My 40 favorite albums of 2019—part 2
30. Bill Callahan, Shepherd in a Sheepskin Vest (Drag City)
“It feels good to be writing again,” sings Bill Callahan in his characteristically affect-free drawl to open “Writing,” a tune from his first new studio album in five years. Lots occurred in his life during that time and he channeled in a new high-water mark that saw his singing—despite the handicap of his clipped phrasing, perpetually eschewing any sort of sentimentality or pathos—his lyric-writing, and production all improve markedly. The record was mixed by Brian Beattie—and really, when will those Glass Eye records get reissued so we can seriously celebrate this guy’s unique genius—and his touch sends Callahan’s songs through shifting effects to underline the context and meaning of his writing, which feels more conversational than ever, particularly when he announces shifts in the action through couplets like “After this next song / We’ll be moving along.” The songs are also more complicated, real, and beautiful than ever, effortlessly weaving in strands of dusky Americana without a whiff of pastiche or archness. Inexorable proof that Callahan is at no remove from the Texas masters who inspired him—he’s just shorn away some of their tragic clichés.
29. James Brandon Lewis, An UnRuly Manifesto (Relative Pitch)
Saxophonist James Brandon Lewis has been demonstrating a wide range of interests and influences in his compositions over the last decade, but he’s never previously collated them into a single powerful statement like he did with An UnRuly Manifesto. His assured quintet—with trumpeter Jaimie Branch, guitarist Anthony Pirog, bassist Luke Stewart, and drummer Trae Crudup III—helps him tie together his investment in energy music, avant-funk, and spiritual jazz, complementing his own fiery solos with tight-knit ensemble play. A couple of brief themes steeped in cycling hypnosis and post-bop melodicism—abstracted from his originals--function as a sharp organizing principle for tunes that exploit modal heat (the title tune), taut, stomping funk (“Sir Real Denard”), wiry free jazz (“Escape Nostalgic Prisons”), and pastoral jams (“Haden is Beauty,” which masterfully evokes the plains vibe of the tune’s namesake, his one-time teacher). I finally saw the group, with guitarist Ava Mendoza taking over for Pirog, in Berlin this past November and the focus was even tighter, the energy more infectious, and it really seems like there’s a lot more greatness to come from this extremely thoughtful, curious musician.
28. Caroline Shaw/Attaca Quartet, Orange (New Amsterdam/Nonesuch)
My review from Bandcamp Daily:
Caroline Shaw won a Pulitzer Prize for her 2013 vocal composition Partita, composed for Roomful of Teeth, an ensemble in which she sings. But her first connection to classical music was as a violinist—an instrument at which she continues to excel. On this enjoyable collection of quartets composed for Attacca Quartet, she reveals her ongoing ardor for the format while subtly reimagining its possibilities. Accordingly, her liner notes cast the work not as an album but rather a garden, tended to by herself and Attacca. Rather than upend tradition, Shaw embraces it, while jiggering compositional mechanisms to see where things go. The stately “Entr’acte” experiments with a key shift used in Haydn’s “Op. 77, No. 2,” spreading it all over the piece to implant a tension that perpetually threatens to topple the sense of grace. The five movements of “Plan & Elevation” sprinkle in fragments of Ravel and Mozart, as well as some of Shaw’s own past works, while “Limestone & Felt” succeeds at conjuring a variety of tactile sensations, whether deploying feather-stroke pizzicato or jagged snapping.
