NEW YORKER: The musician David Byrne once compared the intuitive writing of Bill Buford to the work of the Polish journalist Ryszard Kapuscinski. Since 1995, Buford has contributed nearly fifty pieces to The New Yorker. He has written about a wide array of subjects, including his butchery apprenticeship in Tuscany, the connoisseurs who seek the perfect dark chocolate, and the art of breadmaking in Lyon, France. The New Yorker’s former fiction editor, he has also published three books, including “Among the Thugs” and “Heat.” One of my favorite pieces by Buford is “Delta Nights,” a ruminative Profile of the country-blues […]
BILL FRISELL: What The World Needs Now
Bill Frisell’s career as a guitarist and composer has spanned more than 40 years and many celebrated recordings, whose catalog has been cited by Downbeat as “the best recorded output of the decade.” Released March of ’18, Frisell’s latest album for OKeh/Sony is a solo album titled, Music IS – “Taken as a whole, the album beautifully encapsulates Frisell’s depth and range in all its meditative glory.” – Chicago Reader. It was recorded in August, 2017 at Tucker Martine’s Flora Recording and Playback studio in Portland, Oregon and produced by longtime collaborator Lee Townsend. All of the compositions on Music […]
LOST & FOUND: Art Blakey’s Just Coolin’
Blue Note Records has released Just Coolin’, a never-before-released studio album by Art Blakey & The Jazz Messengers that was recorded on March 8, 1959 in Rudy Van Gelder’s living room studio in Hackensack, New Jersey. The session featured a short-lived line-up of The Jazz Messengers with drummer Art Blakey, trumpeter Lee Morgan, tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley, pianist Bobby Timmons, and bassist Jymie Merritt. The album is available now to stream, download, on CD, and all-analog 180g vinyl mastered by Kevin Gray. The session for Just Coolin’ finds The Jazz Messengers’ saxophone chair in transition. The band had last recorded […]
WIRE FROM THE BUNKER: Meet Sandy Denny
BY JONATHAN HOULON This week’s Wire concerns the First Lady of British Folk, the late great Sandy Denny. At the outset of this series of Wires, I promised to focus on music of which you are likely unaware. I felt confident in this regard because I am cooler than you. But I should also point out that my ability to do these deep dives, as it were, is largely based on my privileged white male privilege (no, that is not redundant: I grew up in Rockville, Maryland). I have been blessed with enough leisure time and resources in my […]
INCOMING: Saint Nick Unplugged
IDIOT PRAYER: Nick Cave Alone at Alexandra Palace – Nick Cave performs solo at the piano in a film shot this June, at the iconic London venue. Join the global live streaming event on 23 July 2020.In this very special show, audiences around the world will see Cave play his songs in a rarely seen stripped back form. From early Bad Seeds and Grinderman, right through to the most recent Nick Cave & the Bad Seeds album, Ghosteen, Cave will perform over 20 songs from his extensive catalogue. The performance was filmed by award-winning Cinematographer Robbie Ryan (The Favourite, Marriage […]
QUESTLOVE SUPREME: Q&A W/ Rick Rubin
I HEART RADIO: He has coined himself the great “Reducer”. However, his imprint on hip hop can not be reduced. Rick Rubin established one of the greatest record labels of all time, which we know as Def Jam and has been going ever since. His sound has been requested by the greats of our time. From LL Cool J and Red Hot Chili Peppers to Kanye West and the Dixie Chicks to Mick Jagger and more. Rick Rubin is the guru of sound. He is also one of Questlove Supreme’s most awaited and anticipated interviews. Yes, class is back in […]
FOXYCONTIN: The Whole World Knows
Foxycontin’s “The Whole World Knows I’ll Never Get Over It Now” from the album This Time You’re On Your Own on Sister Raygun Records.
MT VENGEANCE: Thugs
Mt Vengeance is a Philadelphia rock trio first formed in 2016 out of the ashes of Philly blue collar rock royalty. Singer/guitarist Rich Fravel has been in numerous indie rock bands including Uptown Bones, Latimer, Ashtabula, and Blue. Brian Campbell (bass) was in Philly 80s punk legends The Electric Love Muffin and is currently also in Poppy. Nicky Santore played drums in Valsalva and Providence, RI noise rock band Glory Hole in the early 90s. Mt Vengeance’s first LP Covered in Dust garnered rave reviews in the local Philly press and set out the core sound of the band which […]
MADAME GHANDI: Waiting For Me
Multi-talented artist, percussionist, producer and activist MADAME GANDHI today releases her newest video for Visions track “Waiting For Me” – watch here. Directed by Misha Ghose, “Waiting For Me” was conceptualized and produced by an all-female team and features queer, trans, female and gender non-conforming cast members and marks Madame Gandhi’s first-ever video shot in India. With its contrasting industrial imagery and color palettes, the visual brings to life the song’s empowering message, an eco-feminist call to action that eschews institutionalized power structures in favor of forging new narratives of self-expression. Of the video, Madame Gandhi explains: “We as artists […]
MICHAEL STIPE: No Time For Love Like Now
Written by Michael Stipe and Aaron Dessner, produced by Aaron Dessner, with orchestration by Bryce Dessner, and lyrics by Michael Stipe, “No Time For Love Like Now” is accompanied by a video directed by longtime Eaux Claires, The National and Bon Iver collaborator Michael Brown. “No Time For Love Like Now” is the first song from Big Red Machine since the release of their critically acclaimed self-titled debut in 2018. Big Red Machine began as a collaboration between Aaron Dessner and Justin Vernon in 2008, and has grown into a multi-artist collective. Michael Stipe has designed a “No Time For […]
NPR 4 THE DEAF: We Hear It Even When You Can’t
FRESH AIR: People who have been taking antidepressants for several years sometimes hit a wall, a point when that treatment no longer seems to ease their symptoms. Psychiatrist Julie Holland says that’s where psychedelic drugs could help. Holland was in charge of Bellevue Hospital’s psychiatric emergency room on the weekends from 1996 until 2005, and currently has a private psychotherapy practice in Manhattan. She’s a medical monitor on the MAPS studies, which involve, in part, developing psychedelics into prescription medication. Her new book, Good Chemistry, explores how she thinks psychedelic drugs, including LSD, psilocybin, MDMA and marijuana, might be […]
ALBUM REVIEW: Phoebe Bridgers Punisher
Phoebe Bridgers makes the kind of music best suited for sad self-indulgence, satiating a near-masochistic craving for loneliness. The soft-spoken specificity of her 2017 debut Stranger in the Alps charmed its listeners with eerie emo-folk tales of inescapable blueness. Now, with her 2020 follow-up Punisher, Bridgers casts the same spell with new lyrics, crafting a fresh sense of isolation that cuts deep in quarantine. The album comes a day earlier than expected. Originally scheduled to arrive on June 19th, Bridgers shared a link to the new songs on Twitter with the words “I’m not pushing the record until things go […]
MIKE POLIZZE: CheeWawa
VIA BANDCAMP: Long Lost Solace Find — the first Mike Polizze solo release for Paradise of Bachelors, due out July 31st — finds the Purling Hiss frontman and Birds of Maya shredder stepping out from behind the wall of guitar noise into the bright sunshine. Performed entirely by Polizze with longtime friend Kurt Vile and recorded by War on Drugs engineer Jeff Zeigler, this intimate Philadelphia affair clarifies the bittersweet earworm melodicism of Dizzy Polizzy’s songwriting, revealing bona fide folk-pop chops. Long Lost Solace Find finally harvests the wild local honey from the buzzing hive of Hiss. “Cheewawa,” the second […]