Longform Editions is a boutique record label out of Australia which does many things well, but specialized in releasing short albums packed with electronic experimentalia from all over the world. This one brings Los Angelino Carlos Niño and a world traveling sax player whose work I’m quite new to in Continue Reading
Improvised Music
H.J. Ayala – Le Corps Sacré
This is the second guitar-based album we’ve had the pleasure of reviewing this week. This one comes from Mexican-French guitarist Hector (H.J.) Ayala who works out of Strasbourg, France. The album is a gentle, twangy, pleasantly meandering collection of tones which belong to a film which has not yet been Continue Reading
Sergey Kuryokhin & Boris Grebenshchikov – Mad Nightingales of the Russian Forest
I will be airborne most of today as I go from Moscow to Los Angeles to handle some personal business, so In honor of this momentous event, I present you with what was one of the first Russian jazz/improv/Avant-rock albums I ever heard, from two legends: Sergey Kuryokhin & Boris Continue Reading
Jeff Gburek + George Christian – Thrown Extremes
During the next few weeks, I’ll be catching up on releases I could not get to in 2021. This one is really a gem that I’m surprised I didn’t get to earlier, but thanks to Jeff Gburek reminding me of it, I can happily present this release he did in Continue Reading
Ernesto Diaz-Infante – Saca Los Cuernos al Sol
My fellow Californian Ernesto Diaz-Infante provides us with a warm, shimmering work of nine instrumental pieces composed solely for guitar. Each track is warm, not only by experimental music standards, but in terms of pure music listening. My particular favorite was IV, which reminded me of a hybrid between John Continue Reading
Jeff Gburek – Gendhing Rebaban
As we near the close of a challenging 2021, we’re graced with a release by composer Jeff Gburek which features a rebab, a spiked fiddle. It’s an instrument he studied in Indonesia under Pak Suhardi, blended with synthesizers and electronic bloops and bleeps which left me feeling like I was Continue Reading
Bester Quartet – Piazzolla Angels
Poland’s For-Tune Records have been consistently releasing high-quality jazz and improv music for some time now, but their latest has a special place for me. This collection, with the exception of Por Una Cabeza (composed by Carlos Gardel) was composed by the inimitable Ástor Piazzólla and arranged Bester Quartet leader Continue Reading
Amir ElSaffar – Inana
Inana is the fourth album by Iraqi-American trumpeter Amir ElSaffar which came out in 2011. The trumpeter starts the album with eight tracks dedicated to Inanna, the Mesopotamian goddess of sex, beauty, war and political power. ElSaffar mixes microtonal jazz with Arabic scales such as maqam, which seems to be Continue Reading
[Avant Music News] Jon Hassell Profiled in Memorium
![[Avant Music News] Jon Hassell Profiled in Memorium](https://musicyouneedtohear.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/07/img_5969-768x547.jpg)
Source: The Guardian. By the time Jon Hassell became a revered figure – the kind of determinedly non-commercial, avant-garde artist whose ideas are … Jon Hassell Profiled in Memorium
Ikuro Takahashi – しりえないものとずっと
An’archives, a French experimental music record label, has released しりえないものとずっと (Forever With The Incomprehensible) by legendary drummer and percussionist Ikuro Takahashi. Takahashi has worked with the likes of Keiji Haino’s power-trio Fushitsusha, Seishokki, High Rise, Ché-Shizu, Maher Shalal Hash Baz, Kousokuya, LSD March and Nagisa Ni Te. This kind of Continue Reading