Ken Filiano and Steve Adams | The Other Side Of This

Much energy has been dissipated in search for the Platonic ideal of Beauty. Both thinkers and artists alike have long searched the four quadrants of the heavens in pursuit of what they thought was the very basis of human experience. Perplexed with such vastness, these men returned with even more unanswered questions. Even though the title of this recording insinuates that there might be some inexplicable universe on the other side of the looking glass, as Lewis Carroll’s Alice eventually found out, the space that is explored here belongs unequivocally to the dramatic stage where fiction becomes the only tangible reality. — Rui Horta Santos Continue reading

ROVA Saxophone Quartet | Juke Box Suite | Not Two Records

The seven compositions on this recording where composed with an idealized Juke Box in mind, where any kind of music might show up from any culture or time and be combined for the next “Play”. My music listening has been informed by the spirit and work of Alan Lomax, from blues to raga, ragtime to avant-garde, pygmy chants to Korean court music, following styles and esthetics as they rubbed up against each other in the mingling of culture that was made available by intrepid searchers of music. The “sides” aren’t a direct borrowing but a weaving of the common threads that occur in all music’s. — Jon Raskin Continue reading