Medeski, Martin & Wood: Radiolarians 1 (Indirecto / self-released)
Seemingly incapable of going six months without a release, jazz/jam trio Medeski, Martin & Wood now presents the first release in its Radiolarians series. The album begins the group's experiment of meeting for brief writing sessions, testing out that new material (and only the new material) on the road, recording the material, and then repeating the process.
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Koushik: Out My Window (Stones Throw)
Ontario's Koushik Ghosh weaves choirs of strings in and out of down-tempo, old-school hip-hop beats to create a sound that's made more unique with his dreamlike singing. Mix in elements of 1960s psychedelic pop and you have a celestial mix on Out My Window, his sophomore full-length album.
Koushik: \"Lying in the Sun\" (sample)
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Look Daggers: Suffer in Style (Up Above)
Keyboardist Ikey Owens of The Mars Volta and vocalist 2Mex of The Visionaries prepare a rock/hip-hop union for their new group, Look Daggers, and the result is a catchy, original, organic album. The disc's crazy list of guests includes members of Mastodon, Breakestra, Long Beach Dub All-Stars, Thelonious Monster, and Reel Big Fish.
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Bill Frisell: Rambler (ECM) [reissue]
Jazz guitarist Bill Frisell has traversed dozens of styles in his career, and he has worked with artists as diametrically different as drummer Paul Motian and doom-drone group Earth. This reissue of his second ECM album may not be as all encompassing as his work with John Zorn's Naked City, but it's well across the atmospheric jazz map.
