Marco Barroso’s LUME (“fire” in English, but in truth the acronym of Lisbon Underground Music Ensemble) comes back with a reformulated alignment of musicians and a new collection of compositions challenging the jazz big band format with a chamber ensemble feeling and lots of funk-rock grooves. The coordinates are the same as before in this third opus, but they come in “Las Californias” both refreshed and matured. It seems a paradox, but as the most Anarchist of proverbs declare: paradoxes are liberating...

"Featuring the velvety vocals of Jennifer Charles and the imaginative arrangements of Oren Bloedow, this is an original blend of pop, funk and rock. Their first Tzadik CD, La Mar Enfortuna is a sensuous and lyrical interpretation of traditional Sephardic

“Sleepy LaBeef is a giant of a man, with a booming baritone voice and a deep, rumbling guitar tone to match his size, and his live shows are legendary, non-stop country rockabilly romps, full of good-humored energy. The recordings he did for a reconstituted Sun Records in the 1970s, the best of which are collected here, come as close as we're likely to get to capturing the hurricane force and feel of one of his shows. Track after track catches fire and roars off, and there are plenty of highlights here...

"Eight pieces like eight flashbacks to a bygone daily sonic life. A nostalgia-prone stroll down obsolescence lane. Eight pieces like eight memories and stories, true or fictional, happy or sad, in Technicolor or smell-o-rama. The pieces include:...

Purely improvised music from keyboardist Labrosse & turntablist Tetreault. "Labrosse has given up referencial phrases and works only with abstract elements, while Tetreault has abandoned the use of lps & turned to the turntables intrinsic sound potenti...

"'Porcupine Tree meets Pholas Dactylus?' Well, that's how their label Lizard Records describes them! Labirinto di Specchi (Labyrinth of Mirrors) is a band from Siena who've been around since about 2005. "Hanblecheya" is their proper full-length debut...

All previously unreleased duets recorded between 1982-94, & featuring the soprano sax master with Derek Bailey, Bobby Few, George Lewis, Steve Potts, Roswell Rudd, Masahiko Togashi, Mal Waldron & others.

Steve Lacy: Soprano Saxophone.

"The people who heard Steve Lacy’s final solo performance in 2003 at the “Unerhört” Festival in Zurich will not have forgotten the experience. This rollercoaster of emotions. It didn’t just go under the skin...

A classic ESP release, recorded in concert October 8, 1966 in Buenos Aires, Argentina with a good band, all of whom would go on to some renown and all getting their first international recognition here: Enrico Rava-trumpet, Johnny Dyani-bass and Louis Moholo-drums.
This is one of Lacy's very first free albums under his own name and consists of two long improvisations. Somewhat unusually for ESP, the sonics are very clear and open and you can hear everything that's going on here!

“What could possibly happen when two ultimate masters of soprano saxophone square off for their only recording of duets? Chirps is the only place to find out.
Steve Lacy -- the one who planted the flag for soprano saxophone in the ground of modern jazz, who established its iconic status, who devoted himself to the axe with monkish devotion, who brought shakuhachi breath and stairstep melody into its upper-register antics.
Evan Parker -- arguably the one who pushed the instrument the furthest...

“Laddio Bolocko was a noise rock band from New York City, formed in 1996 by members of Panicsville and the Dazzling Killmen. Their sound has drawn comparisons to experimental rock groups such as This Heat and Can and free jazz musicians like Albert Ayler. The band favored limited releases, offering only small pressings of their original albums."-Wikipedia

"Double-disc which collects all out of print recorded material by NYC group Laddio Bolocko. Drew St. Ivany (guitar) and Ben Armstrong (bass)..

“Something of a follow-up to 1994's Gift of the Tortoise, Songs from a Zulu Farm is another Ladysmith Black Mabazo children's album, on which the nine-member South African male choir led by Joseph Shabalala sings traditional songs relating to children, specifically back home on the farm. Since the singing is in Zulu for the most part, the focus on nature, children, and animals may not be immediately apparent to an English speaker, who will hear the disc as a typical collection of a cappella singing, with...

