Dead Horse
A lull in my journey...
“So weird how you (well, I) can live for decades in a state of mild if favorably disposed indifference to some musician or band and then one day wake in a state of full-blown, whirling obsession.” - Michael Chabon
The Lows Creep In
As much as I am sometimes really into some album, some song, some artist, some show or whatever, I find myself between such a moment and I don’t want to pretend that I have something amazing for you when I don’t. I recently did some deep dives into Roland Kirk (the triple threat who played three horns at once!) and Beat Scientist: Makaya McCraven, and they really lit a fire in me. That fire has dwindled to burnt wood n dust and I haven’t found a new pile to logs to get it raging again. So I’m looking and listening.
In many ways, I’ve been high:
High on seeing Jon Batiste last month. Wow, what a show.
High on my middle school buddy, Adam Schultz, convincing me to stop talking about a jazz newsletter and actually write one. At the Batiste concert, he gave me a one week deadline, provides ongoing feedback and now here we are: 7 newsletters and 40 subscribers in.
High on drummers, notably: Kahil El’Zabar, Nate Smith & Makaya McCraven - I saw the last 2 live in October.
Lows have also crept in:
Low on over-repetition. I found myself getting headaches in late October.
Low on inspiration - there’s nothing I’ve heard lately that I literally can’t get it out of my mind’s eye.
Low on drummers. I’ve oversaturated myself. They’re not bringing me pleasure, I’m not pausing to listen intently, I’m finding myself unable or uninterested in finishing tracks I was really into a couple weeks ago. I need to come back to the beats when I have a refreshed mind.
Low on decoding complex sounds- I think I have some sensory fatigue.
Resetting the Pallette
I’m having some “listening ginger” and resetting my ear’s palate. I’ve reset myself around listening to music I want to in the moment, rather than some intent, like getting to know an artist’s catalog before attending a concert. What has been spinning:
California’s Ambrose Akinmusire (pronounced: ah-KIN-moo-sir-ee) originally caught my ear with Bill Frisell on the album Owl Song (2023). I was so impressed I checked out his solo album Beauty is Enough (2023) and from then on he was on my list to remember. This week, I downloaded When the Heart Emerges Glistening (2011) and got lost in what starts with Ambrose alone on his trumpet and ends in with the band taking me to new places - reflective places, calm places, what the hell is wrong with this world places, missing relatives, making plans, lost in the music, cranking it up as I get to noisy roadways, not wanting to take the earplugs out when I walk into a shop because I’m in Ambrose-land and everyone else around me not plugged in is missing out.
Chaotic Good Jazz, a newsletter I’ve plugged into, shared 30 albums that came out in October. I’ve listened to tracks from about half of them. Two I’d like to come back to are Sneaky Jesus’s minimalist, spiritual jazz on Outta Space and Los Tre’s Taha Mu:
De La Soul: tracks from 2020 onward, like 2021’s collaboration with Potatohead People and others, Baby Got Work.
California’s St Panther caught my ear last night and I added American Dreams to my family’s Summer 2026 playlist. Released yesterday, American Dreams appears on an EP of soulful, poppy songs from a Mexican/Columbian instrumentalist, rapper, producer living in East LA.
Although more novelty jazz than great jazz to most, I enjoyed David McCallum’s Music: A Bit More of Me (1967) a few times this week. A cellist before becoming an actor (best known for his work on The Man From U.N.C.L.E.), McCallum grew up in a musical household, including a violin playing father. The Edge is the album’s standout track for me:
One Album - When the Heart Emerges Glistening
There’s no perfect way into Ambrose Akinmusire’s body of work so why not start with his Blue Note debut? Here’s the All Music review on Ambrose’s website:
He’s not quite there yet, but When the Heart Emerges Glistening, the Blue Note debut from the young Californian, serves notice that he is one to watch. The winner of the 2007 Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition, and still just 28 when this album was released, Akinmusire has, since his indie label debut three years prior, cultivated a voice on the instrument that draws from much that preceded him but points squarely ahead. Working with pianist Gerald Clayton, tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III, bassist Harish Raghavan, and drummer Justin Brown, with co-producer Jason Moran joining on piano on two tracks, Akinmusire surveys post-bop, ballads, free jazz, and funk with equal enthusiasm, mashing them up seamlessly and presenting himself as a bold leader and a sympathetic bandmember.
On “Tear Stained Suicide Manifesto,” the album’s penultimate track and one of the two featuring Moran, Akinmusire eases his way in, sits out a while to listen in as his accompanists explore the song’s open spaces, then returns fired up for the closing crescendos. “Confessions to My Unborn Daughter,” the opening track, begins with Akinmusire stating his case unaccompanied, ritually deconstructs and reroutes scattershot, and finally cools down slowly, the trumpeter taking responsibility for re-piecing it sensibly before it fades away. “My Names Is Oscar” launches as a furious vehicle for Brown, surprises with a spoken word interlude -- the tale of a young black Oakland man shot down by a city transit cop – then gives it back to the drummer, who unleashes a barrage of sticksmanship; never is a trumpet heard. Akinmusire isn’t about brash attitude, though, he brings a soft touch to “Henya” and the standard “What’s New,” and even as he reaches for the outer edges, which he so often does, he displays a tenderness alongside his bravado.
When the Heart Emerges is a breakthrough jazz album that reminds us that in this music, listening closely is of equal importance to speaking out. Akinmusire excels at both.
– All Music
One Song - Catch Me if You Can
In my very first Substack post, when I wrote “I’ll mostly post about jazz and jazz adjacent music but when a rock album rocks my world, I won’t be afraid to use my digital soapbox to shout about it,” I meant it. Nik West has been rocking me for a couple years and she did so again this week.
A dynamic bassist, singer, and songwriter celebrated as a funk-fueled dynamo. Known for an explosive stage presence, distinctive style (often sporting a bass clef mohawk), and for blending funk, rock, R&B, and soul into a unique sound, she’s on my list of people I want to see live.
Catch Me if You Can got on my radar last year, and this live version is my favorite. Hitting with a sharp, funky groove, and showcasing West’s Bass skills, Catch Me if You Can is fun. Start your car, roll down your windows, load up this tune, and hit it.
Other standout tracks for me (Note: these links go to Spotify):
Liner Notes
New Orleans has been designated as a “UNESCO Creative City of Music”
My wife and kids were at a Great Wolf Lodge (IYKYK) this weekend, so I bought a ticket Nick Rolfe and Co. at The 1905. Born in Philly, raised in Seattle, Rolfe has played with Aretha Franklin, Sting, Bruce Springsteen, James Taylor, Idina Menzel, trumpeter Chris Botti and others. Thank goodness he didn’t sound like his albums, which didn’t excite me. Rather, he and the band jammed out. They started with their versions of standards like Cantaloupe Island and Quiet Nights before playing some of their own work and even a piece Rolfe had just completed, but they’d never played. Rolfe alternated between piano and keyboards.
For now, the jazz journey is in neutral, idling comfortably. And I’m fine with that. Because the next obsession will only truly hit when I least expect it.
Hey! Thanks for the CGJ shout-out, glad you were digging the sneaky Jesus and Los Tre picks from last month. We'll have to meet up and catch a show sometime at the 1905 or somewhere else around town!