A Brazilian style album courtesy of Detroit? Yup, courtesy of the collective Sol Set. It has a beautifully mellow jazz vibe, while still having those samba rhythms that are like a burst of sunshine on aplomb fringed beach. There are multiple vocalists and a range of styles that somehow still fit together perfectly.
Category Archives: music
Fabulous Fabiano
Brazilian music is justifiably famous for bossa nova and Tropicalia in the sixties and seventies. But even today they are still producing excellent musicians such as Fabiano do Nascimento, a guitarist who has captured my imagination with his paired back sound. On his 2015 album ‘Danca Dos Tempos’ he teams up with the legendary Airto …
Island Man
Probably my favorite record, if forced to choose, is Grace Jones ‘Living My Life.’ Her backing band includes the likes of Wally Badarou, Sly Dunbar, and Robbie Shakespeare, who were all part of the Compass Point All-Stars band put together by Island Records impresario Chris Blackwell.Blackwell and his label are responsible for some of the …
Nightrider
Talented jazz guitarist Tom Misch is responsible for 2018’s Geography, a melodic and groovy album that shows off Misch’s abilities to the max. This year he teamed up with drummer Yussef Dayes to produce a looser, more improvisational album, which still benefits from a good ear for melody. It’s probably my favorite of the year, …
Weird Fishes
Lianne La Havas has had dinner with Presidents, counts Stevie Wonder among her fans, and has sung on a Prince album. Her latest self-titled work follows a full five years after her breakthrough album ‘Unstoppable.’ I prefer this album because it is something you leave on and let repeat with not a weak track amongst …
The Station
Chris Killip is known for his superb book ‘Sea Coal,’ which showed the desperate side of eighties England. Yet Killip also took pictures of the anarcho-punk scene in the north-east of England. His son discovered some old forgotten contact sheets lying in a cardboard box and so ‘The Station’ was born. Named after the venue …
Shelter
Thomas Barlett has played piano on records for everyone from The National to Sufjan Stevens. He is classically trained and for some reason felt a little embarrassed by it. When his girlfriend returned to England and left him alone in lockdown, he felt moved to write a series of classic piano pieces, which he has …
Words of Love
There’s surprisingly little buzz around Nick Broomfield’s documentary ‘Words of Love’ but it’s one of the best things I’ve seen this year. It’s about the love affair between Leonard Cohen and his Norwegian lover, Marianne Ihlen. It turns out that Broomfield had been Marianne’s lover at one point and this gives the whole enterprise a …
Downtown 81
Nostalgia is rife right now for obvious reasons. Who wouldn’t want to retreat to a more peaceful time?But that said, I’m a New Yorker, and part of me quite enjoys the drama. My idea of escape is to return to the gritty eighties of downtown Manhattan where an artistic and musical explosion was happening after …
Steely Dan
The more I listen to Steely Dan, the better they become. Unlike other groups who tended to stick to the same tried and trusted bandmates, the Dan brought in the cream of US seventies session musicians to join them on their quest from Chuck Rainey to Larry Carlton.This band brought in jazz legend Wayner Shorter …
Popgun 