MartinLogan Renaissance ESL 15A
Anthem MRX SLM
Electrocompaniet - AW 800M
Electrocompaniet - AW 800M
Bryston BP-19
Hegel Music Systems
SVS
Bryston BP-19

CD Music

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CD music

May 2025

Matador Records—OLE2105CD
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****

Sound Quality
****

Overall Enjoyment
****

Perfume Genius is the stage name for Mike Hadreas, a singer and songwriter whose music is delightfully unpredictable. His music defies categorization, but certain themes recur in his work, especially the mysteries of sexuality and the horrors of homophobia. The latter motif isn’t surprising, given Hadreas’s background. He was bullied in high school and dropped out in his senior year. Two years later, while studying art at a school in Seattle, he was hospitalized after being attacked by a group of young men.

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February 2025

Polydor / Fiction Records / Capitol Records 00602475036746
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****

Sound Quality
***

Overall Enjoyment
***1/2

Songs of a Lost World is the Cure’s first album of new songs in 16 years. The group has released a couple of live albums and a few random singles since the last studio album, 4:13 Dream (2008), and has toured off and on. Robert Smith, the Cure’s leader and the one consistent member over its nearly 50-year history, announced a new album several times in interviews since 2008, but it never materialized.

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CD music

December 2024

Verve Records 602468047353.1
Format: CD

Musical Performance
***1/2

Sound Quality
**1/2

Overall Enjoyment
***

Few jazz musicians have been as exhaustively documented on recordings as Charlie Parker, known to his contemporaries as “Bird.” We are some distance from the aura of magic and romanticism that surrounded his very real accomplishments, which makes it hard to grasp how much he influenced other musicians and how revolutionary his music was. Jimi Hendrix’s impact and enduring place in rock music is perhaps a more recent parallel.

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July 2024

Polydor Records 5888429 (CD), 5885024 (LP)
Formats: CD and LP

Musical Performance
***1/2

Sound Quality
****

Overall Enjoyment
****

English singer-songwriter Paul Weller turned 66 on May 25, 2024, the day Polydor released his 17th album. Weller began writing and recording the songs for 66 in 2021, during the COVID-19 lockdown, and collaborated with other songwriters on most of the album’s 12 tracks. He also pulled in a long and varied list of musicians to help with the sessions, which took place over a three-year period at his Black Barn Studios in Surrey, UK.

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May 2024

Blue Note Records 00602458167948 (CD), 00602458167962 (LP)
Format: CD and LP

Musical Performance
****

Sound Quality
***1/2

Overall Enjoyment
****1/2

Charles Lloyd recorded Discovery!—his first album as a leader—in 1964, but he had been appearing as a sideman on drummer Chico Hamilton’s records since 1960. Since then, Lloyd has released more than 50 LPs as leader; his newest, The Sky Will Still Be There Tomorrow, is his 11th for Blue Note Records. The label released it in March, on Lloyd’s 86th birthday. Last year, he released three albums. Trios: Chapel, Trios: Ocean, and Trios: Sacred Thread each featured a different lineup of musicians. Lloyd’s creativity and vigor are such that these three discs contain no filler.

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April 2024

Island Records 602458769012
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****1/2

Sound Quality
***1/2

Overall Enjoyment
****

Brittany Howard’s first solo disc, Jaime, demonstrated the talent that was evident in her work with Alabama Shakes and Thunderbitch. Howard’s contributions to those projects only hinted at her versatility and eagerness to take chances—the 2019 solo album, which I reviewed on SoundStage! Access, showcased a wider range of influences. Howard’s second album, What Now, is even more audacious than Jaime, and contains even more surprises.

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December 2023

Rolling Stones Records / Geffen Records / Polydor 602458122565
Format: CD

Musical Performance
***1/2

Sound Quality
**1/2

Overall Enjoyment
***1/2

When I heard the Rolling Stones were releasing a new album, just two years after Charlie Watts’s death, I was slightly underwhelmed and plenty cynical. Watts and Keith Richards had been the soul of the band—something Richards has stated often and emphatically. And I would have said that the last thing the world needed was another faded attempt at rock’n’roll by a group of old guys (and I’m speaking as another old guy).

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August 2023

Anti- 87824-2
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****1/2

Sound Quality
****

Overall Enjoyment
****1/2

The singer-songwriter Neko Case has been a singular voice in music for more than 25 years, both as a solo artist and as a member of the New Pornographers. Her versatility and restless creativity have led to collaborations with a number of other musicians, including the Sadies, Carolyn Mark, k.d. lang, and Laura Veirs. In 2022, Case released a 23-song compilation of solo recordings as a digital download. Wild Creatures has now been released on CD and vinyl.

