might wanna sniff it out. I must admit that their co-lead singer and songwriter substitute-taught at my school over a decade ago when he was a Frustrated Bachelor, but as sharp as he was, I figured he’d be teaching at this point. He wisely keep his shoulder to the musical wheel.*

*Those of you that are free jazz fans might still be processing all those Zoh Amba records from 2022. Her new one with Orcutt on guitar might be THE ONE you need if she hasn’t hooked you yet.

*I’ve been lucky enough to see Sonic Youth live at their peak (I’m calling that the Goo tour) and in their admirable, um, dotage (2002, maybe?). The new live-in-Brooklyn document is a lovely gift to us, and does it open with some painful honesty.

*Ember. Who the funk are they? Well, they just released the most fascinatingly responsive jazz record of the year. I need to do more research, but I played it out of obligation and ended up hypnotized.

*Steve Pick, my man! Thank you for pointing me to That Mexican OT. If you miss fun and outrageous rap, and maybe like Mexican wrestling, please don’t hesitate. Unless it’s to helmet-polish for a bit.

*It might set you back some, but The Village’s six-decade overview of the great Horace Tapscott’s musical world of Watts is well worth it. He is the most underrated figure in jazz history (mostly because he chose to devote his efforts to local musical work rather than pursuit of fame), and his accomplishment has never been better documented than on the Pan Afrikan Peoples Orchestra set.

*I am standing firm on my feeling that Anohni’s My Back was a Bridge for You to Cross is the most powerful (and therefore best) record of the year. I’ve been told the vibrato is too much (tell that to the ghost of Sarah Vaughan) and that the quality tails (I think it simply shifts in kind of quality), but it still haunts me, and I know I am not alone.

BONUS TIP: If you happen to love balls-out drums (especially drums)-and-guit Devotion-like wailing…check out Spiritual Drum Kingship. Sometimes you just need your ass kicked by surging plugged-in improv.

(Bolded items are new to the list)

Anohni: My Back Was a Bridge for You to Cross (Secretly Canadian)
Gina Burch: I Play My Bass Loud (Third Man)
100 gecs: 10,000 gecs (Dog Show/Atlantic)
boygenius:the record (Interscope)
Bettye LaVette: LaVette! (Jay-Vee)
Buck 65: Super Dope (self-released?)
Jessie Ware: That! Feels Good! (Universal)
Noname: Sundial (AWAL Recordings America)
billy woods & Kenny Segal: Maps (Backwoodz Studios)
Liv.e: Girl in The Half Pearl (Real Life / AWAL)
Kelela: Raven (Warp)
Big Freedia: Central City (Queen Diva)
National Information Society: Since Time is Gravity (Eremite)
Allen Lowe and the Constant Sorrow Orchestra: In the Dark (ESP-Disk)
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble: Spirit Gatherer—A Tribute to Don Cherry (Spiritmuse)
Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records)
London Brew: London Brew (Concord)
Fire! Orchestra: Echoes (Rune Grammofon)
Wadada Leo Smith: Fire Illuminations (Kabell)
The Mark Lomax II Trio: Tapestry (CFG Multimedia)
Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah & Chief Adjuah: Bark Out Thunder Roar Out Lightning (Ropeadope)
Janelle Monae: The Age of Pleasure (Bad Boy)
Dropkick Murphys: Okemah Rising (Dummy Luck Music)
Isach Skeidsvoll: Dance to Summon (Ultraani Records)
Miguel Zenon & Luis Perdomo: El Arte del Bolero, Volume 2 (ArcArtists)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 3—If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich? (New Amsterdam)
Parannoul: After the Magic (Poclanos/Top Shelf)
Yaeji: With a Hammer (XL Recordings)
The Urban Art Ensemble: “Ho’opomopono” (CFG Multimedia 16-minute single)
Felo Le Tee & Mellow & Sleazy: The Ill Wise Men (New Money Gang)
Brandy Clark: Brandy Clark (Warner)
Rodrigo Campos: Pagode Novo (YB Music)
The Necks: Travel (Northern Spy)
Kali Uchis: Red Moon in Venus (Geffen)
Bobby Rush: All My Love for You (Deep Rush / Thirty Tigers)
Marina Sena: Vicio Inerente (Sony)
Young Fathers: Heavy Heavy (Ninja Tune)
Willie Nelson: I Don’t Know a Thing About Love—The Songs of Harlan Howard (Legacy)
Peso Pluma: GENESIS (Double P)
Ice Cold Bishop: Generational Curse (Ice Cold Entertainment)
Allen Lowe and The Constant Sorrow Orchestra: America—The Rough Cut (ESP-Disk)
Tyshawn Sorey:Continuing (Pi Recordings)
Nourished by Time: Erotic Probiotic 2 (Scenic Route)
Walter Daniels: “From Death to Texas” / “Seems Like a Dream” (Spacecase Records 45)
Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Hell to Pay (Black & Wyatt)
Algiers: Shook (Matador)
KAYTRAMINE: KAYTRAMIUNE, Amine, & KAYTRANADA (CLBN)
Withered Hand: How to Love (Reveal)
Lori McKenna: 1988 (CN Records / Thirty Tigers)
ensemble 0: Jojoni(Crammed Discs)
Henry Threadgill: The Other One(Pi)
Kari Faux: REAL BITCHES DON’T DIE (drunk sum wtr records)
Zoh Amba & Chris Corsano & Bill Orcutt: The Flower School (Palilalia)
Lewis Capaldi: Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent (Vertigo Berline)
aja monet: when the poems do what they do (drink sum wtr)
Knoel Scott (featuring Marshall Allen): Celestial (Night Dreamer)
Ember: August in March (Imani)
Meshell Ndegeocello: The Omnichord Real Book (Blue Note)
Taj Mahal: Savoy (Cheraw S.C.)
corook: serious person (part 1) (Atlantic)
Haviah Mighty: Crying Crystals (Mighty Gang)
Rome Streetz: Wasn’t Built in a Day (Big Ghost)
Jaimie Branch: Fly or Die Fly or Die ((world war)) (International Anthem)
Kiko El Crazy: Pila’e Teteo (Rimas)
Islandman (featuring Okay Temiz and Muhlis Berberoglu: Direct-to-Disc Sessions (Night Dreamer)
Edward Simon: Femeninas (ArtistShare)
Kill Bill—The Rapper: Fullmetal Kaiju (EXO)
Money for Guns: All the Darkness That’s in Your Head (CD Baby)
Rough Image: Rough Image (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Ingrid Laubrock: The Last Quiet Place (Pyroclastic)
Rob Mazurek & Exploding Star Orchestra: LightningDreamers (International Anthem)
Kaze & Ikue Mori: Crustal Movement (Circum/Libra)
DJ Black Low: Impumelelo (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Belle and Sebastian: Late Developers (Matador)
Satoko Fujii & Otomo Yoshihide: Perpetual Motion (Ayler Records)
feeble little horse: Girl with Fish (Saddle Creek)
Rocket 88: House of Jackpots (12XU)
Taiko Saito: Tears of a Cloud (Trouble in the East)
JPEGMAFIA x Danny Brown: Scaring the Hoes (self-released)
Water from Your Eyes: Everyone’s Crushed (Matador)
Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind)
Amaarae: Fountain Baby (Golden Angel/Interscope)
Blondshell: Blondshell (Partisan)
Satoko Fujii: Torrent (Libra Records)
Javon Jackson: “With Peter Bradley”—Soundtrack and Original Score (Solid Jackson)
YMA & Jadsa: Zelena (Matraca)
Palehound: Eye on the Bat (Polyvinyl)
J Hus: Beautiful and Brutal Yard (Black Butter)
Das Kondensat: Anderen Planeten (Why Play Jazz)
Iris DeMent: Workin’ On a World (FlariElla)
David Mirarchi: Ink Folly, Orchid Gleam(Unbroken Sounds) (coming soon….)
Baaba Maal: Being (Atelier Live/Marathon Artists)
Bob Dylan: Shadow Kingdom (Columbia)
Lana Del Rey: Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd (Polydor)
Romulo Froes & Tiago Rosas: Na Goela (YB Music)
Buselli – Wallarab Jazz Orchestra: The Gennett Suite (Patois Records)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #9—Targeted (Hammer Recordings)
James Brandon Lewis: Eye of I (Anti-)
Sexyy Red: Hood Hottest Princess (Open Shift)
Joanna Sternberg: I’ve Got Me (Fat Possum)
Tracey Nelson: Life Don’t Miss Nobody (BMG)
Etran De L’Air: Live in Seattle (EP) (Sahel Sounds)
Everything But the Girl: Fuse (Buzzin’ Fly)
Tomas Fujiwara’s Triple Double: March On (self-released EP—coming in March)
Ice Spice: Like…? (10K Projects / Capitol Records EP)
otay:onii: Dream Hacker (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Sylvie Courvoisier & Cory Smythe: The Rite of Spring—Spectre d’un songe (Pyroclastic)
Itamar Borochov: Arba (Greenleaf)
Nakimbembe Embaire Group: Nakimbembe Embaire Group (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Shirley Collins: Archangel Hill (Domino)
Karol G: Manana Sera Bonito (Universal Music Latino)
Hollie Cook: Happy Hour in Dub (Merge)
Andrew Cyrille: Music Delivery / Percussion (Intakt)
Kate Gentile: b i o m e i.i (Obliquity)
Yves Tumor: Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (Warp)
Open Mike Eagle: another triumph of ghetto engineering (AutoReverse)
Yonic South: Devo Challenge Cup (Wild Honey)
Rudy Royston: Day (Greenleaf Music)
Basher: Doubles (Sinking City)
That Mexican OT: Lonestar Luchador (Good Talk)
Staples Jr. Singers: Tell Heaven (EP) (Luaka Bop) Note: the vinyl gets you more great minutes of testifying.
Brandee Younger: Brand New Life (Impulse!)
Babe, Terror: Teghnojoyg
Heinali: Kyiv Eternal (Injazero)
Tri-County Liquidators: “Flies” / “Weep Then Whisper” / “Bitter” (self-released)
Vinny Golia Quartet: No Refunds (Unbroken Sounds)
Kresten Osgood / Bob Moses / Tisziji Munoz: Spiritual Drum Kingship (Gotta Let It Out)
The Art Ensemble of Chicago: From Paris to Paris (Rogue Art)
Clarence “Bluesman” Davis: Shake It For Me (Music Maker Foundation)
The War and The Treaty: Lover’s Game (Mercury Nashville)
Aroof Aftab, Vijay Iyer & Shahzad, Ismaily: Love in Exile (Verve)
Asher Gamedze: Turbulence and Pulse (International Anthem)
Normal Nada the Krakmaxter: Tribal Progressive Heavy Metal (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Natural Child: Be M’Guest (Natural Child Music)
Tanya Tucker: Sweet Western Sound (Fantasy)

