Ralph Towner, Travel Guide

Ralph Towner is a guitarist that exemplifies Ellington's idea of music "beyond category". For years he has refused to be stereotyped as only a modern jazz, new classical or fusion artist, but instead has directed his full, exceptionally talented self to wherever his music takes him.

You know that is still the case when you savor his new album, Travel Guide (ECM 2310). It's a continuation of a three-way collaboration between Towner on classical and 12-string guitars, Wolfgang Muthspiel on electric guitar and vocals, and Slava Grigoryan on classical and baritone guitars. The threesome have been working together off and on since 2005. The intersection of styles makes for a totally absorbing music. Muthspiel the very tasteful electrician, Slava Grigoryan an exceptional classicist and Ralph somewhere between the two.

There are five compositions by Towner and five by Muthspiel on the album. All have something of that open-spaced sound that Towner often favors and, as it turns out, the other two also feel comfortable within.

This is considerably lyrical music. Not surprising if you know Towner's work but equally so of the other two. The guitar playing mixes improvisation (of the exceptional sort) with compositional works that stand out.

It should be heard by you if a jazz-classical nexus in guitar artistry floats your boat. If you don't know what that means, then listen anyway and I think you will be transported.

Gary Lucas, Cinefantastique

There is so much to say about Gary Lucas and his new album Cinefantastique (Northern Spy 043) that I scarcely know where to start. So I'll just start. Solo Gary Lucas guitar is such an entity unto itself that there is really nothing that compares. He has over the years developed his very own sounds, plural, that make him instantly recognizable and at this point inimitable.

There of course is the electric Gary, with Strat and effects pedals playing live in orchestral magnificence. There is Gary on his old Gibson acoustic. And there is Gary on dobro. In each case it isn't just what he plays but how he sounds. I won't pretend I know exactly how he does it--but through a combination of the strings he uses, his tunings, his attack, his use of harmonics and such he gets an extraordinarily bright, wiry tone on the Gibson (and the dobro), a wonderfully singing tone on the Strat. And of course you can hear all of that most vividly on Cinefantastique.

This is about that and it also is about Gary's love of film. He has chosen for this album themes from movies both iconic, known, less known, and otherwise very idiomatic to Gary's all-embracing musicality. Some of his now well-known guitar soundtracks for classic silent films are nicely touched upon, with J'accuse, Spanish Dracula, and 20 minutes of Etr'acte. These are excellent examples of the self-inventing Gary. But then all of this is.

Because whatever the context or theme, his own sensibility is out front, paradigmatically so. "Bali Ha'i" from South Pacific has unforgettable voicings and string accentuations of the implicit melodic-harmonic implications. So too the tuning and playing on "Our Love is Here to Stay" (from An American in Paris) has virtually a recomposition going for it in the bluesy country picking he has created, the tuning which gives him some really hip out and in qualities, plus a harmonic so well-placed that it puts everything together.

Part of this is like John Fahey's famous holiday season arrangements for acoustic. Only better. Better because Gary has the ears to make the tunings work completely and utterly--and because it has more imagination going on, much as I love Fahey.

I must mention some of the amazing electric work--on for example "Vertigo/Psycho" (Alfred's tribute) and "Aguirre, the Wrath of God" (Herzog's masterpiece). It is a translation of the original music to what Gary does with the etherial pedal effects, the driving electricity, the eerie space notes and chords. These are arrangements he's refined and worked over for years and they sound sooo good.

Finally two things. One is the Guaraldi "Charlie Brown" theme. Gary translates the melody-harmony to open tuning and virtually reworks the music so that you still recognize it but it plays that much more brilliantly as it lays out on the open-tuned, finger-picked acoustic.