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CD music

February 2023

Palmetto Records PM2208CD
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****

Sound Quality
****1/2

Overall Enjoyment
****1/2

Esperanza Spalding is a genre-defying musician with a strong foundation in jazz. Fred Hersch is a pianist and composer with an extensive discography as leader and sideman. His playing shows great sensitivity and beauty, and he brings a unique interpretive touch to the work of other composers. He asked Spalding to join him at the Village Vanguard for four nights in October 2018. He assumed she would be playing bass, but instead Spalding chose to focus on singing, with Hersch accompanying.

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CD music

May 2022

Blue Note Records B003456902
Format: CD

Musical Performance
****

Sound Quality
***

Overall Enjoyment
****

In the late 2000s, not long before Troy “Trombone Shorty” Andrews began landing gigs at the White House and on late-night network TV shows, I worked twice with the New Orleans musician at the Ottawa Jazz Festival, where I was the media resource. The first time Andrews appeared there, he was an unknown support act; the following year, he headlined. Both times, he put on astounding live shows that were equal parts Crescent City parade music and guitar-powered Southern rock.

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  1. Various Artists: "Black Lives: From Generation to Generation"
  2. Culture and Flow: Three Saxophonists Who Transcend (Melissa Aldana, "12 Stars"; Roxy Coss, "Disparate Parts"; Julieta Eugenio, "Jump")
  3. Ray Charles: "True Genius"
  4. The Cookers: "Look Out!"
  5. Lee Morgan: "The Complete Live at the Lighthouse"
  6. Ben Goldberg: "Everything Happens to Be."
  7. Vince Mendoza & the Czech National Symphony Orchestra: “Freedom over Everything”
  8. Jakob Bro, Arve Henriksen, Jorge Rossy: "Uma Elmo"
  9. Mark Feldman: "Sounding Point"
  10. Chris Potter: "There Is a Tide"
  11. Sonny Rollins: "Rollins in Holland"
  12. The Nels Cline Singers' "Share the Wealth" and Dave Douglas's "Marching Music"
  13. Cindy Blackman Santana: "Give the Drummer Some"
  14. Ron Miles: “Rainbow Sign”
  15. Matt Wilson Quartet: "Hug!"
  16. Ran Blake & Andrew Rathbun: "Northern Noir"
  17. John Scofield: "Swallow Tales"
  18. Kandace Springs: "The Women Who Raised Me"
  19. Gordon Grdina’s Nomad Trio: "Gordon Grdina’s Nomad Trio"
  20. Jimi Hendrix: "Songs for Groovy Children: The Fillmore East Concerts"
  21. Keith Jarrett: "Munich 2016"
  22. Bruce Cockburn: "Crowing Ignites"
  23. Bill Frisell: "Harmony"
  24. Bruce Springsteen: "Western Stars"
  25. Various Artists: "Jazz Fest: The New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival"
  26. Michael Gregory Jackson Clarity Quartet: "WHENUFINDITUWILLKNOW"
  27. Van Morrison: "The Healing Game (Deluxe Edition)"
  28. Jeanne Lee & Ran Blake: "The Newest Sound You Never Heard"
  29. Joe Lovano: "Trio Tapestry"
  30. Eric Dolphy: "Musical Prophet: The Expanded 1963 New York Studio Sessions"
  31. Ingrid Jensen and Steve Treseler: "Invisible Sounds: For Kenny Wheeler"
  32. Rudy Royston: "Flatbed Buggy"
  33. The Band: "Music from Big Pink (50th Anniversary Edition)"
  34. Mark Turner and Ethan Iverson: "Temporary Kings"
  35. Dave Alvin and Jimmie Dale Gilmore: "Downey to Lubbock"
  36. Willie Nelson: "Last Man Standing"
  37. Miles Davis & John Coltrane: "The Final Tour: The Bootleg Series, Vol.6"
  38. Jimi Hendrix: "Both Sides of the Sky"
  39. Stephane Wrembel: "The Django Experiment III"
  40. Joe Satriani: "What Happens Next"
  41. Mavis Staples: "If All I Was Was Black"
  42. ECV: "Sticks and Stones"
  43. Living Colour: "Shade"
  44. Gregg Allman: "Southern Blood"
  45. Vijay Iyer Sextet: "Far from Over"
  46. Randall Bramblett: "Juke Joint at the Edge of the World"
