Les McCann – Vibrations Funkin' Around With Something Old, Something New – Pony Canyon PCCY-30068

This is Les’ fourth album since his first stroke in 1995, and the first since then with his own band. Amazingly, it’s one of his best ever. He’s now using some kind of keyboard, the sustain powers of which mean that his slower fingering doesn’t sound awkward. As ever, his character shines through everything he does. There’s a lot of his old material in this: “Compared to What” - as relevant as in 1966; the President’s still got his war. But there is new stuff. “Passion World”, a Wayne Shorter tune with words by Gene McDaniels (who wrote “Compared to what”) is very interesting, as is “It’s you” a song Les wrote with Jon Hendricks.

The band is wonderful, particularly Keith Anderson, a young Turrentine-influenced tenor player, who has been with Les since 1991. Donald Dean, and Stan Gilbert who first worked with Les in the sixties, swing as hard as ever.

Available from Mediawars
US$30 – deletion date 3 March 2005 - AM

www.music-map.org

I just discovered this website and thought I would pass it on as it's fun to play with. You type in an artist you like and it creates a map of other artists that are in some way similar. It works by an algorithm (or should that be algo-rythmn?)that is used to map random elements in forensic investigation (apparently).

Some of the closest features in any map may seem contentious, but equally it may make connections or suggest new artists that you wouldn't otherwise have reached...which I suppose is what maps are partly for.

Sekou Bembeya Diabate - Guitar Fo - Discorama WVF479016

Sekou is thought of by the Mandinke in much the same way as jazz fans regard John Coltrane; as the man who turned their music inside out and made of it an exciting, contemporary, popular music. This reputation is mainly deserved, though some of the credit must go to Sekou’s cousin, Papa Diabate, for the concepts that Sekou and Bembeya Jazz National so brilliantly implemented.

This is only the third album Sekou has made as a leader or joint leader, in over forty years of being the leading light of Guinean music. Like the others, it blends the lyrical serenity of traditional Mandinke music with the excitement of Jazz, Funk and Soul music. A new departure for Sekou is that he sings on several tracks. His voice has such charm and personality that one wonders why he didn’t take over as Bembeya Jazz’ vocalist after the death of Aboubacar Demba Camara. A beautiful and joyous album -AM

Various - Music From The OC Mix 2 - Warners B00063MCSE

Something different for the New Year. Apparently, if you’re an aspiring indie band, then you've just got to get one of your songs on the soundtrack of the TV soap The OC. It’s about a young lad, Ryan, who grows up on the wrong side of the tracks in Chino (all of Chino is on the wrong side of the tracks) and gets to live with his lawyer in prosperous Orange County.

This compilation is a good way to try bands ranging from Dios Malos to Beulah, via the Super Furries. Interpol contribute a cracking track; Nada Surf a disappointing one; and there‘s an anodyne version of Maybe I‘m Amazed from Cardiff‘s Jem. Overall, it has a slightly wistful air, in keeping with the expression of Ryan’s face when pondering his latest scrape and the possibility of return to Chino where, as The Mountain Goats have it, the asphalt sprouts.

Norman Simmons - In Private - Savant SCD2056

Norman Simmons has had an interesting career as a back seat driver. He’s mainly known for the first hard bop big band arrangements on Johnny Griffin’s pioneering 1960 album, Big Soul Band. Most of his career has been as pianist and, usually, musical director to jazz singers: Betty Carter; Carmen McRae; Anita O’Day; Chris Connor; Joe Williams et al. Since Williams died in 1999, Simmons has moved forwards; this is his third CD for Savant.

Most of it was recorded in the small hours in a hotel lobby in Japan and feels wonderful. But Caravan is a masterpiece. Simmons thinks the normal approach to this tune, with the band charging across the desert, is “unrealistic”. He imagines carrying the load across endless sands. But the way it comes out, for me, is a (delicate) slow grind/belly rub, with a Bolero rhythm set down by Paul Humphrey’s brushes, Lisle Atkinson’s bass booming out the riff to A Love Supreme, and Simmons full of eastern promise. What a sexy groove! - AM

Madeleine Peyroux in concert. (I thought I'd add a picture (as I didn't use up my full word allowance) just to liven up the text...feel free to delete if you don't like innovation! )

Madeleine Peyroux - Careless Love - Universal 9823583

The second album from this French-Canadian former street performer is a treat. The pitch of her voice and her phrasing has more than an echo of Billie Holliday - which is more than fine by me. She gives a jazz-blues twist to things like Dylan's "You're Gonna Make Me Lonesome When You Go", Cohen's "Dance Me To The End of Love" and Hank Williams' "Weary Blues" - the three best tracks to my ear. Unlike the rash of women singers re-interpreting the standards (Diana Krall, Stacey Kent, Clare Teal, Jane Monheit etc) she has original material and re-interprets some contemporary material in an intriguing way. Mellow, but with an edge.