Excavations and Reissues

Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens: Music Inferno—The Indestructible Beat Tour 1988-89 (Umsakazo Records)
Kashmere Stage Band: Texas Thunder Soul 1968-1974 (Now-Again)
Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached (New Land Records)
Walter Bishop, Jr.: Bish at the Bank—Live in Baltimore (Cellar Live)
Various Artists: Yebo! Rare Mzansi Party Beats from Apartheid’s Dying Years (BBE)
Pan Afrikan Peoples Arkestra: 60 Years (The Village)
Nina Simone: You’ve Got to Learn (Verve)
William S. Burroughs: Nothing Here But the Recordings (Dais Records)
Balka Sound: Balka Sound (Strut)
Sonic Youth: Live in Brooklyn (Silver Current)
John Coltrane: Evenings at The Village Gate (Impulse!)
Various Artists: Playing for The Man at The Door (Smithsonian Folkways)
Hiatus Kaiyote: Choose Your Weapon (Flying Buddha / Sony Masterworks)
Dream Dolphin: Gaia—Selected Ambient & Downtempo Works (1996 – 2003) (Music from Memory)
Eddie & Ernie: Time Waits for No One (Mississippi Records)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 1 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 2 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
The Southern University Jazz Ensemble: Goes to Africa with Love (Now-Again)
Sonny Rollins: Live at Finlandia Hall, Helsinki 1972 (Svart)
Various Artists: The Best of Revelation Records 1959-1962 (NarroWay)
Shizuka: Heavenly Persona (Black Editions)
Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom: Daytime Viewing (Unseen Worlds)
Bob Dylan: Time Out of Mind Stripped Naked (Columbia)
Various Artists: Blacklips Bar—Androgyns and Deviants / Industrial Romance for Bruised and Battered Angels 1992-1995 (Anthology Recordings)
Various Artists: Ecuatoriana (Analog Africa)
RP Boo: Legacy Volume 2 (Planet Mu)
Les Raillizes Denudes: ’77 Live (Temporal Drift)
Eddie Lockjaw Davis and Shirley Scott: Cookin’ With Jaws and The Queen (Craft)
Professor James Benson:The Gow-Dow Experience (Jazzman Records)
Little Bob and The Lollipops: Nobody But You (Mississippi Records)

THIS STUFF! FEELS GOOD!: 110 Truly Interesting Records We’ve Received So Far in ’23 (not bad!)

Hi! I hope summer is off to as dazzling a musical start for you as it has for me! Not only have the records come marching in, but I am teaching a very enjoyable asynchronous class for Stephens College that’s built around Susan Rogers‘ and Ogi Ogas‘ This Is What It Sounds Like (you yourselves might well love not only the book but its fun associated website), which take a look at why our brains push us toward certain kinds of music and not others. My students are doing excellent work: I will send an essay by one of them up very soon, in which the author will enter the current Lewis Capaldi fuck-him/marry-him/kill-him scrum in enthusiastic form. They have to construct, explain, and interpret their unique listening profiles (see the book) for their final project, and I’m definitely looking forward to that.

Nut Notes:

*Boy howdy, that boygenius album has subtle and often barbed charms. Is it just me, or has the counterattack begun?

*It’s quite a boast, but Buck 65 wins this month’s “Truth in Title Advertising” award by a hair over…

*…JESSIE WARE, who got extra points for punctuation and makes me feel young again–seriously. For the record, I am currently 61, and can someone put her and Roisin Murphy on a US tour so I can go dance deliriously and live deliciously?

*The Dropkick Murphys dropped their second (?) album of (literally) unsung Woody Guthrie songs last month–how’d I miss the first, which came out LAST YEAR (it just came in the mail yesterday)? While I was blasting it on Memorial Day, Nicole remarked, “Does his stuff stay relevant or what?” She’s an Okie, so she might be biased–but she’s also correct.

*Wild Up released their third record interpreting the amazing minimalist (but not exactly) work of Julius Eastman. This one is a bit more in your face, which is partly the particular Eastman compositions they chose to work with, but I bet they’ve spent some time with Eight Songs for a Mad King, where he makes one particular unforgettable vocal appearance.

*Nourished by Time…that is one eccentric but impressive r&b album. I was lazy sampling it and assumed from the cover it was going to be a rap album–I know next to nothing about this act–but it sure as hell is not.

*Little Rock, Arkansas’ Kari Faux has a special title message for you that she backs up on her new record.

*Simply put, you’re gonna want that Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens record at the top of the “old stuff” list. I can’t believe it looking back, but I saw a show on that tour–I should have been too ignant to know–and it.is.theshit.

*You think harp and jazz is a twain that never should meet? Brandee Younger does not agree, nor did Dorothy Ashby, whose very convincing soon-come 5-LP reconsideration by New Land Younger contributes notes for.

*”If you’re doing business with a religious son of a bitch, get it in writing!” It is SO nice to hear William S. Burroughs‘ inimitable and often prophetic voice coming from my speakers again, via Dais Records’ sharply assembled compilation of 1960s recordings. (That italicized quote isn’t on the record–look for Uncommon Quotes, if it’s still available–but many other worthy utterances are.)

*MARK LOMAX II never makes a foolish move.

*Brazil in the house…always. Check out #27 and #31 for sure.

*Kate Gentile‘s new free/experimental/jazz record is like walking blindfolded through a wind-blown percussion forest in the middle of the night.

*I have a feeling that The Gennett Suite, in which the artists “elasticize” the sound of the original classic recordings released on that label (think Bix), may meet with some jazz argumentation. I stand with Buselli and Walarab–the originals are strong enough to be stretched. They shine in this new light.

*Many (of the few) readers of the blog probably already know that Lux Interior and Ivy Rorshach of The Cramps were ace 45 collectors. I’m a BIG fan of theirs, but even I was not aware that Righteous Records is more deeply mining their collection, getting past that legendary stuff (“Love Me,” “I Can’t Hardly Stand It,” “The Strangeness in Me,’ “Bop Pills”–I can go on) and finding even more pretty worthy curiosities. Don’t miss the latest at the very end of the list, and it’s just the latest volume.

(Bolded items are new to the list)

Gina Burch: I Play My Bass Loud (Third Man)
100 gecs: 10,000 gecs (Dog Show/Atlantic)
boygenius: the record (Interscope)
Buck 65: Super Dope (self-released?)
Jessie Ware: That! Feels Good! (Universal)
billy woods & Kenny Segal: Maps (Backwoodz Studios)
Liv.e: Girl in The Half Pearl (Real Life / AWAL)
Kelela: Raven (Warp)
National Information Society: Since Time is Gravity (Eremite)
Allen Lowe and the Constant Sorrow Orchestra: In the Dark (ESP-Disk)
Rodrigo Campos: Pagode Novo(YB Music)
Ethnic Heritage Ensemble: Spirit Gatherer—A Tribute to Don Cherry (Spiritmuse)
Yaeji: With a Hammer (XL Recordings)
Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records)
London Brew: London Brew (Concord)
Fire! Orchestra: Echoes (Rune Grammofon)
Wadada Leo Smith: Fire Illuminations (Kabell)
The Mark Lomax II Trio: Tapestry (CFG Multimedia)
Dropkick Murphys: Okemah Rising (Dummy Luck Music)
Islandman (featuring Okay Temiz and Muhlis Berberoglu: Direct-to-Disc Sessions (Night Dreamer)
Parannoul: After the Magic (Poclanos/Top Shelf)
Belle and Sebastian: Late Developers (Matador)
Satoko Fujii & Otomo Yoshihide: Perpetual Motion (Ayler Records)
The Urban Art Ensemble: “Ho’opomopono” (CFG Multimedia 16-minute single)
The Necks: Travel (Northern Spy)
Kali Uchis: Red Moon in Venus (Geffen)
Marina Sena: Vicio Inerente (Sony)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 3—If You’re So Smart, Why Aren’t You Rich? (New Amsterdam)
Willie Nelson: I Don’t Know a Thing About Love—The Songs of Harlan Howard (Legacy)
Allen Lowe and The Constant Sorrow Orchestra: America—The Rough Cut (ESP-Disk)
Edward Simon: Femeninas (ArtistShare)
Tyshawn Sorey: Continuing (Pi Recordings)
Nourished by Time: Erotic Probiotic 2 (Scenic Route)
Walter Daniels: “From Death to Texas” / “Seems Like a Dream” (Spacecase Records 45)
Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Hell to Pay (Black & Wyatt)
Algiers: Shook (Matador)
KAYTRAMINE: KAYTRAMIUNE, Amine, & KAYTRANADA (CLBN)
Withered Hand: How to Love (Reveal)
ensemble 0: Jojoni (Crammed Discs)
Henry Threadgill: The Other One (Pi)
Kari Faux: REAL BITCHES DON’T DIE (drunk sum wtr records)
Kiko El Crazy: Pila’e Teteo (Rimas)
Kill Bill—The Rapper: Fullmetal Kaiju (EXO)
Lewis Capaldi: Broken By Desire To Be Heavenly Sent (Vertigo Berline)
Rough Image: Rough Image (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Ingrid Laubrock: The Last Quiet Place (Pyroclastic)
Rob Mazurek & Exploding Star Orchestra: Lightning Dreamers (International Anthem)
Kaze & Ikue Mori: Crustal Movement (Circum/Libra)
DJ Black Low: Impumelelo (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Rocket 88: House of Jackpots (12XU)
Taiko Saito: Tears of a Cloud (Trouble in the East)
JPEGMAFIA x Danny Brown: Scaring the Hoes (self-released)
Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind)
Mat Muntz: Phantom Islands (Orenda)
Satoko Fujii: Torrent (Libra Records)
Javon Jackson: “With Peter Bradley”—Soundtrack and Original Score (Solid Jackson)
Das Kondensat: Anderen Planeten(Why Play Jazz)
Iris DeMent: Workin’ On a World (FlariElla)
David Mirarchi: Ink Folly, Orchid Gleam (Unbroken Sounds) (coming soon….)
Baaba Maal: Being (Atelier Live/Marathon Artists)
Romulo Froes & Tiago Rosas: Na Goela (YB Music)
Buselli – Wallarab Jazz Orchestra: The Gennett Suite (Patois Records)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #9—Targeted (Hammer Recordings)
James Brandon Lewis: Eye of I (Anti-)
Tomas Fujiwara’s Triple Double: March On (self-released EP—coming in March)
Ice Spice: Like…?(10K Projects / Capitol Records EP)
otay:onii: Dream Hacker (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Sylvie Courvoisier & Cory Smythe: The Rite of Spring—Spectre d’un songe (Pyroclastic)
Nakimbembe Embaire Group: Nakimbembe Embaire Group (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Karol G: Manana Sera Bonito (Universal Music Latino)
Andrew Cyrille: Music Delivery / Percussion (Intakt)
Kate Gentile: b i o m e i.i (Obliquity)
Yves Tumor:Praise a Lord Who Chews but Which Does Not Consume; (Or Simply, Hot Between Worlds) (Warp)
Lonnie Holley: Oh Me Oh My (Jagjaguwar)
Lana Del Rey: Did you know that there’s a tunnel under Ocean Blvd (Polydor)
Yonic South: Devo Challenge Cup (Wild Honey)
Rudy Royston: Day (Greenleaf Music)
Lankum: False Lankum (Rough Trade)
Staples Jr. Singers: Tell Heaven (EP) (Luaka Bop) Note: the vinyl gets you more great minutes of testifying.
Brandee Younger: Brand New Life (Impulse!)
Heinali: Kyiv Eternal (Injazero)
Tri-County Liquidators: “Flies” / “Weep Then Whisper” / “Bitter” (self-released)
Vinny Golia Quartet: No Refunds (Unbroken Sounds)
Black Country, New Road: Live at Bush Hall (Ninja Tune)
The Art Ensemble of Chicago: From Paris to Paris (Rogue Art)
Clarence “Bluesman” Davis: Shake It For Me (Music Maker Foundation)
Aroof Aftab, Vijay Iyer & Shahzad, Ismaily: Love in Exile (Verve)
Asher Gamedze: Turbulence and Pulse (International Anthem)
Angel Bat Dawid: Requiem for Jazz (International Anthem)
Kara Jackson: Why Does the Earth Give Us People to Love? (September Recordings)
Billy Valentine: Billy Valentine and The Universal Truth (Flying Dutchman)

Excavations and Reissues

(Note: These are not in order of my love for them–still sorting that out.)