  47. Steve Coleman's Natal Eclipse: "Morphogenesis"
  48. Valerie June: "The Order of Time"
  49. Delbert McClinton & Self-Made Men: "Prick of the Litter"
  50. Brian Eno: "Reflection"
  51. BassDrumBone: "The Long Road"
  52. Keith Jarrett: "A Multitude of Angels"
  53. Norah Jones: "Day Breaks"
  54. Metalwood: "Twenty"
  55. Nels Cline: "Lovers"
  56. Paul Simon: "Stranger to Stranger"
  57. The Allman Brothers Band: "Live from A&R Studios, New York, August 26, 1971"
  58. Pat Metheny: "The Unity Sessions"
  59. Wes Montgomery: "In the Beginning"
  60. Charles Lloyd & the Marvels: "I Long to See You"
  61. David Bowie: "Blackstar"
  62. John Abercrombie: "The First Quartet"
  63. Billy Gibbons and the BFGs: "Perfectamundo"
  64. Keith Richards: "Crosseyed Heart"
  65. Blue Buddha: "Blue Buddha"; Dave Douglas Quintet: "Brazen Heart"
  66. Jason Isbell: "Something More Than Free"
  67. Ryan Adams: "Ten Songs from Live at Carnegie Hall"
  68. Emmylou Harris & Rodney Crowell: "The Traveling Kind"
  69. Laura Marling: "Short Movie"
  70. Ted Kooshian: "Clowns Will Be Arriving"
  71. Suzie LeBlanc: "La Veillée de Noël"
  72. The Villains: "A Little Something for the Pain"
  73. Henry Mancini: "Music for Peter Gunn"
  74. Barb Jungr: "Hard Rain: The Songs of Bob Dylan & Leonard Cohen"
  75. Jeremy Fox: "With Love"
  76. Will Kimbrough: "Sideshow Love"
  77. A.J. Croce: "Twelve Tales"
  78. The Iveys: "Jenna's Song"
  79. The Dave Miller Trio with Rebecca DuMaine: "Better Than Anything"
  80. Bob Dorough: "Eulalia"
  81. Charlotte de Rothschild and Danielle Perrett: "Christmas Lullabies"
  82. Tchaikovsky/Duke Ellington-Billy Strayhorn: "Nutcracker Suites"
  83. Tianna Hall and Chris Cortez: "Noel"
  84. Tim Warfield: "Tim Warfield’s Jazzy Christmas"
  85. Gina Kronstadt: "Come Over"
  86. The Swingle Singers: "Weather to Fly"
  87. Tierney Sutton: "After Blue"
  88. Cheryl Bentyne and Mark Winkler: "West Coast Cool"
  89. Lorraine Feather: "Attachments"
  90. Lyn Stanley: "Lost in Romance"
  91. Randi Tytingvåg: "Lights Out"
  92. Vincent Cross: "A Town Called Normal"
  93. Nancy Harms: "Dreams in Apartments"
  94. Abigail Riccards: "Every Little Star"
  95. George Shearing & Don Thompson: "George Shearing at Home"
  96. Matthew Morrison: "Where It All Began"
  97. Thisbe Vos: "Under Your Spell"
  98. Mustered Courage: "Powerlines"
  99. Denise King & Olivier Hutman: "Give Me The High Sign"
  100. Thomas Gansch and Georg Breinschmid: "Gansch & Breinschmid Live"
  101. Ben Sidran: "Don’t Cry for No Hipster"
  102. Raquel Bitton: "Rhythm of the Heart"
  103. Frank Vignola & Vinny Raniolo: "Melody Magic"
  104. Laila Salins: "Elevator into the Sky"
  105. Tim Mahoney Band: "Shine Through"
  106. The Summarily Dismissed: "To Each!"
  107. Will Scruggs Jazz Fellowship: "Song of Simeon: A Christmas Journey"
  108. Dallas Wind Symphony; Jerry Junkin, Conductor: "Horns for the Holidays"
  109. Jacqui Sutton: "Notes from the Frontier: A Musical Journey"
  110. Barluath: "Source"
  111. Letizia Gambi: "Introducing Letizia Gambi"
  112. Fiona Apple: "The Idler Wheel Is Wiser Than the Driver of the Screw and Whipping Cords Will Serve You More Than Ropes Will Ever Do"
  113. Susie Arioli: "All the Way"
  114. Georg Breinschmid: "Fire"
  115. Hiroe Sekine: "After the Rainfall"
  116. Jamie Ousley: "A Sea of Voices"
  117. Bill Toms: "Memphis"
  118. The SSJ All-Stars: "From California With Love"
  119. Dale Ann Bradley: "Somewhere South of Crazy"
  120. Duda Lucena Quartet: "Live"
  121. Stevie Nicks: "In Your Dreams"
  122. Megan Slankard: "A Token of the Wreckage"
  123. Take 6: "The Most Wonderful Time of the Year"
  124. "Christmas with The Washington Chorus"
  125. Esperanza Spalding: "Chamber Music Society"
  126. John Escreet: "Don't Fight the Inevitable"

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