Wyclef Jean - Welcome to Haiti Creole 101 - Koch KOC-CD-5783

George Benson said that he had the power to make either jazz albums that sold 50,000 or soul albums that sold a million; that while he’d prefer to make jazz albums, he couldn’t do it to Warner Bros. Well, Wyclef has got the result that Benson probably would have got from WB – BMG refused to issue this album, so he’s released it on Koch’s San Pasé label. As Public Enemy said, “if you don’t own the master, the Master owns you”.

BMG rejected it because it’s a celebration of the 200th anniversary of Haiti’s independence and only a couple of tracks are in English – mostly it’s in French or Creole. Although Wyclef sounds very comfortable in this context, it only managed to get to number 66 on the R&B album chart, which shows how important the promotion power of the major companies is - and how resistant the American public is to anything truculently un-American. There are no plans to release this in Britain; Cardiff shops don’t even have it on their computers as imports, but you can get it from CDX Radyr, Amazon or 101CD - AM

Nick Cave and The Bad Seeds - Abattoir Blues/The Lyre of Orpheus - Anti B0002SROSQ

I’ve had to battle with Nick Cave’s work in the past, notable Murder Ballads; I loved the music but felt depressed and shocked by the lyrics, so much so that I abandoned the album after two hearings. Recently, I’ve come to enjoy The Boatman’s Call and No More Shall We Part. They’re by no means a barrel of laughs, of course, but he’s moderated his bleak vision and the music is as strong as ever.

These two albums, issued together, are even better. The Dark One lets himself go a bit, gets carried along by melodies, and sounds as though he’s having fun. Nature Boy is almost poppy. However, it’s not all fun. Fable of The Brown Ape is as grim as you might expect and there’s a reference elsewhere to the Butcher Bird of his native Australia which suggests he hasn’t entirely forgotten about the blood and guts of life. Overall, though, an uplifting listen.

Hank Crawford - A Funky Thing To Do – Collectables 6597

Joel Dorn, who produced this album, doesn’t like it. It’s not as good as the three best of Hank’s sixties albums, but well up to the other seven, and a lot better than Hank’s later seventies albums. And very interesting.

It’s Pee Wee Ellis’ first recording after leaving the James Brown band; the former straw boss of the James Brown band together with the former straw boss of the Ray Charles band. The title track, composed by Pee Wee, is a fabulous groove; the basis of Salt & Pepa’s sarcastic Step (not many raps in 6/8). The most interesting track is Hank’s version of Bird’s Parker’s Mood. The original was the B side of Parker’s only R&B chart entry and the only recording in which Parker used the stone blues style that was the greatest influence on the young Hank Crawford, backing Memphis bluesmen with Ike Turner’s band. So this is precisely where Hank is coming from - AM

Hot in Dakar 4

Viviane is, I think THE rave in Senegal at present. Her songs were on radios throughout the African quarter all the time. She is Viviane N'dour, Youssou's sister-in-law, having married Ndiaga N'dour, Youssou's sound engineer. She was previously Viviane Chudid and, under that name, spent some time in Youssou's backing vocal group. Marriage appears to have meant promotion. She looks fabulous and can really deliver a song. Her band can play almost any type of music. Much of Viviane's work is Hip Hop and neo-soul. But there are also traditional numbers, including, on her latest,Tere Nelaw, a beautiful song in praise of Leopold Senghor, Senegal's first President, who had died a short time before. There is also the extremely enthusiastic Yii Gainde", another football song, and much the most exciting; you really want to yell along with the crowd. All of Viviane's K7s are probably available on CD - AM

Allan recommends cdmail as a source.

Earl Okin - Musical Genius and Sex Symbol -- Sony5152852

Something different: unless you have frequented the Kings Head Comedy Club in London you may not have encountered Earl Okin. He's in the British tradition of comedy musicians, but out of the top drawer for originality and musicality. This album is worth it simply for his "interpretations" of "I'm just a teenage dirtbag" as a lush bossa nova, a swing version of Blur and an easy listening rendition of Coldplay's Yellow. I'm not sure if they are revivals or covers, but they are very funny...

Bjork - Medulla - One Little Indian TPLP358CD

This is wonderful. It has choirs, voices as musical instruments, double basses like growling, hungry bears, and, above all, Bjork’s own ice-clear voice. There’s nothing here that would make a pop or rock song in the normal sense, just sound-scapes and rhythms mostly constructed without any musical instruments at all. One or two tracks have something approaching a melody, which is welcome, but they are all dramatic and arresting.

What’s it all about? Hard to say. Certainly some of the tracks are about relationships but many are sung in what I take to be Icelandic so I can't tell. The lyrics are printed on the sleeve notes but they’re illegible so perhaps they don’t matter. And the tracks are only identified by numbers so there‘s no help there. Being in almost complete ignorance about what Bjork’s banging on about has in no way spoilt my enjoyment.