Mahlathini and the Mahotella Queens: Music Inferno—The Indestructible Beat Tour 1988-89 (Umsakazo Records)
Dorothy Ashby: With Strings Attached (New Land Records)
Walter Bishop, Jr.: Bish at the Bank—Live in Baltimore (Cellar Live)
William S. Burroughs: Nothing Here But the Recordings (Dais Records)
Balka Sound: Balka Sound(Strut)
Hiatus Kaiyote: Choose Your Weapon (Flying Buddha / Sony Masterworks)
Dream Dolphin: Gaia—Selected Ambient & Downtempo Works (1996-2003) (Music from Memory)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 1 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Various Artists: Purple Haze from East, Volume 2 (WV Sorcerer Productions)
Shizuka: Heavenly Persona (Black Editions)
Jacqueline Humbert & David Rosenboom: Daytime Viewing (Unseen Worlds)
Bob Dylan: Time Out of Mind Stripped Naked (Columbia)
Various Artists: Blacklips Bar—Androgyns and Deviants / Industrial Romance for Bruised and Battered Angels 1992-1995 (Anthology Recordings)
RP Boo: Legacy Volume 2 (Planet Mu)
Les Raillizes Denudes: ’77 Live (Temporal Drift)
Luther Thomas: 11^th Street Fire Suite (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
Eddie Lockjaw Davis and Shirley Scott: Cookin’ With Jaws and The Queen(Craft)
Professor James Benson: The Gow-Dow Experience (Jazzman Records)
Various Artists: Strontium 90, Shrimps & Gumbo—Lux & Ivy Dig Motorcycle Boots & Mutants (Righteous Records)

Gooba Gooba Gooba Gooba, Goodbye: So Long to Huey Piano Smith, last of the New Orleans Professors, and (at long last) a 2023 Top 10.

The great New Orleans piano “professor” Huey Piano Smith–one the last living architects of rock and roll–passed on February 13. Between that date and his first recorded music in 1952 is almost the same span as the distance between the end of the Civil War and the beginning of World War II. Smith had not played in public for quite a long time, and his catalog is not too deep, but the best of what he did wax is timeless, spirit-liberating, deliriously anarchic rock and roll. Whenever Nicole and I have thrown house parties, regardless of the nature and tastes of the guests, we’ve always included his classic with the Clowns, “Don’t You Just Know It” (anyone who attended one particular party we threw will remember me swinging between two rooms by the door jamb yelling the P-Funk-prophesying “Gooba gooba gooba” refrain), and few documentaries have begun so sublimely as Les Blank’s Always for Pleasure: ships arriving at New Orleans docks to the sound of “Sea Cruise.” I watch that film every Mardi Gras (often forcing it on whatever class I’m teaching, along with King Cake), and the coming celebration will be no exception. I urge you, if you are not familiar with Smith’s music with the Clowns, a group that included at various times some great musicians you probably know, to stream the above album then hit Discogs (your best bet).

Also–and, looking back over my posts from the last few years, I realize I ALWAYS do this–I finally have a Top 10 list of excellent new albums for 2023, though it took me until mid-February to compile one. This portends nothing; I have no doubt my December list will sprawl. I need to cease whining. Here ’tis–kind of a motley crew, but they pack a punch:

Belle and Sebastian: Late Developers (Matador)
Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind)
Satoko Fujii & Otomo Yoshihide: Perpetual Motion (Ayler Records)
Parannoul: After the Magic (Poclanos/Top Shelf)
Kelela: Raven (Warp)
Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records)
Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Hell to Pay (Black & Wyatt)
Yonic South: Devo Challenge Cup (Wild Honey)
Staples Jr. Singers: Tell Heaven (EP) (Luaka Bop) Note: the vinyl gets you more great minutes of testifying.
Mat Muntz: Phantom Islands (Orenda)

I’m a day late for Valentine’s Day, which was sort of the occasion for its release (but also not really, since Dr. Mark Lomax’s compositions are always created with the listener’s spiritual sustenance in mind), but this 16-minute “single” by The Urban Art Ensemble, titled “Ho’oponopono,” is a true gift. The song title translates to the name of a traditional Hawaiian “practice of reconciliation and forgiveness.”

Here’s a peek at the trailer for a related production by Dr. Lomax and friends:

Five I Missed That Woulda Made The 2022 List: New Discoveries from the Year That Was (+ a 2023 Addendum)

I don’t need to tell you that you can’t listen to everything. In my darkest moments, the thought that if I chose to step off the edge of the world I might miss a fantastic record has brightened my corner; my (and maybe your ambition) to hear it all is doomed to thwartation, but it never keeps me from trying. I didn’t know about these five records until late last month, but they certainly would have made my 2022 Top 40. Thank the stars or whatever for other blogging rekkid obsessives!

Santigold: Spirituals (Little Jerk Records) — During her early years she was a favorite of favorite students of mine, and thus she was a favorite of mine. I’d largely forgotten about her until I was tipped off about this moving, grooving, and consistent record that, despite the title, begins with this track:

Moonchild Sanelly: Phases (Transgressive Records) — 2022 was a great year for South African dance music, and I stayed well-informed, so don’t ask me why I just know learned about this act. Sanelisiwe Twisha began her career, according to Wikipedia, in “sex entertainment,” and she ain’t shy, for sure, but when I read (not on Wikipedia, though it’s there, but two days ago from a source I already can’t remember) that she called her music “future ghetto punk,” I was all in. Clicked to sample it and was dancing and bouncing around the house. I am 61 and have vestibular neuritis, so that’s saying something. Would’ve been in my Top 20, methinks. I think I’ll send a copy to the the Missouri state capitol of creeps.

Various Artists: Ghost Riders (Efficient Space) — Talk about “other blogging rekkid obsessives”: I am not alone in being grateful for Chuck Eddy‘s existence. He’ll try anything, which is a compliment, and he recommended this Australian collection of strangely moving, eerie, and funny songs from what one Bandcamp user called “garage nobodies” early enough for me to get it onto my 2022 list. I didn’t get it in the mail until late December, then it sat on a stack waiting for me, then in early January I finally dug in. Aside from those other adjectives I used above, it’s also…naively ethereal and lovably camp. Special prizes are a non-country sequel to “Ode to Billie Joe” and a seemingly ill-advised cover of The Beatles’ “Here, There, & Everywhere,” probably my favorite McCartney-sung tune of theirs, that The Common People (heh heh) not only survive but excel on. Thanks, Chuck!

Mary Halvorson: Belladonna and Amaryllis (Nonesuch Records) — A) For some reason I back away from any artist no matter how much I enjoy their work when they release two records at once (except for Ka). B) I have usually been disappointed by “with strings” albums by artists I’m not totally nuts about (Belladona is such). C) I didn’t have time for this project. I’m just being honest. Plus Mary with strings did not appeal to me, despite the fact I dearly dig her even if it were just for this clip that I always show my women’s college students. BUT the strings album is quite beautiful especially because (not in spite) of plectoral soundwave warping, and I discovered too late that the Halvorson-influenced vibraphonist Patricia Brennan, whose 2022 record More Touch is mesmerizing, plays with and around Halvorson on it. So…fuck me, live and learn!

Mary J. Blige: Good Morning, Gorgeous (300 Entertainment Records) — One of the records my wife and I courted to was What’s The 411? I happen to think her team-up with Method Man, “All I Need”, is ETERNAL. I’ve liked everything I’ve heard by her, and enjoyed her in the film Mudbound. I recently taught the mother of her road band’s guitarist (Ma is three days older than me!), who told me many stories and showed me cool pics. I have no reason not to keep up with Mary, but I don’t. Too bad, because I think I love this record more than others who also do–there’s something about the production (by 17 different individuals? but it coheres!) that fits her like a silk glove. Now, I need to play it for Lady O.

BONUS 2022 ALBUM I ALSO FORGOT BUT I SHOULD HAVE PUT AT THE TOP:

Alaide Costa: O Que Meus Calos Dizem Sobre Mim (Tres Selos) — Truly one of the most gorgeous and richly detailed recordings of last year. It’s bossa nova of the highest order sung by the 87-year-old Costa couched in imaginative settings created by the Brazilian production team of Marcus Preto, Emicida, and Pupillo. Thanks to the intrepid Rod Taylor at Brazil Beat, my connection to the country that seems to create a wider and more consistent variety of interesting music than any I’m aware of. I would love a vinyl copy of this but it’ll be a pretty penny. Yesterday was pay day, so maybe I’ll jump. Check this out:

NOW, if you’ve read this far, last post I was moping about being driven half-insane by listing records month by month, year by year–it feels like a competition, governed by the law of diminishing returns, that inhibits my actual full enjoyment of music. Maybe I was in a bad mood–or maybe that post and this post are the emerging answer (now I need to quit Goodreads). Anyhow, here are two records from this year I inexplicably left off that post! I think I was trying not to lean to jazzward, but fuck it–this is good stuff, Maynards!

Lakecia Benjamin: Phoenix (Whirlwind) — Saxophonist Benjamin’s previous album was a tribute to John and Alice Coltrane that held up very well. In between that and this, she was involved in a car wreck that literally busted her chops. She’s rehabbed that problem–and how. This is a blazing set of original compositions augmented by some very notable guest appearances (Angela Davis? Sonia Sanchez? Wayne Shorter? Georgia Anne Muldrow? Patrice Rushen (my favorite of those names to see the light), and I’m not sure they’d have appeared if they hadn’t recognized the power of Benjamin’s playing and writing. Strongly recommended to Trane fans, but she’s got a sound all her own–and style. Dig:

Jason Moran: From the Dancehall to the Battlefield (Yes Records) — Moran’s last tribute, to Fats Waller on his last album for Blue Note, didn’t move me, and as a deep-down Wallerite that was deeply disappointing. This tribute (in Moran’s words, “a meditation on”) to the magnificent and hugely important bandleader and 369th Division Harlem Hellfighter and bandleader, the ill-fated James Reese Europe, is something else entirely. It is going to take a minute for me to fully unpack this varied, exciting, educational, and RICH record, but my sense is it will be in many Jazz Top 10s in December. It mixes takes on Reese’s tunes (and others they played), Moran’s compositions, and even a perfect contribution by none other than Pauline Oliveros, and makes a unified statement about someone most of us don’t know or at least know little about. Here’s a good original starting place: Europe’s “Memphis Blues.”