27. Nate Wooley, Columbia Icefield (Northern Spy)
With this phenomenal quartet featuring guitarist Mary Halvorson, pedal steel dynamo Susan Alcorn, and drummer Ryan Sawyer, trumpeter Nate Wooley masterfully opened a new line of inquiry in his music, forging a weird strain of cosmic ambient improv. Of course, that silly term doesn’t convey the depths plumbed here, but, hey, I’m trying. I’ve seen several reviews mention that the trumpeter engages with the legacy of ECM here, and the idea makes some sense in terms of the expansive landscape fashioned by Halvorson and Alcorn, a richly textured, billowing sound world by turns aqueous, parched, and foggy, but, naturally, Wooley eschews easy serenity, whether that means using electronics to abrade his surroundings with puckering, caustic noise or upending lyric tendencies with tart sputters and skull-rattling cries. Using three dramatically winding, long-form compositions, Wooley and his ensemble—and these musicians definitely operate as a single organism despite all kinds of improvisatory action—explore steadily shifting atmospheres while traversing a sustained route that enfolds various traditions and sonic complexions.
26. Buddy & Julie Miller, Breakdown on 20th Ave. South (New West)
It’s kind of shocking that Breakdown was not only the first duo album Buddy & Julie Miller dropped in a decade, but also that it’s only the third record they’ve ever made together. Although I’ve ingested Buddy’s solo work for years and have loved Julie’s trickle of solo work, as a couple they’ve always seemed to be present, as a backbone, artistic corrective, and guiding force to what’s considered, for better or worse, Americana. The new album doesn’t pull any punches and it doesn’t break new ground, but it also demonstrates that for several decades the pair have had very few peers when it comes to assimilating numerous strands of American roots music (as well as its British antecedents) and producing something poetic, soulful, and gritty. The blend of Buddy’s lived-in drawl and Julie’s ethereal yet deceptively strong and nasal pipes remains one of the great sounds of the 21st century, and the no-fuss production—scrappy yet placing the gorgeous resonance of Buddy’s typically excellent guitar playing in stunning relief of the earthy rhythmic thrust—joins every other album these folks have made in eschewing any trace of era-specific tendencies. It feels kind of old-fashioned, but it also feels as fresh as anything in 2019.
25. Eve Risser, Après un Rêve (Clean Feed)
French pianist Eve Risser knocked me out with her 2015 solo album Des Pas Sur la Neige (Clean Feed), forging one of the most original and convincing excursions into prepared piano improvisation I’ve heard since discovering Magda Mayas. She proves her rigor and restlessness four years later, gathering up her voluminous techniques and knowledge in service of a sustained composition, maximizing the possibilities of the seemingly more limited upright piano. Après un Rêve is a single piece clocking in at just 25 minutes, but its narrative flow, a series of indelible motifs, and serial use of specific sounds such as a recurring, clanging buzz create a wholly satisfying experience. I caught Risser playing a reworked version of the piece at this year’s Jazzfest Berlin, where a sound designer gave the music a greater, more hypnotizing rhythmic character, but using only her own devices here, she’s delivered a small wonder that’s pulled me in further and further with each listen.
24. Rustin Man, Drift Code (Domino)
I never paid any attention to the name Rustin Man during the couple of spins I gave to Out of Season, the 2002 solo debut from Portishead singer Beth Gibbons. I recently went back to that album and while it’s a lovely piece of work, nothing about the arrangements behind the singer are particularly noteworthy beyond a simpatico fit and good taste. I didn’t realize until the release of Drift Code—a couple of weeks prior to the untimely death of Talk Talk’s Mark Hollis—that Rustin Man was actually that band’s bassist Paul Webb. Few would dispute that Hollis was the central figure in Talk Talk, and, I wouldn’t say there’s anything particularly radical about Drifting Code, but that doesn’t change the fact that it remains a stunningly beautiful piece of work, deftly transplanting many of the artistic prerogatives honed by Robert Wyatt within a driving art-rock context. At times there’s a Bowie-esque quality to Webb’s warble, but generally his wispy delivery is steeped in the honeyed, fragile beauty of Wyatt’s sweet, yet world-wise croon—whether on the levitating ballad “Brings me Joy” or the graceful skitter of “Our Tomorrows.” Webb privileges British folk traditions over Wyatt’s pastoral take on jazz, which lends the material a kind of eternal heft.
