S

“ALU's inception as descendants of the psychedelic group Sand, founded by Ludwig Papenberg and Johannes Vester, comes in 1980. Their first single "Bitte Warten Sie!" appears on their own label Der Letzte Schrei! in 1981. Even on these early recordings, the project's sonic orientation is discernible: sequencer-driven, simplistic rhythmic structures layered over fragments of free text, a common thread tracing ALU's musical contours through various successive metamorphoses. Although the band emerged from...

Great, spacy / quiet /restful’ release from the guitarist Chuck Johnson and the keyboardist Marielle Jakobsons. If ‘spacy / quiet / restful’ makes your ears stand up, then you want this!!

“There is an old Norse myth that says the great northern glaciers stored energy until they burst with fluorescent light, creating the Aurora Borealis. Saariselka is inspired by the meeting of earth and light, where slowly moving land masses merge with enveloping light fields. This sonic collaboration between...

Keyboardist/composer Jordi Sabates played on a lot of good Spanish albums during the 1970's. He composed and played keyboards (piano, Fender Rhodes, organ and Moog synths) on this album, that he is joined Toti Soler-flamenco guitar, Ricardo Sabates-ele...

Solo album by this Italian drummer is a climax of his in-depth exploration of the instruments sound & mechanics...

"Longevity is a word rarely associated with jazz ensembles these days. The difficulty in retaining a long lasting musical relationship with any one collaborator is hard enough, let alone trying to keep a quartet together.

An ensemble that has..

How great to see In Cahoots bassist Fred T. Baker with Soft Machine/Eberhard Weber's Colours drummer John Marshall here on a set led by guitarist Joe Sachse!

Jacob Sacks piano
Ellery Eskelin tenor saxophone
Tony Malaby tenor & soprano saxophones
Michael Formanek bass
Dan Weiss drums

“It makes so much sense for a Portuguese record label to release a new opus of the New York pianist and composer Jacob Sacks, considering his many connections with the jazz scene of this country and musicians like João Lencastre, Sara Serpa, André Matos, Gonçalo Marques and Demian Cabaud. Sacks is widely recognized as one of the most creative...


"To composer/bassist Daphna Sadeh, Jewish Music is the cross-cultural patchwork quilt of the diaspora experience. Born in Israel, she has studied in New York and since 2002 has been based mostly in London where she leads her own ensemble and performs...

This is the fourth solo release by Laetitia, who is well known as THE voice of Stereolab, and her first solo in a decade!
In addition to the official blurb, I thought that I’d mention that this reminds me a lot of Aquaserge in their most ‘song’ moments.

"Over the course of her career, spanning three-plus decades, Laetitia Sadier has never shied away from the hard topics, or stopped advocating for the possibility of self-determination and emancipation in the face of the powers that be...


MARGARITA BOTELLO: Voice, Keys, Accordion
JOSÉ LUIS FERNÁNDEZ LEDESMA Q.: Guitar
EDUARDO FIERRO: Drums, Percussion
ADRIÁN PLOWES: Warr Guitar
with
GERMÁN BRINGAS: Soprano Sax
ALEJANDRO SÁNCHEZ: Violín
JERZAIN VARGAS: Trumpet

Almost 15 years have passed since the first SAENA album. The wait was worth it. SAENA is back with an album full of high levelled progressive rock sounds. Every piece has been carefully ensembled as if it were a timepiece, taking care of every

In the final months of 2004, John Zorn wrote over 300 new tunes for his popular Masada project, and he now initiates a new series of recordings featuring the best players out of the burgeoning Masada family in dynamic units performing compositions from...

"Jamie Saft and his dynamic trio (Saft-piano and Hammond organ, Greg Cohen-double bass and Ben Perowsky-drums) presents a sparkling interpretation of the work of Bob Dylan. A lifelong Dylan enthusiast, Saft is the perfect man to take on this challengin...

Another amazing band of likely and unlikely bandmates on this record!

"Virtuoso pianist/guitarist/recording engineer/composer Jamie Saft has been a crucial member of the downtown scene since the early 1990s, both as sideman and as leader of his...

"After two stunning jazz piano trio recordings featuring the music of Dylan and Zorn, dubmeister Jamie Saft returns to his roots with a masterpiece of Jewish heavy metal. Slashing and burning his way through nine tracks of unbridled madness, this is...

"Keyboard virtuoso, dub-master supreme, heavy metal guitarist, soundtrack composer, versatile arranger, master butcher and zonked madman, Jamie Saft has been responsible for some of the wildest and most soulful sounds heard on the Tzadik Jewish series...

Jamie's second CD for Tzadik is a cinematic exploration of dub, pop and club music filtered through his own very personal Jewish lens. Spacy DJ mixes, deep grooves, fucked-up dubs and soulful vocals on subjects ranging from tashlikh toprayer to fratric...

