Our selection of the best new music across a range of genres from the week ending 9 December 2022.
Shannen Moser wants to have a conversation: with their past selves, their present self, their undesignated, unfurling future selves; with the trees that adorn their old street, and the door they used to call home; with the shadows of lovers-turned-to-friends and the overwhelming cacophony of abrupt change. The Sun Still Seems to Move is an album of reckoning with death and trauma, with all the shapes that love can take and all the people we’ve been and will become. It’s a record of regret and relief, unlocking every facet of feeling with an unabashed yet tender vigour. It’s watching the clouds bend to a new shape and still staying outside. It’s cry-laughing on the phone to an old friend, and trying to trust yourself again. By leaning into–and being at the whim–of this kind of vulnerability, Moser is able to navigate the spaces between the losses to produce a truly honest and luminous work.
Ngarra-Burria: First Peoples Composers is an artist development program designed to build bridges for First Peoples musicians to step forward, further develop their composing skills, and connect with the art music sector across a wide range of genres in contemporary classical, new music and jazz. In partnership with Australia’s leading new music group, Ensemble Offspring, Ngarra-Burria has been working with First Peoples composers to bring these exciting, previously unheard voices into the spotlight. Their new album To Listen, To Sing celebrates the creative vision of twelve of the program’s leading alumni: music of beauty, strength and passion.
Harvey Mandel is among the most innovative guitarists to emerge from the Chicago blues scene of the late 1960s. His career began at Twist City and other local hotspots, sharing stages with Muddy Waters, Howlin’ Wolf and Buddy Guy. He came up in that scene alongside Charlie Musselwhite, Mike Bloomfield, Barry Goldberg and Steve Miller, leading to an invitation from Bill Graham to open for Cream at San Francisco’s Fillmore Auditorium in August 1967. Mandel was a member of Canned Heat, appearing with them at Woodstock. He played on numerous John Mayall albums, and on the Rolling Stones’ 1975 LP Black and Blue (“Hot Stuff”, “Memory Motel”), having auditioned for Mick Taylor’s job, which ultimately went to Ron Wood. Who’s Calling is the 16th album under Harvey Mandel’s name as a leader, and his second for Tompkins Square following the 2016 acclaimed comeback, Snake Pit. Joined by guitarist and co-producer Ryan Jewell (Ryley Walker, Laraaji) and bassist Andy Hess (Gov’t Mule, Black Crowes), Who’s Calling finds the 77-year-old guitar legend as vibrant and creative as ever.
After a four year pause, Taken By Trees return to take you on a musical journey – and after a little wait, this one is as magical ever. Another Year opens with an enchanted sonic path with Victoria Bergsman is Say You Don’t Mind, a deceptively simple lullaby-like cover of the track first recorded by The Moody Blues’ Denny Laine. Simultaneously both haunting and soothing with its gently euphoric atmospherics and Bergsman’s own distinctly affecting vocals, which demonstrate why off the back of her own releases the former Concretes singer has been sought out by everyone from John Lewis (who had her cover Guns N Roses) to Peter Bjorn & John.
Ibrahim Maalouf’s 15th studio album is a hymn to inclusion, sharing and identity in a world where claiming one’s difference has become divisive. A new album under the sign of hope and tolerance sublimated by a guest list as bluffing as unexpected. Capacity to Love is an album that lives up to the ambitions of Ibrahim Maalouf. The famous trumpet player has invited artists such as crooner Gregory Porter, Pos of De La Soul the legendary American rap group, English pop icon JP Cooper, Erick the Architect the charismatic leader of the group Flatbush Zombies or the new Mozart of US rap, winner of “Rhythm + Flow” D Smoke.
After their critically-acclaimed recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony, the Czech Philharmonic and Semyon Bychkov continue their Pentatone Mahler cycle with a rendition of the composer’s Fifth. The Fifth Symphony marks an important turning point in Mahler’s symphonic output, away from the prominence of vocal movements in his previous symphonies. And whereas the Fifth seems to follow a teleology from darkness to light like its predecessors, the trajectory is much less straightforward, and full of enigmatic turns. Bychkov’s exceptional eye for detail and pacing make him an ideal guide through this work, while the Czech Philharmonic is capable of letting all the colours of Mahler’s score shine. The Czech Philharmonic is one of the world’s most acclaimed orchestras, with a rich tradition of performing Czech masters and music from Central Europe. Semyon Bychkov has led the greatest orchestras of the world, and is Chief Conductor and Music Director of the Czech Philharmonic as of the 2018/2019 season. Orchestra and maestro made their Pentatone debut with a recording of Mahler’s Fourth Symphony (2022), kicking off a complete Mahler cycle.
The joy of realizing your dream life can be so profound that you feel invincible, confident enough to fly a kite while perched on a cliff. Prolific Michigan producer Apollo Brown transposed the happiness he’s found in his career, family, and circle of friends into his latest album: This Must Be the Place. Brown’s first instrumental project since the grimy noir, Thirty Eight (2014), This Must Be the Place is a continuation of the celebrated Clouds (2011) and a departure from it. Clouds was melancholic boom-bap made for the fall, the soundtrack to a ruminative walk through a leaf-strewn park beneath gray skies, but This Must Be the Place trades somberness for warm nostalgia and glimmers of hope. Brown offers moments for reflective gratitude and portals of escape through new permutations of East Coast-rooted boom-bap, his drums hitting with concussive force as snares crack like ice on midwestern lakes.
Other reviews you might enjoy:
- New music round-up (for w/e 27 May 2022)
- AWO Chamber 8 on tour – music news
- New music round-up (for w/e 12 November 2021)
David Edwards is the editor of The Blurb and a contributor on film and television
