Friday, June 23rd, 2006 ... 3:10 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. ... KZSU, 90.1 FM

Returning after a week in Hawaii: Eight days without touching a computer. Everybody needs to do that once in a while (seriously).

Can't say I got a lot of avant-jazz discoveries out of Kauai, not that I expected any. I did encounter Denny Rouse, an old jazz cat who's played with the likes of Stevie Wonder but also has real bebop credentials from Art Blakey's band. He plays solo Sunday shows at the Smalltown Coffee in Kapa'a, soloing against a CD recording of piano/bass/drums. He's good, and he tosses out some interesting ideas in his solos. Overcharges for his CDs too, but you know ... jazz is a hard way to make a living, and jazz on Kauai, where housing costs are through the roof for exactly the same reasons as Silicon Valley's, has got to be even harder. So, I just went with it; if Denny can get away with sticking it to tourists, good for him. (Note to musicians: I'll be a lot less mellow about this now that I'm off the island!)

Format:
ARTIST -- "TRACK TITLE" -- ALBUM TITLE (LABEL, YEAR)

Steve Coleman and Five Elements -- "Alt-Shift-Return" -- The Tao of Mad Phat Fringe Zones (Novus, 1993)

* Charlie Hunter Trio -- "Swamba Redux" -- Copperopolis (Ropeadope, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Old loft-jazz recordings featuring David S. Ware on sax and Kenwood Dennard on drums, alongside Cooper-Moore on piano, flutes, and various percussion including the homemade diddley-bow. Plus other guests. This track isn't a duet per se, but I guess there's only one musician at a time soloing against Cooper-Moore's diddley-bow rhythm (a twangy, percussive/string sounding beat). Coolly executed. Nice stuff.

Previously noted here. This is a quick-hit track with jazzy horn lines over a snappy, very modern drum beat (a snare that emulates the snap of a drum machine; the band Fieldwork comes to mind).

Previously noted here, and previously played here. It's a low-key tune, but just so catchy, I can't stop playing it.

Whoa -- wacky, synth-laden funk that starts out cartoony and gets into hard-digging fusion soloing. With Steve Grismore on guitar and guitar synth, and Paul Scea on saxes, flute, etc. Also Anthony Cox on bass -- always nice to see his name pop up. (His Dark Metals CD isn't in our library; I'll have to bring it in for airplay sometime.)

* Bernie Maupin Ensemble -- "Walter Bishop Jr." -- Penumbra (Cryptogramophone, 2006)

Free jazz from a veteran of the "electric Miles" period. Maupin leads on bass clarinet and sax, and occasional flute, often digging into funk territory. Keeps to a relatively cool intensity, as opposed to aggressive blowouts; this track, in particular, presents a coolly steady groove. Accessible stuff that includes plenty of substance and sense of adventure.

Cory caught my attention in 2003 with his solo electric bass album, Postcards from California. It had a dusty-road, Americana look that read "Really bad smooth/new-age Windham Hill jazz," but turned out to be really interesting, with a couple of free-jazz moments and some old-world (like 1930s and before) spice here and there.

This album adds saxophonist Dan Willis and drummer John Hollenbeck -- the latter being the leader of the Claudia Quintet, a really interesting modern-jazz group that includes Chris Speed, among others. Valencia includes lots of interesting, experimental snippets and some really good longer songs, peppered by Hollenbeck's complex drumming (he's really good at that "drum-machine snap" mentioned with the Gianluca Petrella CD, above). Lots of room for the sax to explore. Nice stuff, and it's cool to see Combs landing on Phillip Greenlief's Evander label.

A veteran of the Lounge Lizards and the Jazz Passengers, Nathanson has always had a passion for singing in addition to playing the saxophone. He's got a raw but adequate voice with a deep New York accent that adds a touch of sincerity or authenticity; I remember first hearing him on an album he did with Anthony Coleman, The Coming Great Milennium, which I'd picked up on my first ever trip to the Knitting Factory in New York (the Knit was past its prime then, as I would later learn, and it didn't treat the recording artists on its record label too kindly). Anyway, that album's opening track, "Birds/Jews," was my first taste of Nathanson's voice, which I found capitvating. This album's got vocals on every track, sometimes singing, sometimes poetry, sometimes a mix of the two.

Previously noted here. This particular track is a bit quieter than moist, starting and ending with pretty sounds of bells.

Previously noted here. This CD didn't get much airplay because it's two tracks of about 25 minutes each; that sort of thing scares away even sympathetic DJs. The easy answer is to excerpt the tracks -- fade in/out to present a healthy snippet of the music -- but I like to play long tracks in their entirety at least once during their turn in roatation. I'd already played this one before, but I'm a fan of Berne's and this is a particularly impressive track -- so here, on its last week in the "A-file," I figured I'd give it another spin.

* William Parker -- "Codex" -- Long Hidden: The Olmec Series (AUM Fidelity, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

CD of solo saxophone pieces, all played on the same 1950s tenor that Greenlief got from his dad (the whole CD is dedicated to Greenlief's parents and has some touching photos and liner notes.) Devoted to "Memory, Improvisation, and the Developing Language of the Saxophone," the CD features a variety of sounds and strategies, keeping in an abstract vein with lots of different techniques. It's like a musical sketchbook. This track is my favorite, for now anyway -- a middling-aggressive set of jazzy doodles.

Previously mentioned here.

Aaly Trio -- "Why I Don't Go Back" -- Stumble (Wobbly Rail, 1998)

Jeb Bishop -- "i." [untitled track 9] -- 98 Duets (Wobbly Rail, 1998)

Bishop was playing a gig in town, so I figured I give him a spin; this one's a duet with Ken Vandermark. Bishop, a trombonist, is active in the Chicago jazz scene. He's played in a couple of Vandermark projects, and I got to see him live on my trip to Chicago earlier this month, as part of Rob Mazurek's Exploding Star Orchestra.

A 3-CD set of jamming live performances at Tonic, the lower East side NYC venue that's been home to some great free/improv jazz work. McBride's sets were a little more crowd pleasing than most Tonic fare, but this is still pretty cool stuff -- long jams in electric Miles mode. Each CD has a different feel ... CD 1 is like a fusiony, funky concert; CD 2 features two extended jams (about 30 mins. apiece) with Charlie Hunter and Jenny Scheinman guest starring (these tracks are part of a chill-out pause on CD 2); CD 3 gets into a bit of hip-hop mode. Ambitious and colossal.

* = Item in KZSU rotation
! = Pop anomaly
? = Item not in KZSU library

-- Go back to Memory Select playlists.
-- Bay Area free/improv music calendar: http://www.bayimproviser.com.