23. J. Pavone String Quartet, Brick and Mortar (Birdwatcher)
My review from Bandcamp Daily
Violist/violinist Jessica Pavone is well-known in improvised music circles, especially for her duo with guitarist Mary Halvorson, but she’s been composing music for decades—and on Brick and Mortar she delivers the most assured, bracing work of her career. Following a sustained focus on solo performance, where she invested heavily in playing long tones and became interested in cymatics (the study of vibrations, and in her case, how they impact the human body), Pavone has translated that practice for a dazzling string quartet with two violinists (Erica Dicker and Angela Morris) and two violists (herself and Joanna Mattrey). While some pieces are fully scored—such as the haunting, pulsing opener “Hurtle and Hurdle”—most of the music allows for performer input, where the players can alter tempo, transpose pitches, or jump ahead to different sections, which are often charted as blocks of time rather than written-out passages. Pavone and the ensemble dig deep into the friction emerging from the long tones, creating an electric sensation with the harmonically rich vibrations delivering a beautifully coarse weft of sound. At times the blend of the instruments recalls the sound of Norway’s Hardanger fiddle, with its sympathetic, resonating strings. Pavone’s writing is elegant in its crystalline simplicity, with movement that allows the listener to focus on the enveloping sound first and foremost.
22. Damon Locks Black Monument Ensemble, Where Future Unfolds (International Anthem)
Damon Locks has long operated with a razor-like focus both in his visual art and in the various rock bands he’s worked with over the decades—Trenchmouth and the still-extant Eternals—but on his first recording under his own name all of his multifarious endeavors coalesced with a sharpness and power I never expected from him. That was an error on my part; I often roll my eyes when I read about someone making a record they were born to create, but I firmly believe this project has been a lifetime effort for Locks. Tirelessly refining and combining, he formed a dazzling hybrid of black gospel, judiciously deployed electronics and samples, contemporary dance, and heavy grooves meted out with the elasticity of jazz on Where Future Unfolds, a deliberately bold political statement updating a long history of African-American protest movements and art for our present moment, specifically in the context of Chicago’s brutal racial division. Locks is the primary singer only on a couple of tunes, instead giving most of the space to a small, agile choir—a big shift for a front man who’s typically front-and-center at the mike. When I interviewed him for a profile in the Wire last spring he told me, “It wasn't as important for me to be the singer as it was to have the song become what it needed to become,” a choice that conveys his stellar growth here.
21. Lizzo, Cuz I Love You (Atlantic)
I can’t deny that I’m way out of the loop when it comes to popular music these days—when I’m stuck hearing mainstream radio fare I usually feel backed into a very unpleasant corner. I’m thankful my girlfriend foisted Lizzo on me last year, because no other record was able to lift my spirits so easily and consistently. I’m sure many of the production choices are fairly de rigueur these days, but there’s nothing typical about her outsized voice and her obvious glee in deploying it on such a varied program of songs that nonchalantly pick up threads from decades of great Black music—revealing an unalloyed understanding of what made Prince so spectacular, or positing herself as Missy Elliott heir apparent on “Tempo” (next to no less than Elliott!). The old-school R&B keyboards on the title track felt more meaningful after catching her knockout performances on Saturday Night Live last December, where her guitarist modeled her look and instrument after Rosetta Tharpe. I don’t believe for a second that Melissa Viviane Jefferson is wanly allowing keepers to mold her wild talents into some savvy package, but even if that were true this album—despite a couple of less than thrilling tunes that vie explicitly for current radio tastes—this album is unstoppable.
Today’s playlist:
Aizuri Quartet, Blueprinting (New Amsterdam)
Clara de Asís, Without (Elsewhere)
Lucy Railton, Paradise 94 (Modern Love)
Rosali, Trouble Anyway (Scissor Tail)
Allison Miller & Carmen Staaf, Science Fair (Sunnyside)
