Album Reviews

Mose Alison meets Steely Dan meets Gary Wilson is the best I can do to describe this hipster member of Hollywood's famous Dragon family's recent CD. 

Don’t let the October 16th 1956 mono recording date fool you: this Jean-Baptiste “Illinois” Jacquet session was recorded in Los Angeles, probably at legendary Radio Recorders, and the sound will knock you down.

Still raw from 9/11? It's difficult to believe a decade has passed. So imagine this Louis Armstrong concert from 1956. For most of the audience, and for much of America, except for the "Baby Boomer" youngsters too young to remember, World War Two and the enormous human toll it took on families across the country was still a current event.

There's no mystery about why this seventh Foo Fighters album succeeds artistically and commercially. Dave Grohl tempers his scream fest tendencies with focus, clarity and discipline. Producer Butch Vig, who worked with Nirvana tightens it all up and doesn't leave any loose ends hanging in a recording done in Grohl's garage. Grohl brings back Nirvana and Germs guitarist Pat Smear as well as Krist Novoselic on bass and accordian on "I Should Have Known." It's almost a reunion.

Paul Simon can't go back to his folk-rock roots. It's too late for him to turn around, but a younger generation surely can use the hybrid genre as a start-up base of operations. The first and second Fleet Fox albums demonstrate that. 

No one has ever claimed PJ Harvey creates music made for easy, or even pleasant listening. Much of it is dark and painful, but even at its weakest, Harvey's music is provocative and worthwhile.

This impeccably produced (by Norman Granz, who literall built Verve Records and later Pablo around her), career summing concert takes Ella from her beginnings with the Chick Webb Orchestra to her then current quartet featuring Tommy Flanagan, Keeter Betts, Joe Pass and Freddie Waits, all brilliantly choreographed by master showman/producer/record executive Norman Granz along with Newport producer George Wein.