This Is Book's Music

Cynthia Felton has returned with a brand new album, bringing her voice into the studio to record a new album that is a great display of her talents as an artist and arranger. Freedom Jazz Dance (Felton Entertainment) has her choosing a great selection of songs that allow these songs to live and be vibrant today, at a time that perhaps it is sorely needed. When you hear her sing “My Funny Valentine”, “Take 5″, the powerful “Nature Boy”, and “What Are You Doing For The Rest Of Your Life”, one realizes what is missing in… well, I was going to say in “a lot of today’s music” but that would mean I speak only in a mainstream context. I guess there’s a desire in me for music that’s heartfelt to be heard by more people outside of the target audience of this music, because what’s missing is heart, soul, and to a greater extent, musicality. I know people used to mock En Vogue and only know/understand them for their looks, but they each had individual voices that shined. I believe I’ve compared Felton to Terry Ellis before, and I still hear that charm that they both share, but what I also hear is that passion to make music and be heard. It is not an extension of who they are, it IS who they are, they are at one with music, and Felton is someone who does it with so much class… I think if I were to enter a venue or dinner club, see her performing, I’d want to listen to her all night. Come back the next night, hear her again. These are not just note-by-note interpretations of material from jazz and pop songbooks, she adds qualities that show how much she is in tune with the meaning of these songs but wants to make people believe she is the one who wrote them. If someone hears her version of “Nature Boy” for the first time and it makes them believe it was Felton who came up with the story told, she has won.

The album doesn’t give credits for where the music was recorded, but the credits state her vocals, along with the final mix of the album, was put together at Capitol Records. There’s knowledge that there was once magic created in those rooms in Hollywood, so why not go to the source? In fact, when she performs a cover of the Maxwell Anderson/Kurt Weill composition “Lost In The Stars”, she does it almost as homage to what jazz is by recording it in a room that became known for an incredible amount of music. There’s a moment in her performance that sounds a lot like Stevie Wonder, and it’s “chicken skin” inducing. It is almost as if Felton thought “let’s bring this song back into this room, as it would be nice to do so here.”

You don’t have to be a deep jazz fan to enjoy this. If you enjoy a classic pop sensibility, or the power of the human voice, get this.

While his past music had been called “angry folk” by some, this Brooklyn musician doesn’t sound so angry in his new 5-song EP. Chris McFarland’s Beauty And Undertow (End Up) simply sounds like someone with a lot of hopes, dreams, and desires, and when things aren’t going the way he wants (as he describes in the first verse of “Wild Abandon”), he just goes the other way and pushes himself in song, which indirectly will drive his listeners to perhaps do the same. The songs on the EP go from intimate pieces where it’s just him and a guitar to a full on band who rock out as if Lenny Kravitz were backed by Soul Asylum. Check out the closing track, “Simple Selfish Plan”, which is a song one might hear while contemplating stepping off a mountain into the ocean show below, but it’ll make you step back as you realize how much you’re going to miss. Yes, your simple selfish plan is not a good one, so take it to someone and find a better way.

One can imagine McFarland being this generation’s Bruce Springsteen if he wanted to go down that route, but perhaps all McFarland wants to do is be able to tell his stories through his own songs, and if longevity comes along with his music exchange between himself and an audience, even better.

(Beauty And Undertow will be released on August 21st.)

32 years ago, Australia’s AC/DC released Back In Black, the first without vocalist Bon Scott who died in early 1980. A few months after his passing, they found a vocalist from England named Brian Johnson. Five months after Scott’s death, AC/DC released Back In Black and created what would become a hard rock and heavy metal classic, almost instantly. When you bought the album, you didn’t see the title. The words Back In Black was embossed black on black, and it was impossible to turn on a hard rock radio station and not hear a song from this album or earlier records.

Today, Richard Cheese has released a new album of lounge gems, covering not only AC/DC, but INXS, Rick James, Bob Marley, Eazy-E, Led Zeppelin, Michael Jackson, and Nirvana. The album cover not only honors the 1989 AC/DC classic, but also what he does with his comedic take on music. It is called Back In Black Tie, and was released digitally this week but will be released on compact disc very soon. With that said, Cheese’s website says Back In Black Tie will be the last album he will be released on CD, and only 1000 copies will be pressed. Once they’re gone, you’re going to have to cater to flea market bootleggers. You can find out ordering information by clicking here or order directly from LoungeMart.com.

There are guitarists who get busy, and then there are guitarists who GET BUSY. Then you have Melvin Taylor, who does both and then does his own thing. Beyond The Burning Guitar was originally released in 2010 but I believe it’s getting a bit of a promotional push this year. This double CD has liner notes which state that he is “one of the greatest guitarists in the history of jazz, blues, and rock”. He may not be in the forefront, and if you haven’t heard of his work, try this album first.