What To Do?

For several years this has been the spot where I have created gradually expanding lists of my favorite new albums and archival releases that turned my crank for each calendar year. It’s been quite fun most of the time, and recently got me on a few lists to receive review copies, many of which are actually pretty damn good. Thing is, doing so seems to encourage me to have to keep up with everything I hear about that sounds cool. That motivation, plus my natural curiosity and fear that I might miss something, inflates this seemingly fun project into a major pain in the ass too frequently and causes something that I really don’t think is healthy: I spend so much time cramming stuff in my earhole that I spend far less time listening to music I have loved for years. I’m freshly into my sixties, and I am not sure I want to keep doing it. Face it: when you keep hearing “Watching the Wheels” in your head and feeling upbraided by poor ol’ doomed John, you might wanna shift down. Also, so many of my talented, sharp-eared and big-hearted friends–many via the kind graces of Substack–are already doing the work; when you take their work together and add in the indefatigable Tom Hull–and these people do a lot of writing–I have to question what need have you/they of me. Seriously. I ain’t fishin’ for compliments. I mean, I know all that this has been and what it hasn’t.

So…I have some ideas. Obviously, if I only wrote about a few records I liked each month–wrote about them, much more fun than listing–regardless of vintage, I’d solve two problems: 1) I could watch the wheels more frequently, and 2) I’d have time and be motivated to listen to time-tested favorites. I could supplement that new practice by scribbling a bit about how music has manifested itself in my private and professional life, which it always does in interesting ways every month. I could write about ONE new record and ONE old one that really knocked me for a loop–and, again, give the reader a peek into music’s impacts on my domains (I think I actually have more than two, if I get out of the private – professional split and subdivide them. I could just look back into the history of this blog–some readers may not have noticed I’ve done several different things with it over the years–and pick up where I left off with something that was working when real life knocked me off the tracks for a bit.

I’ll figure it out. In the meantime, jeez, at least 10 new records have been rattling my bones by the end of January since I’ve been posting lists. I really can’t say that right now, but I can say this:

Tyler Keith’s seldom if ever disappointed me, going back to the earliest days of his I know, when he co-led The Neckbones, a Southern-fried Voidoids in more than a few ways. Keith wrestles with sin and salvation as regularly but more explicitly than Jerry Lee, he’s a reminder to listeners that much of the best rock and roll–and that’s what Hell to Pay is, even if a violin sneaks in–has come from the working class, and he’s got a way of conjuring desperation that always feels like the United States to me. His first new record in awhile, Hell to Pay, on Black and Wyatt Records, shows his commitment to those values has waned not a whit, and that his musical attack coheres with his excellent dark ‘n’ pulpy ‘n’ sweaty Southern noir novel The Mark of Cain, published last year. I highly recommend both vinyl and book, the latter his first.

Japanese pianist and bandleader extraordinaire Fujii released her 100th album as a leader or co-leader in 27 years (Hyaku: One Hundred Dreams–check it out), sending me on a backwards binge through her catalog that’s yet to hit an impasse. Fujii can do it all scintillatingly: lead big bands and ensembles, duet with all manner of instruments (with other pianists, with violin, and here, with electric guitarist Yoshihide), play like petals falling and landing or a rockslide rattling down to the road. She’s been a “Where have I been?” artist for this listener, and I suspect I’ll spend the year continuing to get caught up. On Ayler Records, and that should tell you something about her intensity.

Am I the only one who mourns the death of the hard-copy music guide? (It sure put the damper on my bathroom reading.) Moping the other day, I was thumbing through an old Penguin Guide to Jazz–I always loved them because they covered European jazz very well and very reliably–and came upon this 1974 **** record I’d overlooked. I then hit Discogs, found a decently-priced copy, and there weren’t many, then waited for Mr.Postman. I’ve played it 4-5 times since then (a few months ago); the band was a cooperative that notably included Sun Ra vet Ahmed Abdullah on trumpet and a young William Parker on bass. At many points on the record they sound like the Arkestra as if led by Ayler: almost magically structured, but intense–intensely martial. I can’t get enough of it; it’s out of print, so if you want to sample it…well, you knows what to do (RIP Barrett Strong). On No Business Records, and good luck. And here’s your luck–whaddya know?

YES THANK YOU: The Best of a Bounty of Absorbing, Motorvating, Challenging, Exciting Albums Gifted Us By 2022

190 albums of new music I can sit down with and which will at the very least engage and stimulate me enough to play them again. 45 albums of music made in the past that’s been reissued or freshly excavated that make me realize I’m never going to get to the point where I don’t have to dive into the past anymore and simply live in the musical moment. Does it all make me feel something akin to Jerry Lee Lewis’ music does? No–none of it does. It makes me feel new and different things, though; Live at the Star Club was a high bar for all popular performers when it came out, has been in the interim, and will continue to be, I can hear it first second to last in my head without having to put it on, and it still makes my skin prickle. BUT I’m all about feeling new feelings (and thinking new thoughts) (and experiencing new physical reactions) today’s music (be it acoustic or electric or organic) can conjure before I die. It’s been a salve as well as a shot in the arm and ass for me all year, and simply surveying the diversity of the list stuns me…and gives me hope. That last is important, because I seriously contemplate (once in a while) the possibility, voiced by folks far more educated than I am, that we’re a virus on this globe. We aren’t, or at least we don’t have to be, and we choose to be, at least some of us will create sounds that honor us, and help us go down feeling fully alive. Merry fucking Christmas, eh? YES. Merry fucking Christmas!

Relatively Merry Musings:

It’s absurd to try and put 190 (or even 45) records in precise modern music lovers’ order. After about #30, the procession gets a little I-Chingish; even so, days after I publish these, I find myself thinking, “Why’d I put that at #112?” I’m not gonna drive myself crazy, though. I feel pretty strongly about my Top 30, though when the wonderful and exacting Facebook group Expert Witness and the comfortably less exacting Facebook group Village Voice Pazz & Jop Rip-Off Poll comes a-calling for my final Top 10, mine might not be THIS Top 10. WON’T be THIS Top 10. Might even have something in it not even among these 235 slabs.
Thank you to one of my phenomenal Stephens College students (also a single mom) (also a veteran of our Middle Eastern wars) for writing an amazing essay on Mary Gauthier’s Rifles and Rosary Beads, which I forced on her (“folk music is not my jam”) and she ended up admiring, and giving a great presentation and handing in a nice research paper on previous-unknown-to-me Colombian-Canadian Jessie Reyez. Reyez has gotten her through some rough nights and I understand why.
I am a Little Simz self-starter. Though, pre-Grey Area, I merely appreciate her work, from that point on I’ve gone starry-eared, and her brand-spanking-new one, delicately Saulted, is no exception. She sounds great, she writes tough, and she inspires. I may come down to Earth in the next month, but I can’t worry about that now.
I have a California friend named Chris who often feeds me fuel I somehow miss, and he recently passed along a powerful, even rowdy record from Kinshasa, Lady Aicha and Pisko Crane’s N’Djila Wa Mudujimu, that moved me to immediately buy a vinyl copy. I could picture myself playing it over and over–and milady also seriously digs music from many African countries. I owe ya, Chris. THAT one may move UP.
Petrol Girls’ new album lives up to the band name. On fire, and fire burns.
Los Angeles’ Juke Bounce Werk label, which I just learned about a couple weeks ago, submitted an inexpensive 52-song comp of consistently propulsive–I dare say bangin’–dance music on Bandcamp. I thought, “Wow! I need to tell people about this!” Then I noticed it was the 10TH VOLUME of such compilations. Where’s the longform piece on these folks?
Above, I mentioned the Facebook group Village Voice Pazz & Jop Rip-Off Poll, which ably–I mean, ably–replaces the Voice’s influential but very gone original poll. Honestly, I like the Facebook version better: it’s more personal, interactive, flexible, surprising, funny–and group members’ early Top 10 submissions remind even the most avid music consumer that YOU CAN’T LISTEN TO EVERYTHING. Together, though, we can. I knew nothing about Mama’s Broke, took a flyer on Mama’s Broke’s Narrow Line on name and title alone from another user’s list…and heard echoes of Dock Boggs and The Carter Family modernized expertly for Struggle 2022. If I’d read about it, I’d have thought, “Not my jam”; it is my jam and peanut butter, too. Generic jars of each, because they’re more affordable.
I came late to both Tyler Childers’ and Pillbox Patti’s albums. Childers had won my heart by writing a song about jacking off on the road, but I’d lost touch with him–and was a bit cold-cocked by his sober-Gram-Parsons gospel album. I knew nothing about Pillbox Patti, but I’d just finished Patrick Haddon Keefe’s Sackler-skewing Empire of Pain, which set me up to be knocked out by her tales of Parsonian heart-pain and substance reliance. Talk about a country paradigm.
Anyone out there annually purchase Blues Images‘ calendar-and-CD combo that keeps the world of country blues alive? Well, hate to tell ya, this one’s the last one–they can’t afford to keep knocking them out. Follow that preceding link to help John Tefteller and crew go out in much-deserved fine and dignified style. PLUS? The accompanying CD, which includes the most amazing job of restoration of ’20s records I’ve heard so far, will stun you.
Can you resist cumbia? I cannot. The two cumbia compilations, one from Mexico, the other from Peru, both from the esteemed Analog Africa label, that I just added to my archival dig list, aren’t just fun–they add twists, even experimentation, to that addictive rhythm.
(Bonus Track I) Dickie Landry. No one like him.
(Bonus Track II) D. Boon died UNJUSTLY–damn you, cosmos–on December 22, 1985. Too cool to be forgotten, corndog.

RELEASES OF NEWLY-MADE MUSIC

(New additions to the list are bolded.)