I conclude with an example of Gary's famous neo-quasi-all-over-again synchronicity that I am constantly experiencing with him. I jokingly said several weeks ago in a review of harp concertos on the classical blog that I love the harp so much I would even like the "Howdy Doody" theme song if it were played on the instrument. Well, so here is Gary playing it--goofing around, but playing a brilliant thirty seconds on the dobro. So I was wrong in a way--it was Gary who could make an arrangement of just about anything and it would sound great. No of course this isn't some psychic kismet--but just an example of how he has taken in the music of our times and reworked it all.

And one thing (as Nixon used to say) that you should make no mistake about. Nixon didn't have Maestro Lucas in mind, but make no mistake about this: Cinefantastique is landmark music--landmark playing, landmark musical thinking. It's a guitar solo landmark, no kidding! Make no mistake about that.

Dewa Budjana, Joged Kahyangan

Indonesian guitarist Dewa Budjana is back with his second album for MoonJune Records, Joged Kahyangan (MoonJune 059). He's made some very many albums with pop-rock group Gigi, which have sold well internationally, but as a solo artist he's more into jazz-rock fusion sounds. This latest album gives us nice, somewhat on the mellow side tunes, some excellent playing by Dewa and a band of heavies--Larry Goldings, Bob Mintzer, Jimmy Johnson, Peter Erskine, and singer Janis Siegel for a track.

What I like about this one is the subtle integration of Indonesian elements and what Dewa lays down on guitar in the midst of it all. He has a great tone and a rhythmic sense that sets him apart. It makes for very pleasing listening.

I hear his next will be a power trio outing. I look forward to that. Meanwhile this is quite nice.

Shrunken Head Shop, Live in Germany

If there's justice in the music world (and there is) much of it has something to do with talent getting heard...eventually. Here it is December, for example, and a recording I received at the beginning of September is finally finding its way to review here. It's not that I didn't appreciate it on first hearing. I did. But this final quarter I have literally been bombarded with music. Sometimes just to get through them the first time becomes a chore. And then my life--as chaotic as side one of Ascension lately. No excuses, though.

So let's press on. We are talking about guitarist Willie Oteri and the band Shrunken Head Shop--and their album Live in Germany (Oteri Tunes). It's good. It was recorded during their tour of Europe in 2012. Willie was a big part of WD-41. Now he finds a kind of out post-Bitches' Brew groove but without a lot of emphasis on groove--with a bit more in the way of a very loose but very appealing kind of tapestry of sound. Dave Laczko of WD-41 is back on trumpet and he plays a integral part of the proceedings. Then there are some hip German and Italian musicians in the band, including Sylvia Oelkrug, violin, Schroeder, drums, Jan Fitschen, bass and stick, Alex Arcuri, electric bass and Konrad Wiemann, percussion.

What grabs me about this is how well the collective freedom is used by all to get a spacey exploration going while consistently keeping it filled with good spontaneous events. Willie's playing is excellent throughout and trumpet and violin interact particularly well with guitar. Then when the basses get it going that's a good thing as well. But everybody is on the mark here.

If you are into post-prog electric freedom and are ready for something different in that zone, this is most definitely ear-candy for your listening mind.

Shayna Dulberger, Ache & Flutter

Lest we forget that "and Bass" is in the title of this review blog, it is time to get back to some new releases by bassists. Up today is a new album by Shayna Dulberger, upright bassist of tensile strength and inventiveness. The album is a quartet outing, titled Ache & Flutter (Empty Room Music 006) and it is excellent. This is music in the avant, open free jazz zone. It ripples with charged energy.

The band is Shayna plus Chris Welcome on electric guitar, Yori Kretzmer on tenor sax, and Carlo Costa on drums. This is what's great about Brooklyn, or one of the things. Jazz artists of stature, both known and unknown, live there and there is continual cross-fertilizations going on all the time, something so necessary for a "scene" to come about. Here are four artists you may not know very well but it takes a Brooklyn to get them together and get them TOGETHER, so to say.