Pucho and The Latin Soul Brothers - The Hideout - Milestone MCD9340

In contrast to Funk Fantastique, this has a really nice sleeve note: full of reminiscences from Pucho about meeting his recently deceased wife at The Hideout, a Harlem club where the band used to play in the early sixties, which was the hangout for the King of the Numbers in Harlem, Spanish Raymond. (You’d have thought he could have found a better moniker than that; even my father was called Ike the Lombard and he was English).

Oh yes, the music. The music’s great, too. Pucho is now leading a much larger band than ever before, with four trumpets, two trombones, one doubling on violin, the great Ed Pazant on alto sax and the usual complement of very rhythm. Lewis Hahn’s violin solos put me in mind of Africando and I found Hahn has played on the last two Africando records, as well as the last two of Pucho - AM

Misc. - Crunch time - Sender send042cd

According to People That Know, this is an example of tech-house. I think I'd be inclined to call it 'a surly mob of square-waves fighting in a sack' and dismiss it as just more of that technological music that they churn out by the lorryload in big factories along the Ruhr valley. However, one of the SIDStations is unexpectedly possessed by the spirit of Grand Funk Railroad and it all goes horribly right. There are echoes of fine old New York electro-funk and Man-Machine era Kraftwerk nailed to huge basslines that rumble along in the style of tanks the size of small villages while happy 'blork' noises that were last seen on old Joey Beltram records burble cheerfully in the background. The overall impression is that of a crowd of small robots gleefully jumping up and down on a pile of rusty corrugated iron.

Hot in Dakar 3

Assane Ndiaye spent many years singing backup to
Thione Seck. He has a voice which someone in Banjul
described to me, with perfect accuracy, as "divine".
If you think Thione has a good voice, Assane kills him
stone dead. His latest albums were Bagnal, a studio
album, and Takussanou Ndakarou, another TV concert
double K7. Assane sings in a slightly more traditional
manner than Thione, and his subject matter is more
religious than political. There is at least one CD out
in France, of his second album, Yone Wi, which is
very good indeed, and has a couple of bonus tracks
from the live album on it - AM

Allan recommends cdmail as a source.

John Lennon - Acoustic - Parlophone 8744282

I have very mixed feelings about this album. It's great to hear Lennon again singing some of his best and most acerbic material accompanied just by acoustic guitar. But it's a motley collection put together presumably to match the popularity of the "unplugged" format. The sound quality varies hugely and some were clearly never intended for release. However, "Working Class Hero", "Watching the Wheels" and even the live version of "Imagine" are worth it. "Woman is the nigger of the world" took a little explaining to the kids when it came on in the car, but their political sensibilities are developing fast.

K D Lang -- Hymns of the 49th Parallel - Nonesuch NNS798472

I've never been a fan of K D's before but bought this album, a tribute to all things Canadian, because I love good cover versions.(I also like Canada). Covers are a divisive issue. Bad ones are awful and the perpetrators should be shot for lack of taste and judgement. But good ones reveal new depths to familiar songs and allow you to rediscover what was great about them. Here, K D Lang reinterprets Canadian songwriters like Neil Young, Leonard Cohen, Joni Mitchell and Jane Siberry. It works spectacularly well, only once or twice descending into the mush which has made me reject KDL in the past. This album forces me to acknowledge that she does have a great voice as well.

P J Harvey - Uh Huh Her - ILPB 143/986 639-6 (LP)

This made me think “so that’s where music is going.” Like many of her albums, there’s enough that’s familiar in the music to get your bearings but then you realise there’s something subtle going on with P J’s voice, the arrangements, the sound and you’re wandering down a completely unfamiliar path. And a good thing too, I say.

There are shades of the relatively mellow predecessor Stories...., like the single from the album, Shame, but there’s also some six-cylinder ranting and a couple of gentle tracks to end. The rough stuff really stood out on the first few plays but now it all seems to fit together. Apparently, she listened to lot of Russian folk music before the recording, on which she plays just about everything herself. Where next?

Charles Earland - Funk Fantastique - Prestige PRCD11030

This CD really pisses me off. First, I have, of course, no complaints about the music, which is some of the most sensational Earland ever recorded. However, second, it has the most awful sleeve note I’ve ever read. It’s not simply that it’s written in an excitingly pseudo-hip style; it’s also that the writer doesn’t know very much about Charles Earland’s music.

Third, this is a compilation of bits of three different sessions. The first chunk is from the session that produced Soul Story. So it’s obvious that LP isn’t going to appear on CD. The second chunk was recorded as part of the Intensity LP, with Lee Morgan. This could have been issued when Intensity, together with the two tracks from Charles III that came from the Intensity session, came out on CD a couple of years ago. And finally, the CD contains other tracks from Charles III; so that LP has now come out on CD, albeit spread between two CDs. Bah! - AM