Rosalia: MOTOMAMI (Columbia)
Willie Nelson: A Beautiful Time (Sony)
Beyoncé: Renaissance (Parkwood Entertainment)
Tanya Tagaq: Tongues (Six Shooter)
Ricky Ford: The Wailing Sounds of Ricky Ford—Paul’s Scene (Whaling City Sounds)
Stro Elliot & James Brown: Black & Loud—James Brown Reimagined (Polydor)
75 Dollar Bill: Social Music at Troost, Volume 3–Other People’s Music (Black Editions Group)
Tommy Womack: I Thought I Was Fine (Schoolkids Records)
Jeff Parker ETA IVTet: Mondays at the Enfield Tennis Academy(Eremite)
Wadada Leo Smith: The Emerald Duets (TUM)
Wet Leg: Wet Leg (Domino)
Harry Styles: Harry’s House (Columbia)
Sun Ra Arkestra (featuring Marshall Allen): Living Sky (Strut / Omni Sound)
Horace Andy: Midnight Rocker (On-U Sound)
Amanda Shires: Take It Like a Man (ATO)
Little Simz: NO THANK YOU (Forever Living Originals)
Mary Gauthier: Dark Enough to See the Stars (Thirty Tigers)
Patricia Brennan: More Touch (Pyroclastic)
black midi: Hellfire (Rough Trade)
Heroes Are Gang Leaders: LeAutoRoiGraphy (577 Records)
SAULT: Untitled (God)(self-released)
Lady Aicha & Pisko Crane’s Original Fulu Miziki of Kinshasa: N’Djili Wa Mudujimu (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
Sudan Archives: Natural Brown Prom Queen (Stones Throw)
Gogol Bordello: Solidaritine (Das Grand Kapital)
Bitchin’ Bajas: Bajascillators (Drag City)
Ashley McBryde: Presents…Lindeville (Warner Nashville)
Steve Lacy: Gemini Rights (RCA)
Suzi Analogue: Infinite Zonez (Never Normal)
Superchunk: Wild Loneliness (Merge)
Dawn Richard & Spencer Zahn: Pigments(Merge)
Various Artists: Sowal Diabi—From Kabul to Bamako (Accords Croises)
Gonora Sounds: Hard Times Never Kill (Phantom Limb)
Ches Smith: Interpret It Well (Pyroclastic)
Anitta: Versions of Me (Deluxe) (Warner)
Ka: Languish Arts (Iron Works)
Lady Wray: Piece of Me (Big Crown)
Bob Vylan: Bob Vylan Presents The Price of Life (Ghost Theatre)
SAULT: Today & Tomorrow(self-released)
The Mountain Goats: Bleed Out (Merge)
ensemble 0: Music Nuvulosa (Sub Rosa)
The Ogun Meji Duo: Freedom Suite (self-released)
Phelimuncasi: Ama Gogela (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
700 Bliss: Nothing to Declare (Hyperdub)
Bruno Berle: No Reino Dos Afetos(Far Out)
The Chats: Get Fucked (Cooking Vinyl)
Jinx Lennon: Pet Rent (Septic Tiger)
Freakons: Freakons (Fluff & Gravy)
Jeong Lim Yang: Zodiac Suite—Reassured(Fresh Sound)
WeFreeStrings: Love in the Form of Sacred Outrage (ESP-Disk)
Etran de L’Air: Agadez (Sahel Sounds)
Homeboy Sandman: I Can’t Sell These (self-released)
Horsegirl: “Billy” / “History Lesson, Part II” (Matador)
Mark Lomax Trio: Plays Mingus (CFG Multimedia)
Makaya McCraven: In These Times (International Anthem)
Moor Mother: Jazz Codes (Anti-)
Buck 65: King of Drums (4320739 Records DK)
JID: The Forever Story (Dreamville/Interscope)
Mdou Moctar: Niger EP Volume 1 (Matador)
ifsonever: ifsonever (Jazz & Milk)
Various Artists: Lespri Ka—New Directions in Gwoka Music from Guadeloupe (Time Capsule Sounds)
Satoko Fujii: One Hundred Dreams (Libra)
Mark Lomax II: Prismatic Refractions, Volume I (self-released)
Special Interest: Endure (Rough Trade)
Petrol Girls: Baby (Hassle)
James Brandon Lewis: MSM Molecular Systematic Music—Live (Intakt)
Kari Faux: Lowkey Superstar(Don Giovanni)
Adeem the Artist: White Trash Revelry(self-released)
Miranda Lambert: Palomino (Vanner)
Backxwash: HIS HAPPINESS SHALL COME FIRST EVEN THOUGH WE ARE SUFFERING(Ugly Hag / self-released)
Daniel Villareal: Panama ’77 (International Anthem)
Kehlani: blue water road (TSNMI/Atlantic)
Iara Renno: Oriki (self-released)
Dr. John: Things Happen That Way (Rounder)
Horace Andy: Midnight Scorchers (On-U Sound)
Ka: Woeful Studies (Iron Works)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 2—Joy Boy (New Amsterdam)
Various Artists: Juke Bounce Werk Presents JBDUBZ Volume X (Juke Bounce Werk)
Lucrecia Dalt: Ay!(RVNG International)
GloRilla: Anyways, Life’s Great (CMG/Interscope)
Mama’s Broke: Narrow Line (Free Dirt)
Isaiah Collier & The Chosen Few: Lift Every Voice (Division 81 Records)
Tyshawn Sorey: The Off-Off Broadway Guide to Synergism (Pi)
Amber Mark:Three Dimensions Deep (PMR / Interscope)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #5—Elemental; Conversations #6 and 7
Morgan Wade: Reckless (Deluxe) (Ladylike)
Zoh Amba: O, Sun (Tzadik)
Jussi Reijonen: Three Seconds I Kolme Toista (Challenge Records International)
Ran Blake: Driftwoods (Tompkins Square)
Whit Dickey: Root Perspectives (Tao Forms)
Billy Woods: Aethiopes (Backwoodz Studios)
Ishmael Reed: The Hands of Grace(Reading Group)
Dan Ex Machina: All is Ours, Nothing is Theirs (self-released)
Anna von Hausswoolff: Live at Montreaux Jazz Festival (Southern Lord)
Felipe Salles: Tiyo’s Songs of Life (Tapestry)
Steve Lehman: Xaybu—The Unseen(Pi Recordings)
Tom Zé: Lingua Brasiliera (Selo Sesc)
Tyler Childers: Can I Take My Hounds to Heaven (Hickman Holler)
Joyce Moreno: Brasilieras Cancoes(Biscoito Fino)
M.I.A.: Mata(Island)
Pillbox Patti: Florida (Monument)
Elaine Elias: Quietude(Candid)
Nancy Mounir: Nozhet El Nofous (Terrorbird)
Rick Rosato: Homage (self-released)
The Beths: Expert in a Dying Field (Carpark)
Alvvays: Blue Rev(Polyvinyl / Transgressive)
Ari Lennox: age/sex/location (Dreamville/Interscope)
Oumou Sangare: Timbuktu (World Circuit Limited)
Various Artists: Hidden Waters—Strange and Sublime Sounds from Rio de Janiero (Sounds and Colours)
SeaJun Kwon: Micro Nap (Endectomorph Music)
Gilla Band: Most Normal(Rough Trade)
Dry Cleaning: Stumpwork(4AD)
Jessie Reyez: Yessie (FMLY/Island)
Brian Eno: FOREVERANDEVERNOMORE(Verve / UMC)
Nduduzo Makhathini: In the Spirit of Ntu (Universal)
Gard Nilssen Acoustic Unity:Elastic Wave (ECM)
Miguel Zeñon: Musica de las Americas (Miel Music)
Priscilla Block: Welcome to the Block Party (InDent)
The Comet is Coming: Hyper-Dimensional Expansion Beam(Impulse)
Serengeti: Kaleidoscope III (Audiocon)
Snotty Nose Rez Kids: I’m Good, HBU? (Distorted Muse)
Kendrick Lamar: Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers (pgLang/Top Dawg Entertainment/Aftermath/Interscope)
Charm Taylor: She Is The Future (Sinking City)
OGJB: Ode to O (TUM) (Note: Band name – O = Oliver Lake, G = Graham Haynes, J = Joe Fonda, B = Barry Altschul / Title – O = Ornette)
Andrew Cyrille, William Parker, and Enrico Rava: Two Blues for Cecil (TUM)
Luke Stewart’s Silt Trio: The Bottom (Cuneiform)
Tyler Mitchell: Dancing Shadows (featuring Marshall Allen) (Mahakala Music)
Crow Billiken (aka R.A.P. Ferreira): If I don’t have red I use blue (self-released)
Dopolarians: Blues for Alvin Fielder—Live at Crosstown Arts, Memphis(Mahakala Music)
The Paranoid Style: For Executive Meeting(Bar/None)
Carl Stone: Wat Dong Moon Lek (Unseen Worlds)
Joy Guidry:Radical Acceptance (Whited Sepulchre)
Tasche de la Rocha: Tasche de la Rocha & The Psychedelic Roses (Sinking City)
Meridian Brothers and El Grupo & Renacimiento (Ansonia)
Avram Fefer Quartet: Juba Lee(Clean Feed)
Jeffrey Lewis: When That Really Old Cat Dies(self-released)
Mitski: Laurel Hell (Dead Oceans)
Jockstrap: Jockstrap (Rough Trade)
Earthgang: Ghetto Gods (Dreamville/Interscope)
Breath of Air: Breath of Air (Burning Ambulance Music)
Immanuel Wilkins: The 7th Hand (Blue Note)
David Murray Brave New World Trio: Seriana Promethea (Intakt)
Fulu Miziki: Ngbaka (EP)
David Virelles: Nuna (Pi / El Tivoli)
Javon Jackson & Nikki Giovanni: The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni (Solid Jackson)
Leikeli47: Shape Up (Hardcover/RCA)
Witchcraft Books: Volume 1—The Sundisk (Iapetus Records)
Hurray for The Riff Raff: Life on Earth (Nonesuch)
Qasim Naqvi/Wadada Leo Smith/Andrew Cyrille: Two Centuries (Red Hook)
Rokia Koné and Jacknife Lee: Bamanan (3DFamily)
Tomas Fujiwara: Triple Double (Firehouse 12)
DJ Black Low: Uwami (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Ibibio Sound Machine:Electricity (Merge)
Zoh Amba: O Life, O Light, Volume 1(577 Records)
Burton/McPherson Trio: The Summit Rock Session at Seneca Village (Giant Step Arts)
Kahil El’Zabar Quartet: A Time for Healing (Spirit Muse)
Pastor Champion: I Just Want to Be a Good Man (Luaka Bop)
Nduduzo Makhathini: In the Spirit of Ntu (Blue Note)
Pusha T: It’s Almost Dry (G.O.O.D. Music/Def Jam)
Elza Soares: Elza Ao Vivo No Municipal (Deck)
Nilufer Yanya: Painless (ATO)
Open Mike Eagle: a tape called component system with the auto reverse (Auto Reverse)
Chad Fowler/Ivo Perelman/Zoh Amba/Matthew Shipp/William Parker/Steve Hirsch: Alien Skin(Mahakala Music)
Tommy McLain: I Ran Down Every Dream (Yep Roc)
Satoko Fujii and Joe Fonda: Thread of Light (Fundacja Słuchaj)
Charli XCX: Crash (Atlantic)
Pete Malinverni: On the Town—Pete Malinverni Plays Leonard Bernstein (Planet Arts)
Marxist Love Disco Ensemble: MLDE(Mr. Bongo)
Samara Joy: Linger Awhile (Verve)
Dedicated Men of Zion: The Devil Don’t Like It (Bible & Tire)
Tyshawn Sorey Trio: Mesmerism (Pi Recordings)
Dezron Douglas: Atalaya(International Anthem)
Charlotte Adigery & Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer (DeeWee)
Tomeka Reid & Joe McPhee: Let Our Rejoicing Rise (Corbett vs. Dempsey)
Earl Sweatshirt: Sick! (Tan Cressida / Warner)
Big Thief: Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You (4AD)
Jeff Arnal and Curt Cloninger: Drum Major Instinct (Mahakala Music)
R.A.P. Ferreira: 5 to the Eyes with Stars (self-released)
Natsuki Tamura: Summer Tree (Libra)
Ghais Guevara: There Will Be No Super-Slave (self-released)
Manel Fortia: Despertar (Segell Microscopi/Altafonte)
Ray Wylie Hubbard: Co-Starring Too (Big Machine)
Various Artists: if you fart make it sound good (WA Records)
Marta Sanchez: SAAM (Spanish American Art Museum) (Whirlwind)
Sonnyjim & The Purist: White Girl Wasted (Duape)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #8—Ablaze (Hammer Recordings)
Mavis Staples & Levon Helm: Carry Me Home (Anti-)
Panda Bear & Sonic Boom: Reset (Domino)
Blue Reality Quartet: Ella’s Island (Mahakala Music)
Cost of Living: Apollo Brown & Philmore Green (Mellow Music Group)
Taylor Swift: Midnights(non-expanded) (Republic)

