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dustedmagazine · 2 years ago

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“Everybody Hollerin’ GOAT” — Derek Taylor’s 2022

I’ve been reverentially pilfering Bill Steber’s photos as visual ledes for as long as I’ve been writing these Year End paeans (the first was in 2003, making this one the nineteenth). There’s something about Steber’s keen eye for negative space, composition and context that makes me think of Blue Note’s Francis Wolff, if transplanted to the Mississippi hill country. No blues to speak of in the stack of recordings this time around, at least as sourced from that legendary, loamy region, but still lots that’s helped keep my head screwed on and faculties relatively fog-free over the past twelve-months.

Wadada Leo Smith

Smith’s ascendance to octogenarian eminence was simply too merry and momentous an occasion to be contained to a single year. As the concluding two entries in a hexalogy of releases on the Finnish TUM label highlighting facets of his multifarious output, Emerald Duets and String Quartets, Nos. 1-12 dropped in May and were also arguably the most ambitious. The Dusted bullpen collectively dug in on both sets in a rousing Listening Post roundtable that forgivably favored the more accessible exploratory encounters with drummers Jack DeJohnette, Andrew Cyrille, Han Bennink and Pheeroan AkLaff.

Joe McPhee

The Powerhouse from Poughkeepsie turned 83 years young in November and as with past years his productive spirit appears immune to enervation or ennui. Ensemble efforts like Survival Unit III’s The Art of Flight (Astral Spirits/Instigation) and Pride of Lion’s No Question No Answers (RogueArt) continue to be the common currency of his artistic realm, but McPhee also found aegis for the release of exhilarating duets with cellist (and freshly-minted MacArthur “genius”) Tomeka Reid (Let Our Rejoicing Rise) and British sax eidolon Evan Parker (Sweet Nothings (For Milford Graves), both pressed on the prolific Corbett vs. Dempsey imprint (see below).

Peter Brötzmann

Speaking again of unstoppable octogenarians, Herr Brötzmann came out of COVID isolation with renewed vigor and a concert calendar still compellingly competitive with musicians a fraction his age. New entries in his edifice-sized discography weren’t nearly as plentiful, but a pair of archival releases still packed a gobsmacking punch. Historic Music Past Tense Future (Black Editions Archive) drops the German reedist and bassist William Parker into the precision polyrhythmic maelstrom of Milford Graves circa spring 2002 across a double slab of vinyl. In a State of Undress (FMP/Be!) is free jazz of a more formal sort with the one-off aggregate of trumpeter Manfred Schoof, bassist Jay Oliver and drummer Willi Kellers tempering the leader’s orotund edges.

Tyshawn Sorey + Greg Osby — The Off-Off Broadway Guide to Synergism (Pi)

Keeping up with Tyshawn Sorey’s indefatigable activities is a lot like keeping pace with Joe McPhee, a full-time pursuit worth every penny and effort. This three-disc set has the instant enticement of capturing his working trio in the hothouse context of an extended gig at the Jazz Gallery in NYC. Add to that a program of alchemized standards sourced from the Great American Songbook and jazz brethren along with altoist Greg Osby in a rare sideman station and the results become an irresistible trigger pull. In a word: epic.

Cecil Taylor

Taylor’s been gone four-plus-years, but his in-life prolificacy continues to bestow posthumous gifts. Revelatory and digital-only, The Complete, Legendary, Live Return Concert at the Town Hall, NYC, November 4, 1973 (Oblivion) expands greatly on its previously truncated incarnation, Spring of Two Blue-J’s originally on Taylor’s own Unit Core imprint back in 1974. Respiration (Fundacja Słuchaj!) and Live in Ruvo Di Puglia 2000 (Enja) reveal previously unreleased prototypes of his solo repertoire separated by the span of thirty-two years. Sharing a surname with the pianist probably suggests the presence of bias, but I will still ardently go on record in stating that all three are essential.

Albert Ayler — Revelations: The Complete ORTF 1970 Fondation Maeght Recordings (Elemental)

Previous editions of this material are now obsolete thanks to this magnificent, meticulously assembled set. So invasive were earlier edits and excisions, particularly as concerns the catalytic contributions of Ayler’s life and musical partner Mary Parks (aka Mary Maria), that it’s like hearing the concerts anew. Parks’ memory and jazz history are restored by producer Zev Feldman and his retinue of collaborators. The results are glorious, both in terms of restored fidelity and the extended majesty of Ayler’s last band firing on collective, conflagratory cylinders.

Chris Dingman — Journeys Vols. 1 & 2 (Inner Arts)

Chris Dingman nearly topped my Year End list two-years ago with an ambitious five-disc opus Peace, a dedicatory body of work for solo vibraphone initially conceived as an aural paregoric for his ailing father. The elder Dingman passed away prior to its release and in navigating the grief in the years since, the son’s doubled down on the unaccompanied format as means of realizing Albert Ayler proffered adage that “music is the healing force of the universe.” Journey’s 1 & 2 reflect their predecessor, but also refract it through a sequence of malleted excursions emphasizing melody and repetition in rippling, elliptical patterns that soothe and enthrall.

