Posts by Doug Collette

Simply by dint of his choice of instruments —once an eight and now seven-string guitar–Charlie Hunter is one of the most original musicians of contemporary jazz. But he’s taken his idiosyncratic choice of axe into realms of music equally distinctive, ranging from his early trio and quartet ensembles to the Pound for Pound group featuring […]

[rating=8.00] Few new releases in any contemporary genre carry the distinguished credentials of Larry Campbell and Theresa Williams. The former was Bob Dylan’s lead guitarist from 1997 to 2004 before going on to assume similar duties in the last stable lineup of Phil Lesh and Friends from 2007 to 2008. Campbell then went on to […]

At least on paper, the June 29th Concert on the Green at Shelburne Museum looked to rival the Discover Jazz co-billing of Robert Randolph and Matt Schofield on Burlington’s Waterfront Park earlier in the month. However on this bout, Trombone Shorty stole the show from Gary Clark Jr whose set failed to generate much momentum […]

[rating=6.00] The topical concerns that permeate the songs on The Monsanto Years shouldn’t surprise anyone who’s listened to Neil Young over the course of his career and particularly in recent years. And if nothing else, the collection of material maintains the viability of the album as a collection of recorded material, in a time of […]

It’s a tribute to the longstanding appeal of the Grateful Dead that their (and rock’s?) first bonafide archival series is now well into it’s third year of reissues via Real Gone Music. The titles originally curated by the late Dick Latvala were first made available through the band’s own merchandising operation with limited retail circulation, […]

[rating=8.00] Listening to the sonic experimentation of Paul Weller’s album Saturns Patterns, it only makes sense this is the man who fronted two bands, The Jam and The Style Council, so very stylistically diverse from each other. Yet Weller declaims his iconoclastic personality here, often as not as cacophonous as it is on “White Sky.” […]

[rating=7.00] Given Charlie Hunter’s use of a seven (once eight) string guitar, it should come as no surprise that, with Curtis Fowlkes on trombone and Bobby Previte on drums and cymbals, Let the Bells Ring On finds the musicians in a wide variety of spaces and places. Yet it’s uncanny how the trio shed new […]

[rating=9.00] Self-produced at Brooklyn Recording, the sound quality of The Bad Plus Joshua Redman is as stark and uncluttered as the album’s cover art. Yet, it serves a distinct purpose: to reveal the detail in the playing of four musicians who’d played a scant few shows together before entering the studio together and nurturing their […]

During the course of the first person narrative of Deal, founding member/drummer of the Grateful Dead Bill Kreutzmann shows he’s (almost) as skilled a storyteller as he is a drummer. Particularly in the early going of My Three Decades,  his informal style lends itself well to the increasingly fast pace of his life as he […]

[rating=8.00] Dawes’ career to this point consists of two steps forward, in the form of initial studio works North Hills and Nothing Is Wrong, one step back, as represented by the sterile Stories Don’t End and a combination return to roots/holding pattern Stripped Down at Grimey’s. If All Your Favorite Bands doesn’t represent more progress, […]