ARCHIVAL DIGS

Los Golden Boys: Cumbia de Juventud (Mississippi Records)
Albert Ayler: Revelations—The Complete ORTF 1970 Fondation Maeght Recordings (Elemental)
Cecil Taylor:The Complete Legendary Live Return Concert at the Town Hall (Oblivion)
Tommy Womack: 30 Years Shot to Hell! An Anthology (Schoolkids Records)
Various Artists: Lovers Rock—The Soulful Sound of Romantic Reggae (Trojan)
Staples Jr. Singers: When Do We Get Paid (Luaka Bop)
Dickie Landry: Solos (Unseen Worlds)
Albert Ayler: La Cave Live 1966 (Ezz-Thetics)
Various Artists: Cumbia Sabrosa—Tropical Sound System Bangers From The Discos Fuentes Vaults 1961-1981 (Rocafort Records)
Biluka y Los Canibales: Leaf-Playing in Quito (1960-1965) (Honest Jon’s)
Various Artists: OZ DAYS LIVE ’72 – ’73 Kichijoji–The 50th Anniversary Collection (featuring Les Rallizes Dénudés) (Temporal Drift)
Les Raillizes Denudes: Live ’77 (Temporal Drift)
Ernest Hood: Back to the Woodlands (Freedom to Spend)
Various Artists: A Chat About the Beauty of the Moon at Night–Hawaiian Steel Guitar Masters 1913-1921 (Magnificent Sounds)
The Rolling Stones: Live at the El Mocambo (Interscope)
Various Artists: Blues Images—1920s Blues Classics, Volume 20 (Blues Images)
Son House: Forever on My Mind (Easy Eye Sound)
Lavender Country: Blackberry Rose and Other Songs & Sorrows (Don Giovanni)
Mal Waldron: Searching in Grenoble—The 1978 Solo Piano Concert (Tompkins Square)
Horace Tapscott Quintet: The Quintet (Mr. Bongo)
Horace Tapscott Quintet: Legacies for Our Grandchildren (Dark Tree)
Dickie Landry & Lawrence Weiner: Having Been Built on Sand(Unseen Worlds)
Various Artists: The D-Vine Spirituals—Sacred Soul (Bible & Tire)
Various Artists: Saturno 2000—La Rebajada De Los Sonideros 1962-1983 (Analog Africa)
Various Artists: Peru Selvatico—Sonic Expedition into the Peruvian Amazon 1972-1986 (Analog Africa)
Kabaka International Guitar Band: Kabaka International Guitar Band (Palenque Records)
The Pyramids: AOMAWA—The 1970s Recordings (Strut)
Hermeto Pascoal: Hermeto (Far Out Recordings)
Sun Ra: Sun Ra Arkestra Meets Salah Ragab in Egypt (Strut)
Asha Puthi: The Essential Asha Puthi (Mr. Bongo)
Malik’s Emerging Force Art Trio: Time and Condition (moved-by-sound)
Volta Jazz: Air Volta (Numero)
Blondie: Against the Odds—1974-1982 (3-CD Rarities Version) (UMe / Numero Group)
Joyce Moreno: Natureza (Far Out Recordings)
Various Artists: From Lion Mountain—Traditional Music of Yeha, Ethiopia (Dust-to-Digital)
Charles Stepney: Step-on-Step(International Anthem)
Ronnie Boykins: The Will Come is Now (ESP-Disk)
John Ondolo: Hypnotic Guitar of John Ondolo (Mississippi Records)
Luciano Luciani y sus Mulatos: Mulata, vamos a la Salsa (Vampisoul)
Cecil Taylor: Respiration (Fundacja Stuchaj)
Norma Tanega: Studio and Demo Recordings, 1964-1971 (Anthology)
Irma Thomas: New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival 1976 (Good Time)
Afrika Negra: Antologia, Volume 1 (Bongo Joe)
Various Artists: Summer of Soul (Legacy)
The Heartbreakers: LAMF—The ’77 Found Mixes (Jungle)

This Art Ain’t Languishin’: Best New Album Sounds and Dug-Up Tracks, January 1 – September 29

Odd-servations:

Two of my pop music / freshman composition classes independently chose Steve Lacy’s Gemini Rights for their first “Album Socratic,” and it a lil’ bit blew my mind. I am (or at least HAVE BEEN) TikTok-resistant, but I learned Steve’s swimming powerfully in that ocean. Even more fruitfully, the seminar made Lacy at least ten total new raving fans who previously hadn’t heard of him. That’s education! (P. S. The 8:00 am Socratic was regarding Lacy’s new one paired with Lucas Combs’ current release, which might seems like a spinach ice cream cone, but the contrast revealed much about artist personae, music marketing, and audience engagement.)
I don’t know what 71-year-old reggae legend Horace Andy’s feeding himself, but I want some of it. I quite frankly am immune to most current rhythm music out of Jamaica, but Andy’s two 2022 records are miraculous medicine. Recommendation: turn up both volume and bass. Reassurance: Andy’s singing just fine.
I barely squeezed Brownsville rapper Ka’s first of two brand-new releases under my deadline. It’s got an education thread that I had to pull on, and it held firm. Ka’s music reminds me of Sahel desert blues–it’s very marginally differentiated but irresistible. I’m listening to the second, and it is no slouch. It might make the list before I hit “Publish.”
Just gotta say that I was very late to the virtues of Chicago’s electronic wonders The Bitchin’ Bajas, and even then figured the album I landed on (their previous one, a Sun Ra cover version flight) might be the only one I’d need. I was wrong. Actually, their new one is even more hypnotic and pleasing than their Sun One experiment.
On the other hand, the brave and few who follow this blog may begin to think I have a vested interest in pushing ANYTHING Columbus, Ohio’s Mark Lomax II creates. Well, ok: first, he’s a master musician with a bursting heart, endless ideas, and a pretty flawless ear for supporting musicians; second, I simply haven’t heard an album of his that didn’t bear replaying and replaying (IF you’re a fan of jazz); third, when I learned he decided to cover the permanently instrumentally sidelined Sonny Rollins’ Freedom Suite, I honestly wondered if I needed to check it out: the original is a masterwork, and David S. Ware’s previous cover version was, um, titanic. Of course, I did check Dr. Lomax’s out, and reached the conclusion that it’s just not smart to doubt his commitment and feeling. It’s the best of the three-count ’em-three records he’s put out this year, and it befuddles me that what remains of the jazz press doesn’t seem to be that curious about them. Their loss.
Last year, I stayed very hot and bothered listen after listen about Swedish bassist Ingebrigt Haker Flaten’s free-but-coherent-and-textured concept album Exit (Knarr). This year’s candidate for free-improv album that might Venus-flytrap the unconvinced is the not-quite-released album Micro Nap, by the Korean-born bassist SeaJun Kwon. It’s alternately–but not jarringly–meditative and raucous, as well as subtly tuneful in perfect tandem with thunderous and exciting cacophony.
The Mr. Bongo label is having a great year. Did I say that last time?
In a somewhat related development, the late, great, and extremely underappreciated Horace Tapscott’s rediscovery, the fuse of which was lit a few years back by Dark Tree Records and which has been helped along this year by–there they are again–Mr. Bongo, continues unabated. If you’ve never heard of Mr. Tapscott, in terms of composing, arranging, and playing jazz, and (even more important) nurturing a musical community across almost a half-century in South Central Los Angeles, he was a 20th century giant who unfortunately wasn’t all that motivated to push his own recordings out there. Perhaps the most famous record he’s been associated with, and which isn’t exactly canonized (though it should be) is Sonny Criss’ Sonny’s Dream: Birth of the New Cool, which he wrote and arranged but didn’t play on. Well, he cut some dandy slabs of impressive variety of format that got limited release and disappeared, but are now re-emerging. Dig in, jazzers.
Unless the earth explodes before November, I’ll be able to see one of my favorite MCs, R.A.P. Ferreira in person, and maybe do Q & A with him. I was not expecting him to release a solo country blues album this month. It’s far from not-bad, from the selections to the faux-Crumb cover art.
Need a dose of that very entertaining but Dixieland-stale stuff called rock and roll? The Mountain Goats have something for you.
Bonus track: weird, ongoing wrestling match between 75 Dollar Bill and Rosalia. Somehow, creaky old Shotgun Guillermo got Beyoncé in a full-Nelson and moved up to #3.
Hidden track: #82 is dedicated AND recommended to my pal Kevin Bozelka!

Note: New additions to the list are in bold.

