Showing posts with label lists listmaking and listmakers. Show all posts
Showing posts with label lists listmaking and listmakers. Show all posts
18 December 2012
Best Lists of Best Jazz Albums of 2012 of 2012
(6) LA Times
Love the subterfuge in having eleven entries on the list and two turning out to be ads, including one from Bon Jovi plugging MasterCard. I guess we should be happy that an outlet like the LA Times bothers, even online and even in such glib fashion, to take note of new jazz releases. And I suspect that's all they're going for.
(5) Philadelphia citypaper
There are more recognizable names and more of them on this list than any others I've seen, and not that I've heard any of these records or anything, but isn't that exactly what you'd expect from something called "citypaper?"
(4) Larry Reni Thomas for JazzCorner
Gotta love it when all you've got for a list is...a list. No hipstering or qualification, just the facts, ma'am. Of course, it's always nice to be able to listen to the work in question, but this one scores points anyway for its unusually direct and unfettered presentation. Tell 'em what you're gonna do, do it, tell 'em what ya did. And done.
(3) NextBop Best Jazz Albums
25-11
10-1
If NextBop really is a movement, I'm not part of it, but I have to say, it's awfully valuable to have a site like this where you can hear more than just 30 second snippets of the latest stuff, and which casts, in this case at least, an admirably wide net. If a slight downgrade is in order, it is on account of the massive size of their list, which if it got much bigger would actually defeat the point of making one in the first place. Even so, I look forward to checking out as much of this music as I can and am grateful for someone else having taken the time to assemble it in one place. Really.
(2) NPR A Blog Supreme
Hard to hate on these cats, since it seems they're being reblogged by the hour: three of the top dozen lists I found Googling "Top Ten Jazz Albums 2012" were actually just this one in disguise. To their credit, though, the layout is nice, the commentary a bit more than cursory, and you can listen. Could be a lot worse.
(1) Nextbop Best Non-Jazz Albums
25-11
10-1
I can think of at least three levels of irony here, which is more than enough to earn this one the crown. Til next year listmakers.
17 December 2012
Perfunctory Year-End Metafiltering
Befitting the time of year we presently find ourselves mired in, NPR's A Blog Supreme has come out with its Top 10 Jazz Albums of 2012. Notwithstanding my pessimism about the very tenability of such lists, which I maintain, I nonetheless feel compelled to peek through my fingers as I cover my face with my hands. I listened to most of the music and wasn't really horrified by any of it which I heard, definitely a win. (The Don Cherry cover was mildly horrifying aesthetically, but not, I suppose, wholly inconsistent with his own thinking.) If you're looking for an endorsement, I'm afraid that's as close as I can get: professional obligation and morbid curiosity
Why such morbidity, the cultural relativists in the room demand to know? Going back to school has cut somewhat into my internet trolling time, but the time I have been able to spend over the last year or so has more often than not turned up artifacts which I do find truly horrifying, so much so in some cases that it is not their categorization as jazz or the clear outpacing of talent by promotion but, in fact, their mere existence which I find most troubling. One reason among many, I suppose, that it would be easier to delve deeper into the work that already exists than to actively seek out new things; a recent conversation here at school reminds me, though, that there are still people in the world (musicians, in fact) who claim to have exhausted all the music they are aware of, new or old, and need to find more just to have something to listen to. That seems impossible to me, but perhaps that's because I've done more canvassing than studying to this point in my life, and thus the realm of canvassed music comes to seem inexhaustible even as I truly know very little about it. There's no excuse, really, for not knowing something about what's going on now, and also, I think, grave consequences of a few different varieties for becoming truly out of touch with the Zeitgeist, even if you consider yourself a dissident; but since there's just so much stuff, filters become necessary evils in the equation, and because I so deeply distrust herd mentality (we call it other, cheerier things now, like "social media"), I try to source from a wide variety of them, and blogging, say what you want, is often helpful in this regard. I promise my participation at least one month out of the year.
Why such morbidity, the cultural relativists in the room demand to know? Going back to school has cut somewhat into my internet trolling time, but the time I have been able to spend over the last year or so has more often than not turned up artifacts which I do find truly horrifying, so much so in some cases that it is not their categorization as jazz or the clear outpacing of talent by promotion but, in fact, their mere existence which I find most troubling. One reason among many, I suppose, that it would be easier to delve deeper into the work that already exists than to actively seek out new things; a recent conversation here at school reminds me, though, that there are still people in the world (musicians, in fact) who claim to have exhausted all the music they are aware of, new or old, and need to find more just to have something to listen to. That seems impossible to me, but perhaps that's because I've done more canvassing than studying to this point in my life, and thus the realm of canvassed music comes to seem inexhaustible even as I truly know very little about it. There's no excuse, really, for not knowing something about what's going on now, and also, I think, grave consequences of a few different varieties for becoming truly out of touch with the Zeitgeist, even if you consider yourself a dissident; but since there's just so much stuff, filters become necessary evils in the equation, and because I so deeply distrust herd mentality (we call it other, cheerier things now, like "social media"), I try to source from a wide variety of them, and blogging, say what you want, is often helpful in this regard. I promise my participation at least one month out of the year.
31 December 2011
Flavor of the (Final) Month
Year-end retrospectives are everywhere, and jazz critics in particular seem to love them some list making this time of year. It always gets me thinking: how many times have they actually spun each of these records? Did they audit them on $1000 speakers or in the car on the freeway? And how many other new releases have they spun this year? How many times? Where?