Jamie Saft - piano
Dave Liebman - tenor & soprano saxophone, flute
Bradley Christopher Jones - acoustic bass
Hamid Drake – drums

“On the transcendent new album Hidden Corners, visionary keyboardist, producer and composer Jamie Saft embarks on a spiritual journey along the searching path unveiled by such iconic forebears as John and Alice Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, and Albert Ayler. Inspired by concepts from Jewish mysticism, the album features an outstanding quartet of deeply

"One of the most prolific artists in the RareNoise roster, Jamie Saft has appeared on recordings by such groups as Metallic Taste of Blood, Slobber Pup, Plymouth, Red Hill, The Spanish Donkey and Berserk! As well as on collaborations with Steve Swallow and Bobby Previte (New Standard / Loneliness Road, which also featured Iggy Pop, Bill Brovold (Serenity Knolls), Roswell Rudd (Strength & Power) and his own New Zion album (Sunshine Seas). And yet, over all those sessions he has never recorded a solo piano...

''Guitars and beats, both electric and acoustic, mixed in dub...Jamie Saft's debut recording deals with the interaction of Black, Arab and Jewish cultures in his hometown of Brooklyn, NY. Featuring his longtime collaborators Jim Black and Chris Speedas...

“You Don't Know the Life takes the undefinable, exploratory trio into stunning new directions with a blend of evocative original compositions, inventive free improvisations, and unexpected standards
Over the last three decades, visionary keyboardist, producer and composer Jamie Saft has made a career out of reinvention. His genre-obliterating range is evidenced by the stunningly diverse innovators with whom he's collaborated - a list that includes John Zorn, Beastie Boys, Bad Brains, John Adams...

"Over a career now spanning nearly thirty years, Jamie Saft has established himself as one of the visionaries of contemporary American music. As a composer, pianist and keyboard innovator, and collaborator of music icons such as Bad Brains, Beastie Boys, the B-52s, Donovan, John Adams and John Zorn, he has been fearless in his pursuit of spiritual elevation through music that both seeks to embrace the whole American canon, and also transcend it, by seamlessly assimilating genres, traditions, idioms and...

In the living room of a small house in Dalarna, the Swedish countryside, Sagor & Swing has recorded this timeless music evoking the surrounding landscape -- the forests, mountains and lakes. Moody and simple melodies with echoes of old Swedish folk tun...

"The new record by Sagor & Swing is quite different from their earlier low-key, melancholic records. Their characteristic sound is still there, but Orgelplaneten is more direct and joyful, more pop perhaps. Their basic instrumentation, organ and drums, is completed with Moog and accordion. This aspect of Sagor & Swing has always been there as a parallel track, but Orgelplaneten is the first time it is expressed on record. This is the fourth album by Sagor & Swing (all released by Häpna)."

"In 1994, The Laser's Edge had a short lived sister label called The Labyrinth. Sailor Free was part of the roster and released a beautiful psychedelic hard rock album called The Fifth Door. After that the band went silent. 19 years later, vocalist...


"Following 2016's compilation of archival recordings by Suso Saiz titled Odisea, Music From Memory mark their 20th release with an album of new works by the Spanish electronic music pioneer. Recorded in Madrid between January and February 2016, this is Suso Saiz's first release of new music in nearly ten years. Titled Rainworks, this release was originally part of a commission from a Canary Islands water company. The first ideas for the compositions developed from a documentary that Suso had seen....

"Following 2016's compilation of archival recordings by Suso Saiz titled Odisea, Music From Memory mark their 20th release with an album of new works by the Spanish electronic music pioneer. Recorded in Madrid between January and February 2016, this is Suso Saiz's first release of new music in nearly ten years. Titled Rainworks, this double LP release was originally part of a commission from a Canary Islands water company. The first ideas for the compositions developed from a documentary that Suso had...

"Sajjanu is a ripping new unit from Tokyo that performs incredibly complex through-composed compositions with few if any repetition. Performed with an intensity and power that is absolutely staggering, this trio of two guitars and drums sounds like a...

Michel is a Christian Arab who lives in Israel. He's also a monster guitarist and this is a very unusual and very appealing jazz/rock album that blends elements of Arabic modes, scales and instruments with hot fusion. I still love good fusion after all...

“The first ever international release of Ryuichi Sakamoto's landmark 1984 album Ongaku Zukan, originally issued in Japan on his own School label in 1984. Remastered by Saidera Mastering in Tokyo. The early '80s were a turning point for Japanese musician Ryuichi Sakamoto. As a solo artist, the smash hit soundtrack he had composed for 1983's Merry Christmas Mr. Lawrence, had put him on the verge of becoming a global superstar. Meanwhile he had called a halt to his work with Yellow Magic Orchestra; the...

"Friendly Pants is the first American release by legendary Japanese saxophonist Akira Sakata in more than 20 years. It pairs the 65-year-old traveler alongside Chikamorachi, the bombast rhythm section of drummer Chris Corsano (Paul Flaherty Duo, Bjork...