RELEASES OF NEWLY-MADE MUSIC

75 Dollar Bill: Social Music at Troost, Volume 3–Other People’s Music (Black Editions Group)
Rosalia: MOTOMAMI (Columbia)
Willie Nelson: A Beautiful Time (Sony)
Beyoncé: Renaissance (Parkwood Entertainment)
Tanya Tagaq: Tongues (Six Shooter)
Ricky Ford: The Wailing Sounds of Ricky Ford—Paul’s Scene (Whaling City Sounds)
Stro Elliot & James Brown: Black & Loud—James Brown Reimagined (Polydor)
Tommy Womack: I Thought I Was Fine (Schoolkids Records)
Wadada Leo Smith: The Emerald Duets (TUM)
Superchunk: Wild Loneliness (Merge)
Gonora Sounds: Hard Times Never Kill (Phantom Limb)
Wet Leg: Wet Leg (Domino)
Anitta: Versions of Me (Deluxe) (Warner)
Ka: Languish Arts (Iron Works)
The Mountain Goats: Bleed Out (Merge)
Sudan Archives: Natural Brown Prom Queen (Stones Throw)
Lady Wray: Piece of Me (Big Crown)
Bob Vylan: Bob Vylan Presents The Price of Life (Ghost Theatre)
Horace Andy: Midnight Rocker (On-U Sound)
black midi: Hellfire (Rough Trade)
Heroes Are Gang Leaders: LeAutoRoiGraphy (577 Records)
ensemble 0: Music Nuvulosa (Sub Rosa)
Ches Smith: Interpret It Well (Pyroclastic)
The Ogun Meji Duo: Freedom Suite (self-released)
Phelimuncasi: Ama Gogela (Nyege Nyege Tapes)
700 Bliss: Nothing to Declare (Hyperdub)
The Chats: Get Fucked (Cooking Vinyl)
Dan Ex Machina: All is Ours, Nothing is Theirs (self-released)
Jinx Lennon: Pet Rent (Septic Tiger)
Steve Lacy: Gemini Rights (RCA)
Freakons: Freakons (Fluff & Gravy)
Mary Gauthier: Dark Enough to See the Stars (Thirty Tigers)
Etran de L’Air: Agadez (Sahel Sounds)
Homeboy Sandman: I Can’t Sell These (self-released)
Bitchin’ Bajas: Bajascillators (Drag City)
Miranda Lambert: Palomino (Vanner)
Horsegirl: “Billy” / “History Lesson, Part II” (Matador)
Mark Lomax Trio: Plays Mingus (CFG Multimedia)
Florian Arbenz: Conversation #5—Elemental; Conversations #6 and 7
Moor Mother: Jazz Codes (Anti-)
Mdou Moctar: Niger EP Volume 1 (Matador)
Various Artists: Lespri Ka—New Directions in Gwoka Music from Guadeloupe (Time Capsule Sounds)
Billy Woods: Aethiopes (Backwoodz Studios)
Mark Lomax II: Prismatic Refractions, Volume I (self-released)
James Brandon Lewis: MSM Molecular Systematic Music—Live (Intakt)
Daniel Villareal: Panama ’77 (International Anthem)
Kehlani: blue water road (TSNMI/Atlantic)
Horace Andy: Midnight Scorchers (On-U Sound)
Ka: Woeful Studies (Iron Works)
Amber Mark:Three Dimensions Deep (PMR / Interscope)
Morgan Wade: Reckless (Deluxe) (Ladylike)
Zoh Amba: O, Sun (Tzadik)
Whit Dickey: Root Perspectives (Tao Forms)
Anna von Hausswoolff: Live at Montreaux Jazz Festival (Southern Lord)
Felipe Salles: Tiyo’s Songs of Life (Tapestry)
Steve Lehman: Xaybu—The Unseen (Pi Recordings)
Tom Zé: Lingua Brasiliera (Selo Sesc)
Nancy Mounir: Nozhet El Nofous (Terrorbird)
Rick Rosato: Homage (self-released)
The Beths: Expert in a Dying Field (Carpark)
Oumou Sangare: Timbuktu (World Circuit Limited)
Various Artists: Hidden Waters—Strange and Sublime Sounds from Rio de Janiero (Sounds and Colours)
SeaJun Kwon: Micro Nap (Endectomorph Music)
Nduduzo Makhathini: In the Spirit of Ntu (Universal)
Gard Nilssen Acoustic Unity:Elastic Wave (ECM)
Miguel Zeñon: Musica de las Americas (Miel Music)
Isaiah Collier & The Chosen Few: Lift Every Voice (Division 81 Records)
Tyshawn Sorey: The Off-Off Broadway Guide to Synergism (Pi)
Priscilla Block: Welcome to the Block Party (InDent)
Serengeti: Kaleidoscope III (Audiocon)
Kendrick Lamar: Mr. Morale & The Big Steppers(pgLang/Top Dawg Entertainment/Aftermath/Interscope)
Makaya McCraven: In These Times (International Anthem)
Charm Taylor: She Is The Future (Sinking City)
OGJB: Ode to O (TUM) (Note: Band name – O = Oliver Lake, G = Graham Haynes, J = Joe Fonda, B = Barry Altschul / Title – O = Ornette)
Andrew Cyrille, William Parker, and Enrico Rava: Two Blues for Cecil (TUM)
Luke Stewart’s Silt Trio: The Bottom(Cuneiform)
Tyler Mitchell: Dancing Shadows (featuring Marshall Allen) (Mahakala Music)
Wild Up: Julius Eastman, Volume 2—Joy Boy (New Amsterdam)
Crow Billiken (aka R.A.P. Ferreira): If I don’t have red I use blue (self-released)
The Paranoid Style: For Executive Meeting (Bar/None)
Carl Stone: Wat Dong Moon Lek (Unseen Worlds)
Joy Guidry:Radical Acceptance (Whited Sepulchre)
Meridian Brothers and El Grupo & Renacimiento (Ansonia)
Marxist Love Disco Ensemble: MLDE (Mr. Bongo)
Mitski: Laurel Hell (Dead Oceans)
Jockstrap: Jockstrap (Rough Trade)
Breath of Air: Breath of Air (Burning Ambulance Music)
Immanuel Wilkins: The 7th Hand (Blue Note)
David Murray Brave New World Trio: Seriana Promethea (Intakt)
Fulu Miziki: Ngbaka (EP)
David Virelles: Nuna (Pi / El Tivoli)
Javon Jackson & Nikki Giovanni: The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni (Solid Jackson)
Leikeli47: Shape Up (Hardcover/RCA)
Witchcraft Books: Volume 1—The Sundisk (Iapetus Records)
Hurray for The Riff Raff: Life on Earth (Nonesuch)
Rokia Koné and Jacknife Lee: Bamanan (3DFamily)
Tomas Fujiwara: Triple Double (Firehouse 12)
DJ Black Low: Uwami (Awesome Tapes from Africa)
Ibibio Sound Machine:Electricity (Merge)
Zoh Amba: O Life, O Light, Volume 1 (577 Records)
Burton/McPherson Trio: The Summit Rock Session at Seneca Village (Giant Step Arts)
Kahil El’Zabar Quartet: A Time for Healing (Spirit Muse)
Pastor Champion: I Just Want to Be a Good Man (Luaka Bop)
Nduduzo Makhathini: In the Spirit of Ntu (Blue Note)
Pusha T: It’s Almost Dry (G.O.O.D. Music/Def Jam)
Elza Soares: Elza Ao Vivo No Municipal (Deck)
Nilufer Yanya: Painless (ATO)
Tommy McLain: I Ran Down Every Dream (Yep Roc)
Satoko Fujii and Joe Fonda: Thread of Light (Fundacja Słuchaj)
Charli XCX: Crash (Atlantic)
Pete Malinverni: On the Town—Pete Malinverni Plays Leonard Bernstein(Planet Arts)
JID: The Forever Story (Dreamville)
Dedicated Men of Zion: The Devil Don’t Like It (Bible & Tire)
Tyshawn Sorey Trio: Mesmerism (Pi Recordings)
Space Afrika: Honest Labour (Dais)
Charlotte Adigery & Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer (DeeWee)
Earl Sweatshirt: Sick! (Tan Cressida / Warner)
Big Thief: Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You (4AD)
Jeff Arnal and Curt Cloninger: Drum Major Instinct (Mahakala Music)
Tee Grizzley: Half Tee Half Beast (self-released)
Hoodoo Gurus: Chariot of The Gods (Big Time Photographic Recordings)
Natsuki Tamura: Summer Tree (Libra)
(D)ivo: Perelman, Berne, Malaby, Carter (Mahakala Music)
Daniel Carter et al.: Telepatica (577 Records)
Ghais Guevara: There Will Be No Super-Slave (self-released)
Pierre Kwenders: Jose Louis and the Paradox of Love (Arts & Crafts)
Manel Fortia: Despertar (Segell Microscopi/Altafonte)
Ray Wylie Hubbard: Co-Starring Too (Big Machine)
Various Artists: if you fart make it sound good (WA Records)
Marta Sanchez: SAAM (Spanish American Art Museum) (Whirlwind)
Sonnyjim & The Purist: White Girl Wasted (Duape)
Earthgang: Ghetto Gods (Dreamville/Interscope)
Mavis Staples & Levon Helm: Carry Me Home (Anti-)
Panda Bear & Sonic Boom: Reset (Domino)
Blue Reality Quartet: Ella’s Island (Mahakala Music)

ARCHIVAL DIGS

Los Golden Boys: Cumbia de Juventud (Mississippi Records)
Albert Ayler: Revelations—The Complete ORTF 1970 Fondation Maeght Recordings(Elemental)
Cecil Taylor:The Complete Legendary Live Return Concert at the Town Hall (Oblivion)
Tommy Womack: 30 Years Shot to Hell! An Anthology (Schoolkids Records)
Various Artists: Lovers Rock—The Soulful Sound of Romantic Reggae (Trojan)
Albert Ayler: La Cave Live 1966 (Ezz-Thetics)
Various Artists: Cumbia Sabrosa—Tropical Sound System Bangers From The Discos Fuentes Vaults 1961-1981 (Rocafort Records)
Biluka y Los Canibales: Leaf-Playing in Quito (1960-1965) (Honest Jon’s)
Various Artists: A Chat About the Beauty of the Moon at Night–Hawaiian Steel Guitar Masters 1913-1921 (Magnificent Sounds)
The Rolling Stones: Live at the El Mocambo (Interscope)
Son House: Forever on My Mind (Easy Eye Sound)
Lavender Country: Blackberry Rose and Other Songs & Sorrows (Don Giovanni)
Mal Waldron: Searching in Grenoble—The 1978 Solo Piano Concert (Tompkins Square)
Horace Tapscott Quintet: The Quintet (Mr. Bongo)
Horace Tapscott Quintet: Legacies for Our Grandchildren (Dark Tree)
Various Artists: The D-Vine Spirituals—Sacred Soul (Bible & Tire)
Kabaka International Guitar Band: Kabaka International Guitar Band (Palenque Records)
The Pyramids: AOMAWA—The 1970s Recordings (Strut)
Hermeto Pascoal: Hermeto (Far Out Recordings)
Sun Ra: Sun Ra Arkestra Meets Salah Ragab in Egypt (Strut)
Asha Puthi: The Essential Asha Puthi (Mr. Bongo)
Malik’s Emerging Force Art Trio: Time and Condition (moved-by-sound)
Volta Jazz: Air Volta (Numero)
Blondie: Against the Odds—1974-1982 (3-CD Rarities Version) (UMe / Numero Group)
Various Artists: From Lion Mountain—Traditional Music of Yeha, Ethiopia (Dust-to-Digital)
Charles Stepney: Step-on-Step (International Anthem)
Ronnie Boykins: The Will Come is Now (ESP-Disk)
John Ondolo: Hypnotic Guitar of John Ondolo (Mississippi Records)
Luciano Luciani y sus Mulatos: Mulata, vamos a la Salsa (Vampisoul)
Cecil Taylor: Respiration (Fundacja Stuchaj)
Norma Tanega: Studio and Demo Recordings, 1964-1971 (Anthology)
Irma Thomas: New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival 1976 (Good Time)
Afrika Negra: Antologia, Volume 1 (Bongo Joe)
Various Artists: Summer of Soul (Legacy)
The Heartbreakers: LAMF—The ’77 Found Mixes (Jungle)

“Interpret It Well: Life in All Its Rich Musical Variety”–Best Rekkids of 2022, January 1st-April 27)

Random bits?

