Tag: Roscoe Mitchell

Things Are Unhinged, but Members of The Earth, Do Not Bend to The Set-Up (Living to Listen’s Favorite Records, March ’26)

The national dumpster fire is raging so hot that The Delines’ sobering but skillful portraits and tales (hit the link below) sound like Sly and The Family Stone’s Greatest Hits in comparison. I hope you all are getting out in the street or otherwise making your presence felt—if you’re hostile to the notion that there’s something to defeat out there, you’re come to wrong blog. You probably don’t like music anyway, and you’re certainly not likely to cotton to any of these new platters.

Developments? I’ve zeroed in on a new and very solid candidate for record of the year, at least so far: Tanya Tagaq’s angry and intense new record—she’s good at those, but to my ear this is her best. I once again exalt a splendid recording by one of Argentina’s finest pianists, Rocio Gimenez Lopez, who deserves many more huzzahs and is joined on the 88s by her husband (note album title). It’s an inspired and inspiring recording. If you’d asked me in 2025 if we needed yet another tribute to Duke Ellington, I might have said no, but Jason Moran’s shining and imaginative solo voyage would have made me eat my words. Quandaries: why aren’t more rock-oriented six-string worshippers on the Bill Orcutt train (maybe they are, and I’m just isolated)—a runaway train it is, trailing several creatively skronky recordings over the past few years—and why did Fugazi and Steve Albini agree to abandon the In On the Killtaker the latter “recorded”? If you need some peace, sound-healer Harlan Silverman has some stillness for you. Along with Mr. Moran, the Congolese act Kin’Gongolo Kiniata score a vibrant five asterisks with their debut album, which appears to be associated with a documentary I need to say. KINACT offers up the latest Nyege Nyege dance-racket. Buck 65 keeps passing the test. Finally, Cecil Taylor’s last performance, which includes a spoken scientific trip, has emerged.

Social music notes: a) Nicole and I not only got to witness the 86-year-old jazz groundbreaker Roscoe Mitchell play live, but we experienced him duet with his lab Shuggie, who kept the room in line (the show was arranged by the St. Louis non-profit Dissonant Works, which experimental art fans should keep an eye on); b) We also enjoyed bass player extraordinaire and frequent Bill Evans partner Eddie Gomez, 81 going on 30, lead his expert band through a set of standards and originals as part of Columbia’s annual We Always Swing series; and c) the truly exciting and informative Apple podcast Fela: Fear No Man made two road trips of ours go extremely quickly—check it out, even if you think you know all you need to know about Afrobeat’s Black President. We still have two episodes to go, during which I hope Tony Allen is at least mentioned.

SPOTLIGHT ALBUM OF THE MONTH

Kin’Gongolo Kiniata: Kiniata (Helico Music)*****

New in March (click this for the Jan-Feb list) No asterisk = good / *** = very good / **** = great / ***** = really great

Buck 65: Do Not Bend (self-released) ****

The Delines: The Set-Up (decor) ****

E L U C I D & Sebb Bash: I Guess U Had To Be There (Backwoodz Studioz) ***

Fugazi: Albini Sessions (Dischord) ****

Sophie Gault: Unhinged (Torrez Music Group)

Ernesto Jodos / Rocio Gimenez Lopez: Una casa con dos pianos (Blue Art) ***

KINACT: Kinshasa in Action (Nyege Nyege Tapes)****

Jason Moran: Jason Moran Plays Duke Ellington (Yes Records) *****

Angelika Niescier: Chicago Tapes (Intakt) ****

OHYUNG: IOWA (self-released)

Bill Orcutt: Music in Continuous Motion (Palilalia) *****

Robyn: Sexistential (Konichiwa / Young)

Shabaka: Of the Earth (Shabaka Records) ***

Sideshow: Tigray Funk (10k & UA) ***

Harlan Silverman: Music for Stillness (Mississippi Records)

Tyshawn Sorey: Members…Don’t! (Pi Recordings) *** (out May 29)

Alister Spence: Always Ever (self-released) ****

Station Model Violence: Station Model Violence (Anti Fade)

