New Albums - Page 130

Prolific Nashville-based jazz fusion/progressive bassist Jon von Boehm has released his self-titled debut as a band leader. The eponymous album came together over the course of two years and features a slew of players with whom he feels comfortable. As he says on his website: “The musicians playing on the album are cats that I enjoy working with and really...

Chip Shearin, best known for the bass line he played on The Sugarhill Gang’s rap classic, “Rapper’s Delight,” has released his debut solo album How I Live. Shearin has made a name as a session player in the years since “Rapper’s Delight” made a splash in 1979/80. He’s worked with artists like jazz players Donald Byrd, Dizzy Gillespie, Warren Hill...

Israeli bassist and bandleader Omer Avital continues to delve into the linkages between jazz and Middle Eastern music on his latest album, New Song. New Song is a follow-up record to 2012’s Suite of the East, and features his longtime band of Avishai Cohen on trumpet, Joel Frahm on tenor saxophone, Yonathan Avishai on piano, and Daniel Freedman on drums....

Bruno Tauzin, a bass teacher known for video lessons and his work, The Art of Solo Bass, has continued to explore his creativity outside the teaching realm and come up with an album. The new release, 12 Miniatures features original music without bass instruction. Tauzin’s solo six-string bass is the star of 12 Miniatures. Here’s a taste of what you’ll...

Funkadelic has released an album of new music after a 33-year hiatus. is the first album the legendary funk group led by George Clinton has released since 1981’s The Electric Spanking of War Babies. The new record, which combines classic funk with hip-hop sounds, features several bassists, including Rodney ‘Skeet’ Curtis, Lige Curry, Jeff ‘Cherokee’ Bunn, and Michael B. Patterson....

Indie band Bastille has reappeared with a new mixtape, with a title reminiscent of its first two. This time out, the “tape” — actually a CD — is . However, the album marks the fist time the “mixtape” has featured exclusively original content, rather than a combination of originals and cover versions of songs. The album does feature extensive collaboration...

Romanian artist, Bass Battle (also known as one person, Bogdan Diaconeasa), has released an EP’s worth of ambient solo bass songs called Play. Recorded over the course of three years, just for fun, the album features only Diaconeasa’s bass and a looper. “I will say that this album is the declaration of my love for this beautiful instrument – the...

2014 has been a good year for sneak albums, but R&B master D’Angelo may have taken the cake by releasing over the course of a weekend. The album, which is his first in fourteen years, is a tremendous return that pushes his art forward while keeping true to his voice. D’Angelo took a more serious approach for Black Messiah with...

Six-string bass is one of the building blocks of drone artist Whote’s (Thomas Watkiss) latest album, Whote II: Moons. Watkiss is the performer on and producer of the record, creating songs with not only the bass, but also distorted guitar, field recordings, and minimal keyboards. Whote is noted for its experimental music, and Moons continues in this vein, with live...

Six years ago on Halloween, Gov’t Mule dressed up in another band’s music. The jam band/Allman Brothers offshoot, featuring Jorgen Carlsson on bass, performed Pink Floyd covers from albums including Dark Side of the Moon, Animals, The Wall, and Wish You Were Here. The 2008 show at the Orpheum Theatre in Boston, was recorded and is now available on CD...

Like It Is: Yes at the Bristol Hippodrome, a 2 CD/DVD set Blu-ray disc, combines songs from two favorite Yes albums: 1971’s The Yes Album and 1977’s Going for the One, in one live package recorded during the band’s spring 2014 tour. “These are two bodies of music that many of the most devout Yes fans wanted to hear in...

Jazz clarinetist, sax player and composer Ken Thomson has released his second album with the group Slow/Fast, again showing how to combine the worlds of jazz and contemporary classical music. Distortion even appears in the group’s music, indicating rock influences as well. The second album, called , sees Slow/Fast featuring all of its original members, including bassist Adam Armstrong, an...