I think the title almost says it all, as the opening track is a wicked duet between… himself. “Dueling Guitars Of Rio Terra” will make guitar enthusiasts listen to this intently and perhaps at half speed. Then he starts to explore his Chicago roots with a bit of blues, jazz, and even some songs for the steppers. His guitar work his sharp, reserved when it needs to be but a brutal jazz punch when the time is right. My only complain is the electronic backing. While the drums are credited to a Senor Jefe, it sounds like a drum machine, and it’s hard to say if that’s a good or bad thing. Taylor also plays the bass, and as for the keyboards, it just sounds a bit lackluster, unlike the guitar work. I do like the fact Taylor incorporates multi-tracking not only to go back and forth with his guitar and bass work, but also do create a bit of guitar mayhem. I would love to hear him do that more, but with a proper band, be it a trio, quartet, or even a big band. This guy is a killer, most of the songs here are Taylor originals but the electronic backing at times gets a bit tedious. If you can bypass that and just listen to his guitar and bass work, Beyond The Burning Guitar is an okay recording. In order for him to go truly beyond, I want to hear him with some musicians where they can to beyond, and then further.

The self-titled album by Nick Vayenas (Whirlwind Recordings) is split between instrumentals and tracks with vocals. I’ll admit: when I first heard his voice, I thought “ehhh, I don’t want to hear this”. At least not yet. I wasn’t ready, but I did like the opening “Prologue”, as he plays his trumpet as if he is welcoming himself into new surroundings, a new city as if to say “hello, my name is Nick, I hope I can be welcomed here without fear”. It makes me wish this “Prologue” didn’t fade out at 3:18. So rather than play the vocal tracks at first, I wanted to check out the instrumentals. If you have the album, this would mean tracks 1, 4, 6, and 8.

“M.O.” is funky and soul, it has that jump that I like, something I think what you might hear if James Brown fired everyone from his band and he want out of his way to find hot musicians here and now. It’s loose, but it’s still on the one so when you hear Vayenas do his thing alongside guitarist Lionel Loueke, you know they’re serious. This is for the money, but it’s still fun.

“Manhattanville”, from the name alone, is a city song, and you hear what Vayenas is observing, everything from traffic to cars, women with seductive addresses to store owners telling you to “get off my lawn”, even though there isn’t a lawn for miles. When he duets with saxophonist Patrick Cornelius, it’s the union one can sometimes find when one is at one with people and the surroundings they’re within.

“Tea Time” is the album closer, and I started to imagine what it would sound like inside of a nigthclub, knowing that this is the last thing you’ll hear. Employees trying to clean up as much as possible, and the musicians trying to “clean up” with their playing, perhaps being able to impress someone enough to where it might lead to a grand tip (money, a drink, a vagina or two, etc.) Loueke gets ever-so-seductive by playing what sounds like a Spanish guitar, and with only a few minutes to spare, Vayenas and his group become one force and go in for the metaphorical kill. Quite nice.

Swingin’ Never Hurt Noboby (self-released) plays bassist ray Parker in a trio setting with violinist Russell George and guitarist Jon Hart, and together they make the kind of music that will make anyone smile. The opening track blends together a Parker original, “Guitar Sammich”, with Charlie Parker’s “Now’s The Time” to show that despite the decades between the two musicians and eras of jazz, music can become harmonious without thought.

The three musicians work beautifully together to where all of them would stand out as leaders. I would have enjoyed this if this was a double, and it would be okay because this music swings. As the title says…

Sandro Perri is a Canadian artist whose music has always covered a lot of ground while he himself has remained constant with all of the changes he chooses to do. For his new release, he gives “Changes” and “Love & Light” to remixers, and all he can do is sit back and see how people reinterpret his creations. The end results are quite interesting.

The thing with Perri’s music is that you never know what you’ll get until you get there, but that can be said for pretty much every song and album you listen to. There’s a sense of confidence in knowing that as a fan of Perri, you’re going to be someone who will want to understand what’s going on. In this case, you can two remixes of both songs. The Eluvium and ZoNgamin remixes of “Changes” sound completely different from one another, almost to where you don’t realize you’re hearing mixes of the same song. The best is arguably saved for “Love And Light”, where the Mickey Moonlight Remix sounds like something you’d hear in an adventurous club at 2:22am, where every sound comes off like the perfect soundtrack of what you’re seeing: moans, whispers, and chopped up break beats luring you in. However, the Max Gross Regurge takes the song out if the club and into the forest in order to bring the song (and the listener) into nature, to see and hear what you’re missing. Like the two mixes of “Changes”, the two “Love & Light” mixes sound worlds away from one another, and hopefully Perri listened to these after receiving them and said “wow, now this blew me away”. Then again, he released them so of course he approved them. The next step is for these songs to enter your mind so it will continue its adventure inside of you.

