Something that Smiley and I share, and have talked about on numerous occasions is the influence of bassist Charlie Haden on not only our bass playing, but our musicality in general. I would say that over time Haden has probably been my biggest influence as a bassist, and although I don't listen to him as much as I once did, I consider him maybe the most considerable force in my development as an improvising bassist.
A brief and understated bio of Charlie Haden goes like this: He made his first big (and I mean BIG) splash in the late 1950's as the bassist for the Ornette Coleman Quartet, with Ornette on alto, Don Cherry on trumpet, and Billy Higgins on drums. The group underwent a number of lineup changes, but any formation of the band recorded with Haden playing bass is fantastic. He went on to play with Keith Jarrett's American Quartet in the late 60's with Jarrett on piano, Dewey Redman on tenor, and Paul Motian on drums. Upon leaving the Jarrett quartet Haden started his Liberation Music Orchestra, a large jazz ensemble with a strong politcal message that went on to record some of the greatest large ensemble records in the jazz library. They still perform and tour to this day in different configurations. A slightly more in depth bio is available here, which includes his projects after the Liberation Music Orchestra.
My top-5 albums either with Haden or led by Haden (in no particular order, this is very hard to do by the way):
I enjoyed all of the youtube videos from Smiley's recommend (man, I had never seen that Vandermark clip, or the Hollenbeck/Bleckmann thing. Beautiful). Here is his Charlie Haden youtube recommendation. The Ornette group footage here is great, and classic. The interview footage was taken shortly after Haden was apprehended in Portugal for making a politcal statement on stage while performing with Ornette:
Our first music pick from Matt Smiley is a record I wasn't familiar with prior to receiving his list. I have about half of the Skirl Records releases (9 total) and love every one of them. When I saw this on the Smiley list I downloaded from emusic and started checking it out. The Skirl releases that I have are some of my favorite records of the past couple years, and this Curtis Hasselbring album fits right in there with the rest of those.
As of late I have come to realize that most of the music that I really love recently can't fit into a specific genre box, or be easily identified as any one particular "type" of music. I've been drawn to musicians who are more concerned with producing great music, without any concern with how it would be marketed, or if it is considered jazz, or rock, or classical, etc. This brings us to Skirl Records, and trombonist Curtis Hasselbring's New Mellow Edwards. Skirls website (independently owned and operated by genius reedsman Chris Speed) says this of the album:
Curtis' composing and the New Mellow Edwards' playing defies traditional jazz conventions and favors primal garage rock-derived grooves, textural explorations and classically-influenced structures. Curtis' tweaked version of a modern instrumental supergroup features strong performances from three of New York's most innovative musicians: Trevor Dunn (Mr. Bungle, Melvins, Fantomas), John Hollenbeck (Claudia Quintet, Theo Bleckmann) and Chris Speed (Bloodcount, Human Feel).
The album is great all around...top-notch compositions, and stand-out performances that are not surprising, but more expected from Dunn, Hollenbeck, and Speed these days. The music is varied. To call it a jazz album doesn't even begin to describe it, but it certainly has roots in jazz, but also rock, surf, electronic, new orleans, latin, and contemporary classical musics. My reason for going into all of this is because jazz is often viewed as a stale, and in some cases even a dead art form. Young audiences aren't drawn to jazz, because they think "jazz" only refers to Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, and the other great artists who were in their hey-day in the 1940's, 50's, and 60's. My gateway to jazz was through that music, and I still love it to this day. But I think that the music has a much wider audience than this, and a lot of it would appeal to people who consider themselves rock fans and have never been exposed to improvised music with a wider scope.
Someone who immediately comes to mind as an amazing musician (jazz, country, rock, fusion and more), whose improvised output would be accessible to, and even enjoyed by fans of modern rock music is Nels Cline. He has performed with a number of jazz legends, has a discography or great improvised music, and many of you know him as the guitar player for superband Wilco. Some of my favorites to check out are The Nels Cline Singers' Instrumentals, and Draw Breath. Wilco fans, I urge you to download (for free, from his website here!) Cause For Concern, and Suspended Head off of Instrumentals and give it a listen. You might be surprised that you like it.
