Music Monday: Some Old, Some New, and Some Unexpected
- Aug 26, 2024
- 2 min read
It would be low hanging fruit to talk about the 65 anniversary of the recording of Miles Davis’s Bitches Brew this week. So, I’ll just leave it:
More exciting is that 60th anniversary of Tony Williams first album, Life Time. It’s an amazing album perhaps not for its virtuosity — although there’s plenty of that — but for the ensemble assembled to support Williams on his debut: Sam Rivers on sax, Herbie Hancock on piano, and no fewer than THREE bassists appear on the album: Gary Peacock and Richard Davis play together in a few tracks and a 20something Ron Carter plays a trio with Hancock (also a 20something and Williams on the album’s final track. Needless to say, this is heady company for the 18 year old Williams and an album that is worth enjoying both on in its own right and as an artifact in what would be a remarkable career for Tony Williams:
The next two albums don’t appear much on YouTube, but they’re worth tracking down on your favorite streaming service (or just buy the durned albums from the artists or Bandcamp!).
The first is from Philadelphian Hiruy Tirfe (of Eritrea decent). It’s called 10,000 Hours (2023). It opens with a gentle piano riff played over a series of clips about Malcolm Gladwell’s 10,000 hour rule which states that it takes 10,000 hours to master something (which presumably makes me a master in emails and blogging, but not much else).
Go check out the rest of the album. Most of it is pretty conventional — or what passes these days for “straight ahead jazz” — but much like James Brandon Lewis, it hints at more to come. For some fun, check out Tirfe’s Tiny Desk Concert audition:
The next album is something unexpected. I know nothing about Thokozile Collective, but their self-titled album is pretty nice. I guess they’re from the UK, but they obviously embrace the sounds of South Africa. Or maybe they’re South African living in the UK? I don’t actually know, but check it out:
It’s pretty great and a brilliant mix of fun and chill.
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