Friday, March 9th, 2007 ... 3:00 p.m. - 4:50 p.m. ... KZSU, 90.1 FM

Format:
ARTIST -- "TRACK TITLE" -- ALBUM TITLE (LABEL, YEAR)
Horizontal lines denote microphone breaks.

* Nels Cline -- "Yokada Yokada/The Rumproller" -- New Monestary (Cryptogramophone, 2006)

A tribute to Andrew Hill, playing his music in new arrangements by Nels. He's assembled a crack team to do it, with some unusual voicings: Andrea Parkins' accordion and Ben Goldberg's clarinet, for starters. No piano! The result is a joyful and original sound, with Hill's familiar composing style popping up quite often, of course. You can tell they had a lot of fun making the record, and it does come across as a richly original piece of work, not just a covers album.

* The Miyumi Project -- "Episode One" [excerpt] -- re:Rooted (Southport, 2006)

Latest installment of bassist Tatsu Aoki's project combining Japanese music with jazz ideas. This one starts with slow sparse drums, building up into a full-on jazz combo with some really nice woodwind and violin solos. The band includes Jeff Chan and Francis Wong, two (ex?) Bay Area jazzsters that I've lost track of; I'm pretty sure Jeff moved to Chicago. Nice stuff, in any event.

Previously noted here.

A jazz improv quartet led by sax and guitar, with occasional electronics. Abrasive, clangy stuff much of the time, with a good fresh sound although I'm not always buying into the electronics segments, but overall it's a great session with a dark world overlook and a sometimes bitter taste.

* Rich West -- "Detritus or Treasure" -- Heavenly Breakfast (pfMentum, 2006)

Previously noted here. This track gets into some hard-driving grooves on the electric piano, but there's lots of cool artsy playing beforehand. Nice multiphased piece.

This one-minute track (and I'm spelling the name exactly like it is on the CD) is like a blast of electronica: A dry, snapping, fast beat coupled with aggressive sounds. Elsewhere, the album has a more rambling quality, with Maneri and others floating through clouds of dark and active improv.

Previously noted here and here.

* Muhal Richard Abrams, George Lewis And Roscoe Mitchell -- "Dramaturns" [excerpt] -- Streaming (Pi Recordings, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here. A 13-minute trio piece that operates in a kind of controlled fury.

* Andrew Lamb -- "Katrina's Path" [conclusion] -- New Orleans Suite (Engine Studios, 2006)

* Brian Groder and the Sam Rivers Trio -- "Diverging Orbits" -- Torque (Latham, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Previously noted here.

Played on glorious vinyl. With Brandon Ross on guitar, this isn't a very "outside" sounding date but it's got some laid-back yet robust tracks. Good stuff. Marion Brown was on my mind this past week after I heard a long track from his rare ECM record played on last.fm. So, I grabbed this from the library, but it turned out to be in mediocre shape -- little scrapes of static kept showing up. Should have cleaned the record first. I was glad to give it some air time anyway, and I hope no one found it too excruciating.

Previously noted here.

* Mark Helias/Open Loose -- "Subway" -- Atomic Clock (Radio Legs, 2006)

Previously noted here.

Straightforward jazz, with some comfortably dealt standards and some originals. DJ Fo notes that during the solos, the sense of time frees up and melts a bit, creating something a little different from your usual standards readings (whether that's good or bad is up to you).

* = 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.