Achille Succi bass clarinet
Julian Arguelles tenor and soprano sax
Samo Salamon guitar
Pascal Niggenkemper bass
Roberto Dani drums
Christian Lillinger drums

"Here is one more live recording of the Ljubljana Jazz Festival, featuring the Slovenian guitarist, and former John Scofield’s student, who is unanimously pointed out as one of the most defying players today in Europe: Samo Salamon. The Sextet is of transnational constitution, putting together the cream of the Europe

Tony Malaby tenor & soprano saxophone
Samo Salamon guitar
Roberto Dani drums

"A former student of John Scofield, Samo Salamon was named by the magazine Guitar Player as one of 10 most interesting guitarists of the moment, with All About Jazz stating that this Slovenian is «one of the most talented and interesting to emerge on today’s jazz scene», putting him at the same level of Kurt Rosenwinkel and Ben Monder.
The Penguin Jazz Guide choose his debut record “Ornethology”, from 2003.

Led by guitarist Kido Natsuki of Bondage Fruit, Salle Gaveau combines the art-music tango, as typified by the brilliant and famous work of Astor Piazzolla with a rock energy and zaniness. Using the same quintet musical configuraration as Piazzolla's...

This is simultaneously the coolest thing I heard this week and the most insane thing I heard this week. Salsa Celtica are a Scottish group that plays salsa. Not only do they play salsa REALLY well but they do it with anywhere from small hints to huge patches of Celtic sounds peeking through the Cuban rhythms. This is really totally great and one of the most brilliantly UNconventional mash-ups ever. Recommended.

“When a band is said to be fusing Afro-Cuban salsa and Celtic music, someone who...

Saluki were a Norwegian band that made one album in 1976 for the legendary Compendium label, mixing jazz/rock and prog with more pop touches.
The band folded shortly after releasing their one and only album.
Now, 42 years later, we have the follow-up release which was actually composed as their follow up album, but was never recorded due to Compendium folding.
If anything, overall and taking into account is was recorded more than 40 years later, so the timbres are different, as a record...

Dino Saluzzi: bandoneon

“Dino Saluzzi’s solo bandoneon breathes songs of Andean mountain villages, family histories, the changing seasons and more, and draws you into the player’s world of memory, where chorales and tangos and waltzes resound. Saluzzi epitomises the musician-as-storyteller and his compositions on this 1988 recording paint pictures in the mind. Jean-Luc Godard responded to the implied images of Andina and used its music in both Nouvelle Vague and Histoire(s) du Cinéma.”

Dino Saluzzi bandoneon
Anja Lechner violoncello
Felix ´Cuchara´ Saluzzi tenor saxophone
The Metropole Orchestra,Jules Buckley conductor

"Dino Saluzzi’s new music for orchestra and soloists characteristically glides through the...

"Argentinean bandoneon master’s ECM debut album is a spellbinding solo tour de force, tracing an ‘imaginary return’ to the villages of Dino’s childhood, as elements of folk tunes and other root sounds are integrated into the floating rubato of tango."...

Influenced by Astor Piazolla (what Argentinian accordion player would not be?) but with his own strong sensibility. A great group with a sound that mixes neuvo tango with ECM.

Dino Saluzzi bandoneon, percussion, voice
Celso Saluzzi bandoneon

Dino Saluzzi, bandoneon
Anja Lechner, violoncello
Felix Saluzzi, tenor saxophone

"Cellist Anja Lechner and clarinet and sax man Felix Saluzzi both appeared as soloists on Dino’s orchestral recording “El Encuentro” in 2009, a shared...

“Salva, formed in Gothenburg, Sweden in 2003 by vocalist/multi-instrumentalist Per Malmberg, guitarist Stefan Gavik and keyboardist Johan Lindqvist, was born out of the urge of main man Malmberg to create music that combined the best of all musical avenues but with a firm foundation in progressive and hard rock. The mission was to make adventurous music with an emphasis on strong melodies and hooks.
There would be no set rules and if a song needed a ‘catchy chorus’ or elements from genres that are...

“The juxtaposition of dualistic concepts like love and anger, joy and heartache, and the way these emotions are inextricably linked in our romantic psyches inform all of Cecile McLorin Salvant's virtuosic, urbanely produced fourth album, 2017's Dreams and Daggers. Recorded live at the Village Vanguard (yes, you can sometimes hear the enthusiastic audience) and in studio at New York's DiMenna Center, the double-disc set features Salvant on a thoughtfully curated selection of standards and several....

''Caldra is the copper pot boiling on the fire side, where the flavors mix together. Caldra is the result of over twenty years of work that Mario Salvi has carried on his melodeon, the container where creativity marries the musical traditions and rhyth...

"A sort of supergroup, as most of their members came from well-known bands, Samadhi were formed after the split of Raccomandata con Ricevuta di Ritorno by singer Regoli and guitarist Civitenga, along with keyboard player Sabatini (from Free Love and Kaleidon), Aldo Bellanova from Teoremi on bass and drummer Ruggero Stefani (L'Uovo di Colombo), and two other members.

Despite the impressive pedigree of the musicians the album is nice though not a masterpiece, mixing good prog influences with some...


"The design of the Hebrew letter samech is a circle, and represents infinity, because it has no beginning or end. In Kabbalah the samech represents the infinite power of the Ein Sof, G-d’s infinite light. Another brilliant Jewish music group out of...

Samla was the original band of keyboardist/composer Lars Hollmer. They blended progressive with bits of folk elements & more. This is an earlier, more overtly "progressive rock" disc than what came later, with some great melodies & great playing...