Corbett vs Dempsey

John Corbett is indicative of my favorite species of record collector: an altruist whose obsessiveness in the endeavor is exceeded by his ardor for sharing the spoils of this searches through reissues that completely do the artifacts justice. Chief among the offerings this year, German free jazz pianist Georg Gräwe’s first two forays as a leader, New Movements (1976) and Pink Pong (1978), and the pivotal Globe Unity (1967), which restores Alexander von Schlippenbach’s first multinational large ensemble enterprise to circulation. Also of note, another stack of entries inspired by the Sequesterfest series of concerts initiated during the pandemic. Drummer Hamid Drake’s Dedications features solo percussion-planted encomia to his influences and is probably my pick of the eight titles released so far.

The Pyramids — Aomawa: The 1970s Recordings (Strut)

A box set that brings a personal blind spot into bracing focus and rectifies it. The Pyramids initial three albums plus a concert air shot given the deluxe treatment by the Strut label. Ancient to the Future with audible Sun Ra Arkestra and Art Ensemble influences, reedist Idris Ackamoor’s ensemble is never slavish or supine in its interpretations of precedence. Percussion jams are plentiful, as are spiritual jazz overtones, and it all combines in an earthy gestalt that also has a healthy respect and acumen for groove. I’m of an age where regrets feel increasingly impractical, but it’s still good to catch up.

Grounation — The Mystic Revelation of Rastafari (Soul Jazz)

An arguable Jamaican analog to Aomawa in its assemblage of certain analogous ingredients, Groundnation was also something else entirely. Sprawling across three LPs (a milestone in the country’s recording industry), The Mystic Revelation of Rastafari resonates as history lesson, call to arms, sacred text, and adulatory celebration among other appellations. Count Ossie, Cedric IM Brooks and their confreres mined both zeitgeist and musical alloy that had lasting effects not just on reggae, but self-determinate roots-oriented music of all sorts. Soul Jazz’s painstaking attention to accurate reproduction and contextualization is admirable and immersive.

Robbie Basho — Bouquet (Lost Lagoon)

Self-produced, released and circulated in 1984, Basho’s penultimate album tests and perhaps proves the prevailing theory that detractors of his singing far outnumber those of guitar playing. Still, he succeeds where other great polarizers of the pipes like Irene Aebi, Yoko Ono and Ethel Merman fail in his unflappable earnestness and credulity. The self-doubt and cumulative frustrations that haunted Basho in life subsume in the sincerity of his music, strangely sui generis in its intensely personalized strains of borrowed religion, spirituality and mysticism. Mileage varies, but there’s no denying Basho’s commitment to his muses.

Sun Ra

Labels like Modern Harmonic and Cosmic Myth Ra continue to keep Ra relevant even though the Saturnian left the planet decades ago. This year’s passel of reissues includes timely returns of Ra to the Rescue and Universe in Blue, each augmented with extra and/or extended tracks. The latter album includes several showstopping John Gilmore spotlights and ample Ra organ-omics while the former gets its most complete edition yet with a survey of snapshots across 1970s sessions. A genuinely new release, Prophet zeroes in on Ra’s 1986 in-studio experiments with the then-newfangled eponymous console and he responds like a kid in a keyboard candy store with select Arkestral band members, including an ailing June Tyson, in exuberant, if fleeting, support.

Steeplechase

The Danish label is an old reliable in these pages, plugging along with current releases from its international stable of artists alongside occasional, but always welcome, reissues. Stephen Riley’s My Romance isn’t the tenorist’s first recording with B-3 organ, but it does mark his first as a leader. Electing Brian Charette to cover the keys with just Billy Drummond on cans in support is a stripped-down stroke of genius. Vintage concert performances with bop pianist Duke Jordan in the company of Danish tenorist Bent Jaedig (Montmartre ’73) and archival recordings by tenorist Brew Moore (Special Brew) and dearly departed Philly guitarist Monette Sudler (In My Own Way) stand out, too.

Bear Family

Bear Family basically has access to a bank vault-sized archive when it comes to vintage country fare. It’s a mighty good thing because Bill Carter holds at best token traction with the 21st century arbiters of the genre. Sixty-seven tracks across two discs chart the ups, downs, and all arounds of Carter’s career (The Complete Recordings from 1953 to 1961) jumping from Western Swing to hillbilly to honkytonk to rockabilly. Perhaps best of all, Carter was 92, lucid, and around to see the release back in March. Western Swing legend Bob Wills’ younger brother Billy Jack was the recipient of similar treatment with Cadillac In Model ‘A’, a comparatively stingy 31-track survey and latest in the label’s long running Gonna Shake This Shack Tonight series.