Again, my reason for mentioning this is because all of the releases on Skirl are these type of genre-bending, in-the-cracks, let-your-influences-all-hang-out type of music that I have come to love in recent years. It all has a basis in improvisation, but is the type of music that I think might be equally appealing to a rock audience (fans of Wilco, Radiohead, Flaming Lips, Pavement, etc) as it is to a jazz audience. My two favorite Skirl releases are Andrew D'Angelos' Skadra Degis, and Hilmar Jennson's Meg Nem Sa for starters (short clips can be heard through the links to emusic). The are both a little edgier, and maybe not for everyone...but they are two of my favorite albums of recent years. There are so many albums that fall into these cross-genre cracks, and many have been overlooked for lack of marketability. I couldn't nearly begin to crack the surface in this post, so I tried to (unsuccessfully) stay close to the original recommends. This is something that I think about a lot, so I apologize for the very wordy, rambly post. If you stuck it through to the end, here is a clip from New Mellow Edwards. It is called ABC's of the Future, and it's sort of like electronic music written for an all-acoustic quartet. I really love it:
On a not-totally-related, but not totally-unrelated note, anyone here seen There Will Be Blood? Did you happen to notice who wrote the fantastic score for the movie. Radiohead's own guitarist Johnny Greenwood, who is also a composer-in-residence for the BBC. Great, great orchestral and modern chamber string music, from a rock guitarist, what what? I much look forward to more of his orchestral music.
Adam was not surprisingly listening to Curtis Hasselbring's New Mellow Edwards, and Nels Cline's Instrumentals at the time of this post.
The comedy group Stella (pictured above l-r) is Michael Showalter, Michael Ian Black, and David Wain. If you are around my age or older you might remember these guys as part of the cast of MTV's The State from the mid-90's. Michael Ian Black is perhaps the most recognizable to people for his role in VH1's I Remember the 80's, etc. As a comedy group Stella has appeared in a number of formats since 1998 (when they began making the shorts). In addition to the 27 short films they made, Stella also had a very brief run on Comedy Central in 2005 which produced 10 half-hour episodes now available on DVD here, and they still perform as a live touring comedy group.
I have never seen the half-hour episodes of Stella, but people like fellow Egg Baby and friend Mike Ward insist that they are worth a damn. I am convinced that he is probably right. My only exposure to Stella is through the shorts recommended here by Matt Smiley, but I am a huge fan of their contributions to other movies and shows. My personal favorites, aside from the shorts, are The State (which is unattainable in it's entirety, but you can now download Season One from iTunes), Michael Showalter's Showalter (all available here at collegehumor.com) and one of my favorite funny movies Wet Hot American Summer. Sidenote, the David Cross and Michael Cera episodes of Showalter are especially worth viewing. There is a ton more info on everything they've been involved in at their website www.stellacomedy.com. If there is a movie or show that one of these guys are a part of, it is probably in your best interest to watch it. Unless you don't like really funny things, then I advise you avoid them.
All of the Stella shorts are also available at collegehumor.com, with a convenient like here. The episode I chose to share is maybe the funniest video on the internet, titled Pizza. Warning: Clip below might be inappropriate for some.
As promised we are back up and running in full force for the new year. Our first post of 2009 comes from Matt Smiley, friend, bassist, musician, throat-singer, etc. I know Matt from my days at JMU, but strangely we were never there in school at the same time and didn't actually meet until after I graduated. The reasons for this are probably boring, and won't be explained in any further detail. Matt is a great jazz bassist, and is pursuing a masters degree out in Colorado. He checks out a LOT of stuff. His initial list had to be edited for length...everything on there was deserving of mention, but there was just no room. And now for the goods:
Music:
"Jazz" Terry Riley and Don Cherry--Bootleg (download!) Victor Feldman--Arrival of Victor Feldman (Scott Lafaro's major recording debut) Curtis Hasselbring--New Mellow Edwards Steve Lacy/Joelle Leandre--One More Time
"Classical" Morton Feldman--String Quartet No. 2 (a six hour continuous piece of music) La Monte Young-The Well Tuned Piano Charles Ives--Universe Symphony, String Quartet No. 1 Giacinto Scelsi--Quattro Pezzi Su Una Nota Sola (Four Pieces on a Single Note)
Books:
Jack Kerouac--Dharma Bums, American Haikus Coleman Barks--The Soul of Rumi Samuel Beckett (first minimalist)--Collected Plays of Samuel Beckett
Film: Anything by David Lynch True Stories (David Byrne film) Outside Out (Michael Gordon film featuring Col. Bruce Hampton Film (Buster Keaton)--Samuel Beckett
TV:
Stella Shorts Twin Peaks
Youtube:
Don Cherry--link Charlie Haden--link Ken Vandermark--link John Hollenbeck and Theo Bleckmann--link
Adam is listening to The Vastness of Space by Reid Anderson at the time of this post.
