Tenor and soprano saxophonist John Coltrane had recently signed with the newly formed Impulse! record label and settled on what wold be his greatest band featuring pianist McCoy Tyner, bassist Jimmy Garrison and drummer Elvin Jones when these epochal recordings were committed to tape in 1961. Coltra...

Coming hard on the heels of the album that many feel is Mingus's masterpiece, The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady, this album takes a ten piece little big band and reprises several of Mingus' most well known compositions and was recorded in January and September of 1963. Joining the great bassist an...

Experimental guitarist Nels Cline's latest album is a project that he had been planning and delaying for several years. Multiple guitars, electronics and many layers of music combine to make for an album that seems very much like a journey inside Cline's particular musical universe. "Prayer Wheel" h...

In guitarist John McLaughlin's four decade plus career he has covered a lot of ground: acoustic, electric, jazz, world fusion and beyond. Coming of age with the British blues and rock boom in the 1960's, McLaughlin's early recordings show him at ground zero of the burgeoning jazz fusion movement. Mc...

Big Road Blues has an excellent essay accompanying their last show dedicated to Earl Hooker called Play Your Guitar, Mr. Hooker: "Among his peers, Earl Hooker is widely considered the greatest guitarist of his generation. His wild performances attracted a loyal following wherever he went as he enter...

Pianist Matthew Shipp seems to have re-committed himself to exploratory acoustic jazz in a trio format with Joe Morris on bass and Whit Dickey on drums. This is an interesting group that explores the twilight netherworld between structure and freedom, and between standards and originals. Shipp's mus...

Fool: A Novel by Christopher Moore My review rating: 4 of 5 starsDoing a comic parody of King Lear from the perspective of the jester is right up the alley of satirical novelist Christopher Moore. What results is a lewd, bawdy and quite funny book that manages some pretty deft political satire as we...

Guitarist Grant Green recorded many great sessions for the Blue Note label during the early and mid 1960's. While primarily known as a groove and blues player, he could more than hold his own in a progressive setting as well. This is one of Green's finest achievements as a bandleader, but ironically...

Trying to remake one of the greatest and most unique pop music albums forty years after the fact is quite an audacious challenge. Van Morrison's Astral Weeks has stood outside of time and space for so long that the thought of going back to that mystic well seems like a fool's errand for even one so ...

Captain Beefheart aka Don van Vliet retired from the music business in the early 1980's, but he still casts a long shadow in several musical realms including rock 'n' roll and jazz. Fast 'n' Bulbous is a hard swinging septet that covers Beefheart's compositions from a progressive jazz perspective. L...