Classical Gas

My world wasn’t instantly transformed when I impulsively purchased a promotional copy of Philip Glass’ North Star for $1 as a teenager.  My unseasoned ears couldn’t process the work of the minimalist composer.  What initially struck me as impossibly cold and foreign now sounds warm and familiar.  The propulsive portions of Pulse/Quartet, a lively rendering of two works by Glass’ peer Steve Reich, put me in mind of North Star.  I’m immediately smitten this time around.


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I write weekly concert previews for The Kansas City Star.

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I named Olivia Fox the KCUR Band of the Week.

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Recently at Plastic Sax: Ozark jazz, a weekly survey of Kansas City’s jazz scene and a report from an Ornette Coleman symposium.

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Crooner Vic Damone has died.

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The country artist Daryle Singletary has died.

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I was one of six people at Lola Pistola’s show in Kansas City this week.  I didn’t buy any merch, but I 'll donate a somewhat misleading new tagline to the artist: “Patti Smith with a Puerto Rican accent.”

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Intermediate State, a 20-minute EP of Ethiopian jazz by the Belgian group Black Flower, is wondrously transportive. 

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If I were to become a Lyft driver, GoGo Penguin’s A Humdrum Star might provide the soundtrack to my midnight shift.  The cosmopolitan but ultimately vacuous fusion of jazz and electronica would create a tip-oriented tone for my clients.

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I realize it’s hypocritical to deride derivative bands like Greta Van Fleet while praising the recycling of Fu Manchu.  My primary defense of Clone of the Universe hinges on the epic 18-minute closing track.  Here’s the title track.

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Third-rate Roxy Music, anyone?

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J Dilla lives!  The Jefferson Park Boys play dreamy Dilla-esque jazz on Casual Horns, Dog.

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Nightfall, the hushed pairing of trumpeter Till Brönner and bassist Dieter Ilg, is gorgeous.  Here’s “A Thousand Kisses Deep”.

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While it’s not the least bit titillating, the Fifty Shades Freed soundtrack is a handy survey of modern pop. 

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)

Album Review: BJ the Chicago Kid- In My Mind

Some of the people who share my enthusiasm for Frank Ocean whine about the absence of a follow-up to his 2012 masterpiece Channel Orange.  I have better things to do.  Appreciating good-to-great albums by male R&B artists including Avant, Babyface, Bilal, D’Angelo, D.R.A.M., José James, Jodeci, R. Kelly, Miguel and the Weeknd has kept me busy during the past three years.  Add BJ the Chicago Kid to that list.  In My Mind doesn't achieve the heights of Channel Orange, but even the album's weakest tracks are enjoyable Keith Sweat, Prince and D’Angelo knockoffs.  Frank should feel free to take his time.  I’ll be in ”Church”.


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I reviewed Dwight Yoakam’s sold-out concert at the Uptown Theater.

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I featured Fullbloods on KCUR’s Local Listen.

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I wrote an extended concert preview about Wavves.

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The album release show for Be/Non’s Mystic Sunrise/Sunset Magic at the Scottish Rite Temple was mind-blowing. 

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Much of Your Friend’s Gumption resembles the vacillating sounds I heard when I suffered from night terrors as a child.

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There’s nothing I don’t like about the song and the video for Josh Hoyer & Soul Colossal’s ”Parts of Man”.  RIYL: Lee Fields, not-so-silly love songs, Percy Sledge.

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Ed Motta’s delightfully odd Perpetual Gateways is RIYL: Steely Dan, LA session cats of the 1980s, Gregory Porter.

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I embraced GoGo Penguin’s 2014 album, but the British group’s debut on Blue Note Records is overly chilly.  Here’s ”Res”.

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Cian Nugent’s Night Fiction is RIYL: Sandy Bull, spacing out, the Autumn Defense.

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Rogue Waves,  five remixes of a single Miguel song, is incredibly impressive.

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Wolfmother’s Victorious is big, dumb rawk, and Leslie West help me, I like it.  RIYL: Mountain, 1972, Billy Squier.

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Brian McKnight’s sappy Better makes me happy.

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We Like It Like That, a new documentary about Latin boogaloo, looks like my kind of movie.

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)

Concert Review: Brother Ali at the Granada

I went to a hip-hop concert and an Occupy Wall Street rally broke out.  Lacking a backpack filled with spray paint and Howard Zinn tracts, I felt a bit more out of place than usual at the Granada on Sunday.

Backed only by DJ Last Word, Brother Ali, Bambu and Mally performed over two hours of old-school hip-hop for the 100 or so people who had ponied up $15 to gain entry.

Ali explained that he embarked on a tour without a new album or promotional support in an effort to reconnect with his real fans.  He added that he selected his tour mates partly because they were good fathers to their children.  The Minneapolis rapper is so painfully sincere that I had to take him at his word.  Coming from most anyone else, the assertions would have seemed like weak rationalizations for the pitiful turnout.

Long one of my favorite MCs, Ali performed most of his best known material, from the scathing political attack "Uncle Sam Goddamn" ("Obama is killing people with drones") to the self-esteem anthem "Forest Whitiker" ("you ain't gotta love me").  A rap about raising children in the aftermath of the Mike Brown incident was the clear highlight of the evening.

The contradictory messages espoused by Los Angeles' Bambu irritated me so much that I considered giving him a piece of my mind after the show.  Minneapolis' Mally was likable enough.  The trio issued an informal performance of "Home Away" earlier this week.


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I reviewed a concert by the Flaming Lips and Electric Würms.

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The video for Kansas City Bear Fighters '"You're In Kansas" is clever.  (Via Tony's Kansas City.)

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Here's the video for Farout's "Bittersweet".

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Marc Myers' remembrance of Joe Sample is invaluable.

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Howard Reich reports on Steve Coleman's genius grant.

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Polar Bear is better on paper than on headphones.  In Each and Every One is RIYL: Radiohead, jazz for people who don't like jazz, the Pat Metheny Group.  Here's "Life and Life".

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Cold Specks' Neuroplasticity is another album I'm supposed to like.  I loathe it.  RIYL: Patti Smith, "Art", Neneh Cherry.  Here's "Absisto".

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Steve Arrington continues to funk everything up.

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From the Why Didn't Any of You Jerks Tell Me About This Department- GoGo Penguin's excellent v2.0 is RIYL: Esbjörn Svensson Trio, European jazz, the Bad Plus.  "Hopopono" is a representative track.

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The Mark Turner Quartet's Lathe of Heaven looks promising.

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Donnie McClurkin's Duets is RIYL: Sunday mornings, the Winans, clapping.

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Bahamas' Bahamas is Afie is RIYL: Jimmie Spheeris, lite rock, Dan Fogelberg.

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Death Metal Angola.

(Original image by There Stands the Glass.)