Bill Frisell: All Hat soundtrack (Emarcy)
Jazz guitarist Bill Frisell has left an indelible mark on the genre since the early 1980s, and in the process, crossed into Americana, country, blues, experimental rock, classical and more.
He has worked with artists as diametrically different as drummer Paul Motian and doom-drone group Earth, and this release finds him scoring the 2007 film All Hat with a beautiful country-Western soundtrack that leans on pedal steel, harmonica, and Frisell’s sublime melodies.
Skeletonbreath: Eagle’s Nest, Devil’s Cave (Ernest Jenning)
The fiery fiddle of O’Death violinist Robert Pycior leads Skeletonbreath, a trio that combines Pycior’s strings with the low-end rumble and punishing, straightforward rhythms of mid-’90s alt-rock.
Pycior’s violin work combines progressive rock leads with discordant keys, neoclassical melodies, and worldly flavor. Andrew Platt’s bass rumbles with the force of Shellac or The Jesus Lizard, and Tris Palazzolo’s drums thud with urgent ferocity. The trio’s mixture is unlike almost anything else, and this comes highly recommended.
Nicole Mitchell’s Black Earth Strings: Renegades (Delmark)
Composer/flutist Nicole Mitchell holds rare talents, composing her own brilliant works and contributing to many masterful discs that include works from Exploding Star Orchestra, Frequency, Indigo Trio, and more.
As a smaller incarnation of her Black Earth Ensemble, Black Earth Strings combines modern jazz sounds and African rhythms via an acoustic quartet. This, the group’s first commercial release, is a compelling mixture of percussion-less themes that capture with melodies and hooks and rivet with adroit improvisations.
Upsilon Acrux: Radian Futura (Cuneiform)
With heaping doses of melodicism, the über-precise rhythms of math/prog quintet Upsilon Acrux should appeal to adventurous music fans who enjoy old-school Hella, Tera Melos, or other likeminded musicians.
The band’s swirling finger-tapped guitar action, Moog harmonies, dirty riffs, and clean-channel harmonics layer atop beats that alternate between chaotic and playful. The style also recalls old Nintendo scores (on crack) with melodies similar to those of Minus the Bear. Fans of virtuosic guitarists will get their money’s worth.
Upsilon Acrux: “Landscape”
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Tags: Bill Frisell, Black Earth Ensemble, Black Earth Strings, Cuneiform, Delmark, Earth, Emarcy, Ernest Jenning, Exploding Star Orchestra, Frequency, Hella, Indigo Trio, Minus the Bear, Nicole Mitchell, O'death, Paul Motian, Robert Pycior, Shellac, Skeletonbreath, Tera Melos, The Jesus Lizard, Upsilon Acrux