There are eleven short numbers, all written by Ms. Dulberger, all driving the music and giving the players paces to slot into and thrive. And they do. Shayna has that very percussive push that reminds me of Mingus. Whether soloing, teaming up in a killer rhythm tandem with Carlo Costa, forming a four-way persona in ensemble improvisations or getting involved with the compositional motives, she shows what an artist she is on the bass. It is no accident that William Parker, bass titan, writes some very complementary liner notes in the inner sleeve of this album. She is a heavy and shows us how and why on this album.

But the band is hot, too. Costa is a drummer of excellent musicality and gets a head of froth going when needed or lays back and swings strongly but not loudly. Chris Welcome plays lines on the guitar that identify him as Chris Welcome, himself and nobody else. They are melodically-harmonically out but also mostly linear in that horizontal lining sense that lays the artist bare before the listening ear and puts the immediacy at stake at every moment.

Yori Kretzmer has character in his tenorism. He has lots of SOUND in his playing, controlled human utterance plus outness that can be gruff or winding along post Lester-Trane-Rivers. It's the what as well as the how with him too, since these are hip out lines going places but also sounding skywards.

What we have is 42 important minutes of music, showing this band to be a contender on the avant scene today, showing Shayna a bandleader that (I sure hope) is here to stay, a very good writer of the structured tune-composition frameworks, and a bassist that is right there, right here, right wherever she is, a real player!

So if what I wrote just now makes you think you might like this one--believe me I am not saying it all for my health! It is what it is--but what that is, IS! In the best sense of IS!

For more information on Shayna Dulberger's recordings and to order paste the following address into your browser and hit "enter": http://shaynadulberger.com/Albums.html#AF

Tarun Balani Collective, Sacred World

Some fusion/prog from Mumbai, India? Mumbai (formerly named Bombay) is a city with a rich musical heritage, of course, but we don't get much in the way of jazz/prog over here from there. Here's one that's very good. We have the Tarun Balani Collective doing Sacred World (self-released).

Tarun plays the drums with flair and wrote all the compositions. Sharik Hasan plays a central role as pianist, with much of the key compositional elements getting foundation in what he does, but then he voices and solos nicely too. Aditya Balani plays electric and acoustic guitar, and sometimes you can detect a touch of Metheny/early Abercrombie there. He's good and takes it his own way. Bruno Reberg plays contrabass and does a fine job anchoring it all. He also takes some nice solos with a woodiness that is cool. And then there is Suhail Yusuf Khan on Sarangi and vocals--it sounds like he is playing with a plectrum rather than a bow sometimes but it's very good.

So put all of this together and you have distinctive South Asian jazz-rock-prog-fusion that does not sound like what you'd expect and that does not matter because it has its own way. It's lyrical, it moves. Well done!

Mike Keneally, You Must Be This Tall

The term "progressive rock" in some ways became as unwelcome in the '70s as that of "cool jazz" in the '50s. Sure, in both cases the music sometimes suffered from excesses and the reaction against it with "punk" and "hard bop" was predictable and perhaps inevitable. Nonetheless there was plenty there in both cases of music that was totally valid, excellent, worth hearing still.

So if I tell you that Mike Keneally's album You Must Be This Tall (Exowax 2414) might be thought of as progressive rock today, you must not take that as to mean that you are in for some kind of pretentious synth version of the "1812 Overture" or something of that ilk.

It is complexly arranged compositional rock that takes the best of Zappa in his ambitious moments and groups like Yes and perhaps a hint of Pink Floyd's middle period . . . or at least it's music that has something in common with that, but made into a new something.

Keneally plays a very nice electric guitar along with acoustic, synths, bass and vocals. There are live drums much of the time played by Marco Minnemann. It's new advanced, "progressive" rock that rings true and does not at all play on nostalgia as much as builds a music on the foundations of the past.

Keneally is a guitarist with excellent taste and sound, a rock composer with a great sense. And the album fully satisfies a need for some hip complexity that always remains musical. So, there.