Tanya Tagaq: Saputjii (Six Shooter) *****

Cecil Taylor New Unit: Words and Music—The Last Bandstand (Fundacja Słuchaj Records)

Various Artists: Born in the City of Tanta–Lower Egyptian Urban Folklore and Bedouin

Shaabi from Libya’s Bourini Records 1968-75 (Sublime Frequencies) ***

Weld Khadija ou L-Farqa L-Jilaliya:  Walad Haja Radio Annajah 718 راديو النجاح (Hive Mind)

2025: Too Cool for Me To Have Forgotten (or Missed)

Blanco teta: La Debacle de las Divas (Les Disques Bongo Joe)

kangding ray: SIRAT—Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (Invada)

Vintage Albums I Deeply Enjoyed This Month

Kauro Abe: Winter 1972

Abdul Al-Hannan: The Third World

Polly Bradfield: Solo Violin Improvisations

Cairo Free Jazz Ensemble: Heliopolis

Arthur Doyle + 4: Alabama Feeling

Gang of Four: Another Day Another Dollar EP

G.L. Unit: Oran Gu Tang!

The Grateful Dead: Rockin’ The Rhein

Wardell Gray: Memorial (Volumes 1 & 2)

L7: Fast and Frightening

Ikue Mori: Painted Desert

Mount Everest Trio: Waves from Albert Ayler

Kasey Musgraves: Same Trailer, Different Park

Kasey Musgraves: Golden Hour

Kasey Musgraves: Deeper Well

Public Image Limited: Second Edition

Jimmy Rushing: Rushing Lullabies

Masahiko Sato Trio: Penetration

The Stanley Brothers: The King Years 1961-1965

Swamp Dogg: Total Destruction to the Mind

Swamp Dogg: Gag a Maggot

Charles Tyler: Eastern Man Alone

John Tchicai and Cadentia Nova Danca: Afrodisiaca

Sonny Boy Williamson: The Essential Sonny Boy Williamson

Bob Wills & The Texas Playboys: The Tiffany Transcriptions, Volume 3—Basin Street Blues

The Frank Wright Quartet: Church Number Nine

Hey! I Read, Too—and So Should You!

Martin Amis: Money

Dan Flores: Coyote America—A Natural and Supernatural History

Laurel Holliday: Children of the Troubles—Our Lives in the Crossfire of Northern Ireland

Yasunari Kawabata: Snow Country

Freya McClements & Joe Duffy: Children of the Troubles

John D. MacDonald: The Deep Blue Good-By

Toni Morrison: Beloved

Edna O’Brien: Lantern Slides—Stories

Elizabeth Strout: Olive Kitteridge

Follow me on Instagram and Substack if you get the notion! Also, more of my education adventures found here.

The Long Way Home: Diary Playlist 4 (April 29 – May)

The week’s listening. I was ending my tenth semester at Stephens College with students doin’ the final exam wig-out all around me, and the chaos was catching. I also road-tripped. This playlist catches that:

Faulkner

Plucked from History’s Dustbin (best recent purchase of an old record): William Faulkner Reads from his Works (featuring selections from The Sound and The Fury and Light In August; procured for me by the gents at Hitt Records!).

Grower, Not a Shower (old record I already owned that’s risen significantly in my esteem): Rhiannon Giddens’ Freedom Highway; The Rolling Stones’ Some Girls (I already loved it–I just fell even more in love with it, by learning to more fully accept and appreciate “Some Girls,” “Faraway Eyes,” and “Shattered.” Um, it was already showin’ — plenty.

Encore, Encore! (album I played at least twice this week): The Go-Betweens’ 1978-1980; The Rolling Stones’ Some Girls.

Through the Cracks (sweet record I forgot to write about): Sleep, The Sciences; Van Morrison and Joey DeFrancesco, You’re Driving Me Crazy; Salim Washington, Dogon Revisited.

Coming Attractions (Sunday’s Children): Aretha Franklin, Young, Gifted, and Black; Professor Longhair, Crawfish Fiesta; Z.Z. Hill, Greatest Hits.