If the type of jazz is of the vocal variety, not only solo but with group harmonies, you will like the old time vibe of The Spider and the Fly by Sylvia Herold & The Rhythm Bugs. Some of what they do reminds me a bit of what makes The Manhattan Transfer so great, and in this case, Sylvia Herold goes back to the songbooks and explores songs that were once cherished but may be honored by select audiences. In fact, the youngest song on the album is a Dallas Frazier composition from 1965 clalaed “Mohair Sam”, made famous by Charlie Rich. The rest of the songs are from the 30′s and 40′s and despite the vintage of these compositions, they hold up quite well. One may only hear it as far as the music and go “oh, this is completely dated” but then that means you’re not truly listening. Herold’s voice is a joy, and while I would not mind hearing her do other styles, I love hearing her in this context.

Bassist Tim Carey allows himself to shine on Room 114 (self-released), an album that also has Jeff Busch (drums), Tarik Abouzied (drums), Eric Verlinde (piano, keyboards), and Brendan Odonnell (guitar) going along for the ride. This is the kind of jazz you expect to hear in a nice club, people paying attention to the music and nothing else, allowing their food to get cold because the music is that good. It’s nothing extravagant, although there is extravagance in the musicianship. The one who stands out the most is guitarist Odonnell, and as I was playing this I had to be sure that this was what I was hearing. There are parts where i thought “wow, this should be an Odonnell album” but as I found myself getting caught up in the overall vibe of the music, I could hear how they worked together on this one mission, which is to perform songs composed and arranged by Carey, the captain of this ship. It has the kind of groove one might expect to hear on a lot of jazz albums from the 1970′s, the type one would expect to hear on Steely Dan records when Donald Fagen isn’t singing. I’m not sure what I would experience if I opened the door to Room 114 but if this music is what greets me at the door, I’m curious as to what may greet me inside.

“Holy crap!” may not be the most obvious way to start a review for a jazz album review, but David Caceres opens up his self-titled album (his fourth) with a cover of Maxwell’s “Symptom Unknown”, which is a bold move for any jazz artist. Some jazz purists will say “do nothing but the standards” but as someone who reviews a good amount of jazz, I want to hear something other than the accepted standards. In this case, Caceres shows his skills as a vocalist and saxophonist that brings the song back to its introspective home to create a bit of a temple of church, where you and only yourself becomes your own place of worship to figure out what you must do to get from here to there. I was blown away by his performance, as his voice shows qualities that remind me of the warmth of Black Crowes’ Chris Robinson and Corinne Bailey Rae. How about Maxwell? It’s very much a Maxwell song, but it sounds nothing like him and probably isn’t meant to. It’s a fantastic way to start the album, which then moves into a cover of Ray Lamontagne’s “You Can Bring Me Flowers”, bringing a jazzy New Orleans bravado into Lamontagne’s celebration of the American spirit, adding more spices into what’s already there. By Caceres singing the line “you can bring me flowers when I’m dead and gone” is his way of saying “yes, I have too much to do, don’t honor me now, I don’t want that. Put me to work, or let’s work together”. With two songs, he is bringing the listener into his community like a pied piper, hoping people will want to join him on his journey.

Van Morrison gets the funky/Northern soul vibe with a nice rendition of his “The Way Young Lovers Do”, sure to become sample-fodder for select producers and DJ’s, while “Giving Up” (a Van McCoy original that was covered by both Gladys Knight & The Pips and Donna Hathaway) is one of those that will make those cold nights warm. When Caceres wants to, he could be a heartbreaker for the ladies with his voice, and one could easily see him beign up there with Robin Thicke and Remy Shand. However, Caceres hasn’t run off to a hidden corner in Canada nor does he want to be novel for the sake of trying to put value in other people’s relevance. This is Caceres on his own terms, someone who wants to display his skills into the words of others, an interpreter, an arranger, an artist with a lot of range and depth. While the majority of his album are covers, including tracks by Stevie Wonder and Herbie Hancock, he does offer two of his own compositions, “Gratitude” and “Sacred Path”, which brings things back to his jazzy roots, and it’s not a bad place to be in. One can then here how he was rooted to hearing more, or hearing other music inside and out to become who he is here, and what he may continue to do for the rest of his musical career.

I must say, if more jazz vocal albums was like this, you’d hear a lot more of this everywhere and not just in a small pocket called jazz. Forget age barriers and whatnot, this is music for everyone. To everyone who does take time to hear David Caceres: take time to pass this along to the next man or woman and spread the word.