Anthony Braxton

Music Fall Picks 2013

The Best Jazz Shows in NYC This Month

These are the best jazz shows in NYC this month.

Ten Free Jazz Albums to Hear Before You Die

Free jazz is challenging, violent, political, spiritual, joyous, peaceful, and a million other things. It's about shattering forms in order to find a new world of sound somewhere further outside. And once this new world is found, it's time to go looking for a newer one. When, as a college student, ... More >>

Fall Arts Guide 2012: Music

Weasel (Walter) Nation

On the daringly avant label ugEXPLODE

Q&A: Zeena Parkins On Being A Dancing Bear, Working With Björk, And Her New Band The Adorables

The Brooklyn-based harpist Zeena Parkins doesn't follow rules. Whether she's playing with Björk, Thurston Moore, Ikue Mori or John Zorn, her harp rarely sounds like a harp. Instead, it's soaked in digital surrealism and alien mystery—exquisitely dripping, cosmically pinging or wildly feedback ... More >>

Colin Stetson

Q&A: Rhys Chatham On Playing With Oneida, Taking Up Trumpet, And The Survival Of New York

Even via Skype, Rhys Chatham remains profoundly, permanently enthused. The giddy 100-guitar maximalist/minimalist yin to Glenn Branca's foreboding 100-guitar maximalist/minimalist yang, Chatham's '70s/'80s innovations—rounded up by Table of the Elements on 2002's An Angel Moves Too Fast To See ... More >>

Sam Rivers, R.I.P.

A Spotify playlist of Sam Rivers' work is here. Jazz composer, multi-instrumentalist, and organizer Sam Rivers died of pneumonia on December 26. Rivers' importance to the American jazz avant-garde extended beyond his recordings and performances. In his demonstration of artistic self-reliance and co ... More >>

Deadmau5, K-Holes, Screaming Females, And More: Your Guide To The Weekend's Biggest Shows

The week brought us Jon Brion and Shellac and Sam Sparro (not to mention a handful of surprise Occupy Wall Street pop-ins), and that wide spectrum of genres is also represented in this weekend's concert listings. Tonight Deadmau5, who Maura has just informed me stands out as the only artist to be n ... More >>

Download: CSC Funk Band's Clattering Party Anthem "Caneca"

​It's been two years since YIMBY first peeked in on CSC Funk Band, the rollicking, hard-hitting, long-jamming, unapologetically funktacular boogie monster tapped to finally "bring booty-moving, head-nodding grooves to the Todd P universe." In that time they've blossomed from eight members to 1 ... More >>

Download: Tracks By Charlie Looker's Extra Life And Sculptress

​Charlie Looker has spent 10 years in New York art-rock anomalies--Lavender, Zs, Period, Extra Life, Sculptress, even (briefly) Dirty Projectors. The common thread is always the place where the vulnerable sentiment of indie rock collides with the jagged rhythms of contemporary composition; Loo ... More >>

Jazz Consumer Guide: Pure Joy and Hard Work

Saxophonists get up to mischief (and engage in a little drama)

Marty Ehrlich & Ray Anderson Quartet

Mary Halvorson & Jessica Pavone

The State of Jazz 2010

No norms, no borders, and everything's happening, louder than ever

Mary Halvorson

Life, Death, and Rebirth at the CareFusion and Vision Jazz Festivals

Jazz Consumer Guide: Mocking Traditions, or Joining Them

Plus suave elegance, raw non-beauty, and other works-in-progress

Jazz Consumer Guide: Loosening (or Tightening) Up

Or slicing, or muscling—anything but letting up, really

An Addendum to that Piece on MGMT's Wesleyan Surrealist-Pop Mafia

Max GoldblattAndrew VanWyngarden and Simon O'Connor (left to right, with guitars) You know the one--Cristina Black's much reblogged music feature that ran in print two weeks ago. It seems that in the wake of the piece, every Wes alum with a guitar pick and a cowbell came out of comment-lurker hidi ... More >>

Jazz Consumer Guide: A Summer Suite of Harmonic Disorder

Transcending roots and relishing every moment, whether you've got the rhythm section or not

2008 Voice Jazz Poll Winners

2008 Jazz Poll Ballots: A-O

New releases, reissues, debuts, and more—each critic's picks

2008 Jazz Poll Ballots: P-Z

Funk Fusion, Bebop Terrorism in New Jazz Records

Talents old and new throw stuff against the wall and see what sticks

2007 Jazz Poll Ballots: A-O

New releases, reissues, debuts, and more—each critic's picks

2007 Jazz Poll Ballots: P-Z

New releases, reissues, debuts, and more—each critic's picks

The 2007 Jazz Poll

This year's finisher's

The Year of the Woman

With all the ballots counted, our decidedly un-macho Jazz Poll finally finds its headline

Live: Battles at Webster Hall, 11.12.07

Melody Lingers On

Mastering Dylan, flubbing Darin, and paying tribute to the inimitable Max Roach

A Month on the Town

The man who's reviewed 12,000 records reviews 32 shows in 30 days

To Serve and Protect: A Freestyle Series Rumbles On

Fractious Solidarity for Trouble Times

Balance and teamwork from individualists the record business considers totally impractical

Low Rent

The real possibilities open up when it doesn't cost a bundle to pursue your muse

Covering Expenses

A who, what, why, where, when—and how many—of the uncharted world of independent jazz labels

Rituals of Getting Acquainted

With the Brit avant-garde, rust-belt saxophone, Braxton standards, Dylan standards

Music as Sex

What you hear is what you get: Bailey's astounding sounds

Outcats Inc.

The cats are really cooking on CIMP out in Redwood, and so is the label owner's wife

Listings

Chances Are

Martial Solal Sets the Standard

Aquí Se Habla Español

David Murray Makes a Cuban Connection

Point Counterpoint

Dave Holland Enlarges His Horizon

Mouse Trap Replica

Post-War Jazz: An Arbitrary Road Map

Salaam

Bridge Across the Cliff

Venerable Enough for the Veep’s List

Holy Squat, Jazzman!