"On Modern Lore, Julian Lage's second studio recording with his trio, the composer and guitarist focuses on the groove, building his melodies and solos around the work of the prodigious rhythm section of double bassist Scott Colley and drummer Kenny Wollesen. Modern Lore finds Lage playfully flipping the script he followed on his acclaimed 2016 Mack Avenue debut, Arclight.
"Last time it was specifically a combination of the electric guitar being a lead voice interacting with those pre-bebop songs...

"Commissioned by the Lisbon Architecture Triennale 2007, “Espaço” is more than a wonderful jazz piano trio record. Architecture is the motive sustaining this geometric but organic music: the idea of regular and irregular structures, continuous and...

"This is an exciting display of 6 string prowess that really isn't classical, yet will inevitably become a classic. It is an amazing tour de force worthy of the California Guitar Trio. The efforst here focus on composers and players who are heroes to...

Rachel Anne Warren - vocals, keys
Jonathan Badger - acoustic and electric guitars, oud, mellotron, piano, vocals, balalaika, concussions
Really great, edgy, electro-pop duo project from the under-recognized Jonathan Badger (who I knew, of course) and Rachel (a really fine singer from Baltimore who I didn't know before this project)

"Lake Mallory is the musical hybrid born of the wildly diverse sensibilities of Jonathan Badger (Cuneiform, MT6, High Horse) and Rachel Anne Warren...

Oliver Lake Alto Saxophone / Christian Weber Bass / Dieter Ulrich Drums.

"The recordings presented here by Lake, Weber and Ulrich, are convincing for different reasons. They show the three musicians in an intensive exchange, jumping across...

''Bun-Ching Lam's extended composition '...Like Water' is an evocative and imaginative work, as sensuous as its title. A native of Macau, now living in NYC, Lam has studied composition with Roger Reynolds, Pauline Oliveros, and Robert Erickson, and has...

Susana Santos Silva, trumpet, electronics / Gonçalo Almeida, double bass, effects and loops / Greg Smith, drums.

"The particularly dynamic and inventive Portuguese jazz scene has a new front with the trio Lama. Curiously enough, the project was..

Joachim Badenhorst clarinet and bass clarinet
Susana Santos Silva trumpet
Gonçalo Almeida double bass, keys, effects and loops
Greg Smith drums and electronics

"No other title could be more certain to describe the music played by this transnational band lead by the Portuguese double bassist and composer Gonçalo Almeida and having Joachim Badenhorst (once again, like on the previous “The Elephant’s Journey”) as special guest. In fact, everything is in permanent inner mutation alo

"Remixed and remastered for the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina, Andrew Lamb’s New Orleans Suite is a testament to the continued power and relevance of jazz, pouring out a wide range of emotions for listeners: shock, anger, sadness, and hope...

"The New Yorker critic Whitney Balliett once said her tiny wisp of a voice "would scarcely reach the second storey of a doll's house", while jazz critic Leonard Feather described it as "a voice in a million". Blossom Dearie pursued a singular career...

"Alex Lameira is a guitar player from São Paulo, Brasil, and this is his first record, recorded with his quartet (guitar, piano, bass, drums). This is the result of Alex and drummer André Souto taking part in some work-shops conducted by Itiberê Zwarg (Hermeto Pascoal’s bass player & leader of Itibere Orquestra Familia), where Hermeto's "Musica Universal" concept is taught and exposed among younger generations of musicians.

Besides the core quartet, Itiberê joins in playing several instruments...

“A new edition of the wonderful 1976 album ‘Marscape’ by Jack Lancaster And Robin Lumley, taken from newly discovered master tapes.
This excellent album was recorded and released in 1976 and was composed and conceived to mark the landing on Mars of Nasa’s Viking 2 Explorer in September of that year.
For the sessions, saxophonist and woodwind player Jack Lancaster and keyboard player Robin Lumley were joined by John Goodsall on guitars, Percy Jones on bass and Phil Collins on drums.
The...

Jonn Buzby / keyboards, vocals
John Covach / guitars (1,3,4,6,12)
Brian O'Neill / guitars (2,5,7-11)
Gerald Wilson / bass
Wesley Hare / drums

Land of Chocolate is the project of vocalist / keyboardist Jonn Buzby, brother of Chris Buzby of Echolyn. The band presents a very assured, modern progressive rock, with impressive vocals; overall, this makes me think of a more edgy Echolyn or maybe a less demented Bubblemath [another band who took a long time between two of their albums!