Thank you, Christian, for Bob Vylan at the last minute. I needed that.
Ricky Ford? Who’s Ricky Ford? Well, I knew him best through his stellar tenor on Ran Blake’s The Short Life of Barbara Monk and Abdullah Ibrahim’s Water from an Ancient Well, both modern jazz classics. I remember trying some of his solo albums and thinking he was kind of like an Ellingtonian without Ellington. BUT…35-40 years later his new album sounds like something we will sadly never get again: a new Sonny Rollins album. That’s high praise, and he’s not that inventive, but you’ll hear what I mean: power, confidence and wisdom of tone, steaming momentum, ideas extended lyrically and imaginatively.
Wet Leg the album not as good as Wet Leg the singles machine, but still FUN. And I (and probably you) need that. One of my students liked their sense of camp, and I get that. I have film students in class, too, and they’re curious about those Wighters’ taste.
I am already feeling I’ve underrated percussionist Ches Smith’s new album Interpret It Well. It’s one of those rare albums that establish a mood and flow and sustains it from beginning to end. The whole is much more powerful than the sum of its parts, and the playing is stimulatingly precise and responsive.
I’m as atheist as can be (I neither have, recognize nor pursue a theology), but it’s been a good couple of years for new black gospel records in the traditional vein. Thanks, Hardin, for pushing Pastor Champion on me, and thanks, Bible & Tire / Fat Possum, for just sticking to that old mission. It’s liberation music, at heart, and I’m ’bout it.
When I heard the Mekons and Freakwater were doing a set of acoustic mining songs, I asked myself, “Do I really need that?” Mekons being involved, I had to dip a toe (or a lobe) in; I just prefer Mekons with DRUMS. Actually, the album’s rousing, moving, and not necessarily about mining, and I recommend it.
Is there such as thing as discorrhea? Sometimes I think about that when I think about Jinx Lennon (I’m not sure how many people think that much about Jinx Lennon, but he’s worth it). Maybe it’d be better to really hone and weed before he lets another one go. The thing is, though, Pet Rent rocks harder than any of the last few, and it’s hard to think of any artist who’s so alive and receptive in his immediate environment than Lennon. I’m currently reading Henry Miller’s Black Spring, and “Horseshit!” has popped up a few times in the first twenty pages as ol’ Hank instructs us on immediacy of living, but maybe Jinx achieves that. Maybe.
Speaking of horseshit, I’ve been alive and listening to records long enough to smell it, but, dammit, SAULT has my detector on the blink. And by blink I mean my detector blinks off and on. I am keenly aware their “mystery” is part of the attraction (or marketing); on the other hand, when I’m really leaning forward and undistracted, they seem to be so much of these times and their struggles, endless tragedies, and fleeting glow that I buy what they’re offering. And AIR? It’s a test. An early morning game of art-critical Texas Hold ‘Em.
As he always seems to be, Sun Ra makes new appearances on this update: first, represented more than ably by the soon-to-be-98 (you are reading that correctly) Arkestra glue-guy Marshall Allen on Tyler Mitchell’s outstanding Dancing Shadows, then on a Seventies archival dig working close to one his many homes (Egypt) with the talented Salah Ragab. Both recordings are outstanding.
I always make at least one Record Store Day purchase. I hate crowds, so I usually hit eBay first thing the next morning, but this year the proprietor of Dig It! Record Barn / Records to Go in Carterville (or is it Duenweg?), Missouri, established a tiny call line for people who could not make it–I’m about 250 miles away. If you answer the phone when there’s a lull in traffic through the stacks, you might get a chance; I was completing a three-mile stroll when the phone buzzed and I became the proud owner of Albert Ayler’s Revelations—The Complete ORTF 1970 Fondation Maeght Recordings on Elemental Records. I’ve heard the original recordings, which were not complete and didn’t sound that swell, but had never owned them. This heavy item arrives Thursday, so truth be told, I have not listened to it yet. But I’ve got a hand in another Texas Hold ‘Em game….

New Music (bolded items are new to the list):

75 Dollar Bill: Social Music at Troost, Volume 3–Other People’s Music (Black Editions Group)
Rosalia: MOTOMAMI (Columbia)
Tanya Tagaq: Tongues (Six Shooter)
Ricky Ford: The Wailing Sounds of Ricky Ford—Paul’s Scene (Whaling City Sounds)
Stro Elliot & James Brown: Black & Loud—James Brown Reimagined (Polydor)
Superchunk: Wild Loneliness (Merge)
Gonora Sounds: Hard Times Never Kill (Phantom Limb)
Wet Leg: Wet Leg (Domino)
Amber Mark: Three Dimensions Deep (PMR / Interscope)
Etran de L’Air: Agadez (Sahel Sounds)
Billy Woods: Aethiopes (Backwoodz Studios)
Morgan Wade: Reckless (Deluxe) (Ladylike)
Lady Wray: Piece of Me (Big Crown)
Tyler Mitchell: Dancing Shadows (featuring Marshall Allen) (Mahakala Music)
Bob Vylan: Bob Vylan Presents The Price of Life (Ghost Theatre)
Mark Lomax II: Prismatic Refractions, Volume I (self-released)
ensemble 0: Music Nuvulosa (Sub Rosa)
Anna von Hausswoolff: Live at Montreaux Jazz Festival (Southern Lord)
Various Artists: Lespri Ka—New Directions in Gwoka Music from Guadeloupe (Time Capsule Sounds)
Ches Smith: Interpret It Well (Pyroclastic)
Jinx Lennon: Pet Rent (Septic Tiger)
Freakons: Freakons (Fluff & Gravy)
Joy Guidry: Radical Acceptance (Whited Sepulchre)
Javon Jackson & Nikki Giovanni: The Gospel According to Nikki Giovanni (Solid Jackson)
OGJB: Ode to O (TUM) (Note: Band name – O = Oliver Lake, G = Graham Haynes, J = Joe Fonda, B = Barry Altschul / Title – O = Ornette)
Andrew Cyrille, William Parker, and Enrico Rava: Two Blues for Cecil (TUM)
Luke Stewart’s Silt Trio: The Bottom (Cuneiform)
Priscilla Block: Welcome to the Block Party (InDent)
Anitta: Versions of Me (Warner)
Mitski: Laurel Hell (Dead Oceans)
Immanuel Wilkins: The 7th Hand (Blue Note)
Fulu Miziki: Ngbaka (EP)
Hurray for The Riff Raff: Life on Earth (Nonesuch)
Rokia Koné and Jacknife Lee: Bamanan (3D Family)
Tomas Fujiwara: Triple Double (Firehouse 12)
Ibibio Sound Machine: Electricity (Merge)
Kahil El’Zabar Quartet: A Time for Healing (Spirit Muse)
Pastor Champion: I Just Want to Be a Good Man (Luaka Bop)
Pusha T: It’s Almost Dry (G.O.O.D. Music/Def Jam)
SAULT: AIR (Forever Living Originals)
Nilufer Yanya: Painless (ATO)
Satoko Fujii and Joe Fonda: Thread of Light (Fundacja Słuchaj)
Charli XCX: Crash (Atlantic)
Pete Malinverni:  On the Town—Pete Malinverni Plays Leonard Bernstein (Planet Arts)
David Friend & Jerome Begin: Post- (New Amsterdam)
Dedicated Men of Zion: The Devil Don’t Like It (Bible & Tire)
Space Afrika: Honest Labour (Dais)
Charlotte Adigery & Bolis Pupul: Topical Dancer (DeeWee)
Earl Sweatshirt: Sick! (Tan Cressida / Warner)
Big Thief: Dragon New Warm Mountain I Believe in You (4AD)
Tee Grizzley: Half Tee Half Beast (self-relased)
Hoodoo Gurus: Chariot of The Gods (Big Time Photographic Recordings)
Natsuki Tamura: Summer Tree (Libra)
(D)ivo: Perelman, Berne, Malaby, Carter (Mahakala Music)
Spoon: Lucifer on the Sofa (Matador)
Manel Fortia: Despertar (Segell Microscopi/Altafonte)
Ray Wylie Hubbard: Co-Starring Too (Big Machine)
Keith Oxman: This One’s for Joey (Capri)
Marta Sanchez: SAAM (Spanish American Art Museum) (Whirlwind)
Earthgang: Ghetto Gods (Dreamville/Interscope)

Archival Digs:

Albert Ayler: La Cave Live 1966 (Ezz-Thetics)

Albert Ayler: Revelations—The Complete ORTF 1970 Fondation Maeght Recordings (Elemental)

Son House: Forever on My Mind (Easy Eye Sound)

Lavender Country: Blackberry Rose and Other Songs & Sorrows (Don Giovanni)

Hermeto Pascoal: Planetário da Gávea (Far Out Recordings)

Hermeto Pascoal: Hermeto (Far Out Recordings)

Sun Ra: Sun Ra Arkestra Meets Salah Ragab in Egypt (Strut)

Cecil Taylor: The Complete Legendary Live Return Concert at the Town Hall (Oblivion)

Afrika Negra: Antologia, Volume 1 (Bongo Joe)

Various Artists: Summer of Soul (Legacy)

Neil Young: Carnegie Hall 1970 (Reprise)

Living To Listen

Compact music commentary about artifacts new and old: I enthuse, I don't accuse, but I do refuse–to review anything lukewarm or colder!

Category: THE CURRENT LIST

IT ENDS HERE: My Favorite Albums of 2023

Integrated List Solutions: 2023’s Best Discs With a Month to Go

Happy Hour in Excelsior Springs: Not Feeling Tardy Delivering My Favorite Records of 2023, January 1 – September 1

THIS STUFF! FEELS GOOD!: 110 Truly Interesting Records We’ve Received So Far in ’23 (not bad!)

Gooba Gooba Gooba Gooba, Goodbye: So Long to Huey Piano Smith, last of the New Orleans Professors, and (at long last) a 2023 Top 10.

Five I Missed That Woulda Made The 2022 List: New Discoveries from the Year That Was (+ a 2023 Addendum)

What To Do?

YES THANK YOU: The Best of a Bounty of Absorbing, Motorvating, Challenging, Exciting Albums Gifted Us By 2022

This Art Ain’t Languishin’: Best New Album Sounds and Dug-Up Tracks, January 1 – September 29

“Interpret It Well: Life in All Its Rich Musical Variety”–Best Rekkids of 2022, January 1st-April 27)

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