“I Need Fuel!” (May 4th, 2018, MO 63, 54, 5, 44)

I road-tripped to my parents’ home in Monett, Missouri, to celebrate my brother’s birthday–he was home from Dickinson, Texas. Unfortunately, my ace-boon pavement podnah Nicole was under the weather, so I was driving solo.

Also, my vehicle is a ’93 Ford Splash with 88,000 miles on it–I don’t entirely trust it, but it does have a nice stereo that masks those worrisome noises. So I selected some special, time-tested records to keep me fully engaged, and to “study” in “The Lab”–my nickname for the truck cab.

Neckbones: Souls on Fire

If the Rolling Stones were from Oxford, Mississippi, fronted by Richard Hell, and drunk on LAMF. Oh yeah: and cut loose with a week’s pay in a casino. But let me pull your coat on lead singer Tyler Keith. I hate to keep making comparisons, but this is true: if you, like me, are a fan of Jeffrey Lee Pierce and The Gun Club, there’s no reason for you to miss Tyler’s work with The Neckbones, The Preacher’s Kids, and The Apostles. It’s got the same fire, the same sense of spiritual hauntedness, the same immersion in the blues-based rock roll verities with a cerrated edge. What it doesn’t have, I think, is Pierce’s doomed aura–and that’s a good thing. Not something you wanna root for, you know?

I’m getting off topic, but proceed thusly through Mr. Keith’s oeuvre:

1) The Neckbones: Souls on Fire

2) Tyler Keith & The Preachers’ Kids: Romeo Hood

3) Tyler Keith & The Preachers ‘ Kids: Wild Emotions

4) The Neckbones: The Lights are Getting Dim

5) Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Do It for Johnny

6) Tyler Keith & The Apostles: Black Highway

7) The Neckbones: Gentlemen

To prove I’m somewhat objective, I’ve never warmed up to The Preachers’ Kids’ The Devil’s Hitlist or Keith’s kinda-solo Alias Kid Twist, though the cassette-only The Apostle is worth the search. To recap, and I will not have stuttered:  Tyler Keith and his projects equal to, if not better, than Jeffrey Lee Pierce’s.

The Rolling Stones: Some Girls and Tattoo You

A few weeks ago, I was having fun making fun of Mick Jagger’s garb and minstrelsy as modeled in videos from these records. Since then, I’ve come back to the videos, then to the records, to just joy in Charlie’s cracking drumming and Keith’s lewd, thick, buzzing guitar lines–sounds of the gods! Played both albums all the way through, loud, with nothing but a smile–and re-re-replays of “Lies,” “Respectable,” “Hang Fire,” “Start Me Up,” and “Neighbors.”

The Go-Betweens: 1978-1990

Yeah, I only listened to this comp THREE TIMES this week. Simply, the cats from Brisbane are my uncontested favorite romantic pop group–the music can rock or be sensuous and luxurious, with constant surprises: spring rain, pool draining, men o’ sand v. girls o’ sea, white witchery + poetry that’s Irish and so black, getting back up on the pony, period blood, cattle and cane. If this album ended after its first 11 tracks, it’d be an A+; as it is, it’s a solid A. Note: I love Grant, but I’m a Robert guy.

Oh, yes, I did. I needed to feel the breeze blowin’ up me, and be reminded what a moon can do (though I was driving into Monett in broad daylight). I also needed to get in touch with the real me before coming all the way home, and the china pig snuffles? They center me.

Short-shrift Division:

I am strange. I grade research papers at midnight to these sounds.

Dennis Gonzales and his New Dallas Sextet: Namesake–Fabulous, passionate, energetic, long-form jazz, from the genre’s most underrated living composer (and one hell of a trumpeter). Secret weapon: on horns and flute, Douglas Ewart!

Roscoe Mitchell: Discussions–The septuagenarian jazz sensei shows no signs of slowing. Playing puts me in a focused, contemplative, unsentimental mood–perfect for scoring freshman essays.