Via satellite, transmitting from northeast Los Angeles — the Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35. 7pm California time, Wednesdays.
34.1090° N, 118.2334° W . . .
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Vila, the new symphonic samba jazz album by prolific Brazilian guitarist Fabiano do Nascimento, feels like both his most intimate and his most grandiose, as he tries to keep the idyllic minimalism of his style of acoustic guitar while striving for the expressive radiance of 1960s noir film scores. Nascimento, now a fixture of the Los Angeles jazz scene, wanted the record to pay tribute to the street he grew up in Rio, an enclosed alleyway in the old neighborhood of Catete . . .
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The recently reissued Oracle, a collaboration between bassist Gary Peacock and recently deceased guitarist Ralph Towner gives us a look at two legends in deep midcareer. Originally released in 1995, it shows two restless musicians, each with their own highly developed, distinct musical language, looking to mix things up. Though more
Peacock-forward, its seamless mix of carefully spontaneous playing and freewheeling composition serves as a fitting farewell to Towner, and reminds us that the great ones never stop evolving, long after their so-called “classic” eras have ended . . .
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From the mysterious expanses of southern California’s Inland Empire emerges … The Disassociation! This new group is a powerful joining of forces, an impressive melding of minds, bringing together long-running lo-fi indie pioneers Refrigerator (a band that today continues to be underrated, even by the cognoscenti), Amy Maloof of Falcon Eddy, artist/musician/DJ Sam Sousa, and the brilliant author Jonathan Lethem . . .
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Winged Wheel’s third LP, Desert So Green, shows off this imaginative and evolving approach with terrific results. Though certain elements remain in place, the dream team sextet (Whitney Johnson, Cory Plump, Matthew J. Rolin, Steve Shelley, Lonnie Slack and Fred Thomas) seem intent on not making the same record twice . . .
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This third album from the ambient folk-blues supergroup Pullman explores the connection between memory and physical frailty, finding musical communion amid loss. It’s a quiet, emotionally charged gift, letting long-time member and early onset Alzheimers sufferer Tim Barnes make the most of his limited remaining time on earth . . .
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Via Chicago, guitarist Rand Kelly, bassist Ramsey Bell, and drummer Josh Resing are The Slaps. Formed in 2017, the genre agnostic trio are constantly in motion, and, more impressively, consistently interesting. This installment of the Lagniappe Sessions finds the band paying tribute to pre-Dark Side era Floyd with a lived-in, and woolly, cover of Obscured by Clouds' "Wot’s… Uh the Deal". AD Manna, indeed! And keeping things local, they deliver an amped up version of friend and touring partner hemlock's "Under All The Kudzu . . .
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Fusing elements of Japanese City Pop, French New Wave, and a touch of Kosmische Musik, Testpattern by Evelyne/Maseo is sonically sublime. Recorded in Maseo Hiruma’s home studio circa mid-80s, the material hits as well as anything coming out of the renowned Yen Records at the time. Fans of Yellow Magic Orchestra are legion, and this recently unearthed addition to the golden era of Japanese electronic music will delight any YMO junkie . . .
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Via satellite, transmitting from northeast Los Angeles — the Aquarium Drunkard Show on SIRIUS/XMU, channel 35. 7pm California time, Wednesdays.
34.1090° N, 118.2334° W . . .
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Recently, a previously unheard Sextant tour FM broadcast from SF’s legendary Boarding House emerged. It’s well worth your time. This group is especially good when they stretch way way way out. And they certainly do that here: most of the performance is made up of a 40+ minute spiral through “Hidden Shadows.” Everyone gets a chance to shine, of course, but let’s give it up for the rhythm section of Buster Williams and Billy Hart, who hold things down and lift things up simultaneously, letting the prog-funk-jazz mutant grooves spin and swirl all around the . . .
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Pedal steel guitarist Barry Walker, Jr. has long spun out his unearthly twangs for rustic psychedelicists like Mouth Painter, North Americans and the Rose City Band. The lingering, shape-shifting overtones that float from his instrument imbue an instant mystery and ambiguity. He puts the “cosmic” in “cosmic country.” Now on this solo album—accompanied by drummer Rob Smith from Animal, Surrender! and Jason Willmon from Mouth Painter—he puts his ineffable sound at center stage, in songs that traverse drone, Americana and Reichian minimalism . . .
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Sometimes things just take time. It's been a whole decade since The Olympians, the orchestral funk and soul combo led by songwriter Toby Pazner (Sharon Jones, Lee Fields, El Michels Affair) dropped their self-titled debut on Daptone Records. But 2026 sees the group's long awaited return with In Search of a Revival, due out February 13th on Daptone . . .
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Over the last few years, and now three records, Jana Horn has quietly asserted herself as a songwriter of great merit amongst a vast and seemingly bottomless sea of artists also in search of answers through song. Her most recent LP, a self-titled work written during a period of transition in her life—notably a relocation to New York City having graduated from a writing program in the University of Virginia—captures movement not just in the physical sense of moving from one physical place to another, but of progressing the flow of her interior life . . .
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In some ways, Shintaro Sakamoto's fifth record Yoo-hoo follows a continuation of the pop-centric sensibilities of Like A Fable: lifting backdrops of surf guitar, Spector-like orchestration and funky exotica crafted for the dancefloor in a way that only Sakamoto could usher into existence. Yet another work of an auteur of his musical craft, the album sees Sakamoto channel midcentury Japanese styles like "Mood Kayō", drawing from Latin rhythms and Hawaiin compositions. As has become customary, the musician is able to masterfully curate shadowy corners of the past to create something exceptionally neoteric . . .
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Toronto’s Mean Red Spiders released their opus, Starsandsons, in 2000, to little lasting acclaim. On the one hand, the album came too late – their psychedelic, arty sensibilities were out of sync with the changing tides. On the other hand, it was too early – critics and fans didn’t have the right language to fully grok what the Mean Red Spiders were on about. But as contemporary
“shoegaze” and “dreampop” bands have mined the ‘90s aesthetic for their own sound, it’s given us a newfound appreciation for some overlooked classics, and Starsandsons is ready for a reappraisal . . .
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