David Bowie’s Last Shape Shift

David Bowie’s prolific and inventive recording career began over 50 years ago, and he achieved fame early on with the release of “Space Oddity” in 1969 (see our post from 2013). Over the decades he was called a “shape shifter” for surprising us regularly with changes in look and musical style. It is a bittersweet final chapter to his story that he passed away on the day he released “Blackstar”, with its full serving of new musical direction. We won’t have the opportunity to hear Bowie expand and expound upon this new direction in interviews or performances, so let’s make sure to do a little examination of his last work on our own.

Blackstar was recorded with the backing of jazz musicians saxophonist Donny McCaslin, guitarist Ben Monder, drummer Mark Guiliana and keyboardist Jason Lindner. Bassist Tim Lefebvre was on hand as well. Bowie met McCaslin in 2014, and McCaslin, Monder and Guiliana played in the orchestra on Bowie’s 2014 single “Sue (Or in a Season of Crime)”. The track is in a straighter jazz vein than the more eclectic sounds the group created on “Blackstar”.

The songs from “Blackstar” getting the most early attention are its nearly 10-minute title track and “Lazarus”. Both are the subjects of elaborate videos, the latter taking on a special meaning in light of Bowie’s passing. But the videos can frankly be a distraction from hearing the music, so let’s start with “Dollar Days” which has no video – but close your eyes for good measure.

Now that you’ve practiced listening with closed eyes, listen to “Lazarus” once that way, then take the last look at one of Rock and Roll’s geniuses he apparently intended us to take.

Two Fine Pianists – A Jazz Prodigy and a Special Singer Songwriter

Let’s start with a VERY young talent, in case you missed the piece on “60 Minutes” last weekend. Joey Alexander is a 12-year old jazz piano prodigy who’s being mentored by no one less than Wynton Marsales. The story goes that Joey taught himself to play listening to his parents’ jazz records in his native Bali. It’s pretty obvious that his brain is wired in a special, special way.

Check out this soulful studio performance of “Over the Rainbow”, a track featured on his 2015 debut album “My Favorite Things”, Grammy-nominated for Best Jazz Instrumental Album. If you’d like to hear him really cook, listen to another track from that album, Coltrane’s “Giant Steps”. The recorded version is nominated for “Best Improvised Jazz Solo”.

Vienna Teng has five studio albums to her credit, a recording career that began in 2002 after this Stanford-educated computer scientist quit her day job. Her most recent album, “Aims” released in 2013, covers a lot of musical ground and reveals many influences. You can listen to and buy the tracks on her website.

Vienna lists Tori Amos as one of her influences, and you can’t help but hear that on “Close to Home”. In case you need a reminder, though, listen to Tori’s performance of her exquisite “Silent All These Years” from 1992.

Back in the Saddle!

After a extended hiatus for most of 2015, Music Now & Then is mounting a comeback for 2016! Please send your encouragement, and I’ll try to keep the posts coming.

Though it might fairly be said that 2015 will not go down as one of the most memorable years for new music, there is plenty to catch up on over the next few weeks. A fun place to start is this mashup by DJ Earworm. “50 Shades of Pop” is the ninth installment in his annual series of retrospectives. This year he samples from the top 50 songs in Billboard’s Year-End Hot 100. While The Hot 100 is not typical grist for Music Now & Then, this mix gives a nice feel for what you’ll be hearing if you watch the music award shows in the months ahead. The first voice you hear is a single word from Adele.

DJ Earworm’s first effort in this vein was 2007’s “United States of Pop”, but he only dug 25 deep into that year’s pop stack. Rihanna was exploding that year, and Adam Levine started sporting that tux! Instead of Adele, the first voice you hear is Jay Z.

If you want to dig deeper into the history of these mashups and get DJ Earworm’s views on the underlying music trends, this recent article on Vox.com is what got me going on this post. Enjoy, and it’s good to be back!

Eclectic Times Two – alt-J and TV On The Radio

The first thing to know about alt-J is that the band’s name is not alt-J. If you simultaneously press the “Option” key on your Mac, which also serves as the “alt” key, while pressing the letter “J”, you get the symbol ∆. That’s the upper case Greek letter Delta, and in an Artist Formerly Known as Prince way, that’s the band’s name. And a triangle makes a great hand sign to hold up at concerts.

Now on to the music. The band released its second album, “This Is All Yours”, in September. ∆ puts out some pretty eclectic music, but they found their way to a catchy hit with “Left Hand Free”. Check it out and then listen to “Choice Kingdom” to get a feel for the range of material on the album.

TV on the Radio generates an eclectic mix of their own and put out their fifth album, “Seeds”, in November. Whether you’re a skateboarder or not, you’ll get a kick out of the song and the video for “Lazerray”. The credits at the end give the names of all the skateboarders and, in a nod to the uncomfortable future, to the drone operator.

While not big chart toppers, the band had a minor hit a few years back with “Will Do”. Nice song with a video featuring what may have been a bad Google Glass prototype.

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Two Bands of Brothers – Punch and Barr

Over a year ago we wrote about the then recent doings of Nickel Creek alums including mandolin virtuoso Chris Thile. Around the time Nickel Creek disbanded in 2006, Thile formed a new group called How to Grow a Band, since renamed The Tension Mountain Boys, since renamed Punch Brothers. Their fourth album “The Phosphorescent Blues” was just released – thanks for the reminder Eric!

The album contains the eclectic mix of styles that fans of the band and of Thile have come to expect. Give a listen to the first single released from the new album, “I Blew It Off”, with its pop vocal harmonies. Then dip back to “Movement and Location” from their prior album “Who’e Feeling Young Now”.

The Barr Brothers released their sophomore effort “Sleeping Operator” last October. Brothers Andrew and Brad Barr originally played together in The Slip, a Boston-based band that performed together through 2011, but have put most of their recent effort into the Montreal-based The Barr Brothers. Here’s a live performance of “Even The Darkness Has Arms” from that album.

“Even Rats” from The Slip’s 2006 album “Eisenhower” was one of the songs adapted for the video game “Guitar Hero”. Listen to a bit of the original, then watch a young guitar hero go at it back in the day!