Ezz-thetics

Born out of both providence and necessity, the Ezz-thetics label exists in the continued absence of the venerated Hat Hut lineage of imprints. The earlier catalogs are tied up in legal proprietary knots, leaving owner Werner X. Uehlinger to throw caution to the curb and pursue a longstanding dream of applying his decades-honed judgment as a producer to free/jazz classics. The venture immediately ran afoul of critics who took umbrage with his audacity in side-stepping stateside copyright considerations and reimagining sacred texts. Wherever one opines on those controversies, there’s no denying the new lease audio engineer Michael Brandli has accorded the source materials. Cecil Taylor’s (With) Exit to Student Studies Revisited, Paul Bley’s Play Annette Peacock Revisited, and Sun Ra’s Nothing Is… Completed & Revisited are exemplary stand outs.

Fresh Sound

Lisbon-based Fresh Sound is another reissue label that continuously courts its share of contention. The logical, if admittedly self-serving counter is that American rights holders to nearly all of the music that they traffic in couldn’t be bothered to apply even a fraction of the care or quality they bring to bear. Exacting attention to the most esoteric and obscure jazz artists has long been the archetype. This year’s batch includes definitive collections of trumpeter Dave Burns (1962 Sessions), baritone saxophonist Virgil Gonsalves (Jazz in the Bay Area 1954-1959), altoist Joe “Mouse” Bonati (Portrait of a Jazz Hero) and Belgian vibraphonist Fats Sadi (Sadi’s Vibes: A Retrospective 1953-61).

Morteza Mahjubi — Selected Improvisations from Golha, Parts 1 & 2 (Death is Not the End)

Tempered instruments aren’t an intuitive match for micro-tonal composition, but that hasn’t hindered musicians of manifold ethnicities from adapting them to the intricacies of indigenous music. Iranian pianist Morteza Mahjubi did so prolifically during his lifetime, recording his innovations for Golha (Flowers of Persian Song and Poetry) radio programs between 1956 and his passing in 1965. Spread over two album-length discs (with hopefully future volumes to follow), Mahjubi applies his custom tuning system to the ivories and approximates the sonorities of endemic instruments like the tar (lute) and santur (hammered dulcimer).

Branko Mataja — Over Fields and Mountains (Numero)

Mataja’s biography reads like a Spielbergian screenplay. Abducted from his native Belgrade and conscripted to a German work camp during WWII, the lifelong guitar enthusiast worked a variety of trades after being liberated, before emigrating to England, then Canada, and finally a string of stateside cities. Mataja eventually settled in Los Angeles where he worked as a barber and started a side business a freelance guitar technician. Memories of his home country haunted him, and he recorded a pair of albums in his garage studio/workshop from which this LP is sourced. Milky, murky reverb and sustain are calling cards, alongside an improvisatory approach to traditional Croatian melodies that’s equal parts melancholic and mysterious.

V/A — Padang Moonrise: The Birth of the Modern Indonesian Recording Industry 1955-1969 (Soundway)

A double-LP + 7” survey stacked with sublime discoveries from coordinates geographic and temporal that beg for an even deeper dive. Reverb-dipped guitars and swirling, droning organs are persistent common denominators alongside varied hand percussion and a revolving cast of melancholic crooners across genders and dialects. It’s cross-cultural music that’s exotica-adjacent and still ripely redolent of American soul. Ghost World’s Enid would’ve had a field day immersing herself in this stuff. I know I have.

Jalaleddin

Old, but still new to me, and perhaps my most listened to platters among the many vinyl discoveries procured on record shop safaris this year. Discogs lists seven albums to Jalaleddin’s name, and I feel fortunate to have found six on the cheap in a single shop. Based in San Francisco in the 1970s and a master of the kanun (Turkish trapezoidal zither,) Jalal Takesh started his musical career cutting belly dance records. Benefiting from a Santana-like broadmindedness, his bandleading would soon conscript musicians of other traditions including Indian ragas, Greek rebetika, and Spanish flamenco. Hand-sketched and colored by an academic friend of Takesh’s, the album cover illustrations are aces, as well.

25 More in No Fixed Order…

Andrew Cyrille/William Parker/Enrico Rava — 2 Blues for Cecil (TUM)

Michael Bisio Quartet — MBefore (Tao Forms)

Ingrid Laubrock/Brandon Lopez/Tom Rainey — No Es La Playa (Intakt)

Patricia Brennan — More Touch (Pyroclastic)

Mark Turner — Return from the Stars (ECM)

Jeb Bishop/Pandelis Karayorgis/Damon Smith — Duals (Driff/Balance Point Acoustics)

Ches Smith — Interpret it Well (Pyroclastic)

Sam Rivers — Caldera (NoBusiness)

Toots Thielemans & Rob Franken — The Studio Sessions 1973-1983 (Dutch Jazz Archive)

The Pyramids — Penetration! (Sundazed)

Horace Tapscott Quintet — S/T (Mr. Bongo)