Musicians are prone to wondering these things when it comes to questions of critical authority, but I wonder also out of a bit of insecurity. I haven't acquired or listened to a single record that was released this calendar year. It's quite rare for me to do so any given year, and has been forever. Real or imagined professional obligation as a player, composer, teacher and thinker has compelled me to spend an awful lot of time catching up on things that happened before I was born, and only secondarily on staying "up to date" with the latest developments. Whether I'm winning the battle or not, this is slowly changing: I've acquired many more records released in the 2000's over the last couple of years than I did during the years they were actually released. There's plenty going on today that interests me; it's just so hard to find that it's easier to wait a while and see what people are still talking about at the end of next year. I've learned the hard way that it's safe, nay, essential to ignore flavors of the month during the month in question. That goes for the final month of the year as much as any other.
As for the authority question, I can't imagine putting out a list of my own even if I had done more work. I've found that I need 3 listens to settle on a general thumbs-up or thumbs-down. My opinion changes frequently before that point and almost never beyond it. But to rate a group of albums empirically against each other would require several more hearings of each. And of course, I'm not talking about listening in the car or while making dinner; the music needs to be the sole object of your attention if you're going to claim any authority whatsoever, even to yourself. (When I say "empirically," of course I don't mean "for everyone for all time," but I think that within your own aesthetic, you can certainly be clinical in going about this kind of thing. If you don't, you end up fooled.) This is not at all to say that you are not listening for pleasure or that you are otherwise contriving some foreign mode of perception; indeed, distracted listening is the most unfulfilling and foreign mode for me. I recommend the opposite.
So, have these critics sampled even several hundred of the several thousand new jazz records that have come out this year? Have they devoted ca. 5 hours of calm listening time to each? That's getting into the thousands of hours already, an average of 3-4 hours every single day of the year, and you figure at some point for work or play they will want to listen to something from last year or earlier as well. I doubt that all of these numbers are nearly this high, though one or two of them might be (just a hunch, but I suspect it's the total number of records that's high and the number of spins that's low). I think lists which are constructed with authority are entertaining and sometimes even highly informative, but I have to be suspicious of the year-enders. Even if the critics themselves are authorities, the task they've chosen is one which under present conditions simply cannot be achieved authoritatively.
Classical music is, of course, a different and much more difficult situation. Maybe I really am living in the dark, but I've long been struck by the differences between how jazz and classical musicians go about their business. I think classical music badly needs an "underground" scene. I think classically trained players need to stop taking as a given that it's only a matter of time before they land a $200,000 a year gig playing in a top 5 orchestra. I think they then need to be willing to get to work building something better without the promise of an immediate union scale paycheck. String quartets playing Metallica covers in a classical style for coffee shop yuppies is not "underground." Jazz, its precarious condition notwithstanding, still has an underground. There are still compelling jazz performances and records being made in places and by people that the NEA and the yuppie DINKs they survey can't wrap their heads around. Can you say that about classical music? I can't. I see the same slick coating as the jazz world without the underground bearings that have kept it alive in contravention of so many professional listmakers' dire predictions. And I see a clear and simple explanation for this in the petit bourgeois self-importance of so many classical musicians. Jazz players collectively are not perfect, they are not saints, and of course they are getting more bourgeois by the day and will surely have to face this issue soon enough, but right this minute, their tradition is alive because they go underground and eat ramen when they have to. Meanwhile, the classical brats are floating higher and away, sipping merlot in a hot air balloon that's on fire. So I applaud the jazz critics' for including in their year-end lists music that was actually created this year! That means someone thought to make it, found a way to realize it, and got it into their hands. We should try it, classical folk. Grab your flannel shirts and PBR and let's get the fuck down to business already.
Musicians are prone to wondering these things when it comes to questions of critical authority, but I wonder also out of a bit of insecurity. I haven't acquired or listened to a single record that was released this calendar year. It's quite rare for me to do so any given year, and has been forever. Real or imagined professional obligation as a player, composer, teacher and thinker has compelled me to spend an awful lot of time catching up on things that happened before I was born, and only secondarily on staying "up to date" with the latest developments. Whether I'm winning the battle or not, this is slowly changing: I've acquired many more records released in the 2000's over the last couple of years than I did during the years they were actually released. There's plenty going on today that interests me; it's just so hard to find that it's easier to wait a while and see what people are still talking about at the end of next year. I've learned the hard way that it's safe, nay, essential to ignore flavors of the month during the month in question. That goes for the final month of the year as much as any other.
As for the authority question, I can't imagine putting out a list of my own even if I had done more work. I've found that I need 3 listens to settle on a general thumbs-up or thumbs-down. My opinion changes frequently before that point and almost never beyond it. But to rate a group of albums empirically against each other would require several more hearings of each. And of course, I'm not talking about listening in the car or while making dinner; the music needs to be the sole object of your attention if you're going to claim any authority whatsoever, even to yourself. (When I say "empirically," of course I don't mean "for everyone for all time," but I think that within your own aesthetic, you can certainly be clinical in going about this kind of thing. If you don't, you end up fooled.) This is not at all to say that you are not listening for pleasure or that you are otherwise contriving some foreign mode of perception; indeed, distracted listening is the most unfulfilling and foreign mode for me. I recommend the opposite.
So, have these critics sampled even several hundred of the several thousand new jazz records that have come out this year? Have they devoted ca. 5 hours of calm listening time to each? That's getting into the thousands of hours already, an average of 3-4 hours every single day of the year, and you figure at some point for work or play they will want to listen to something from last year or earlier as well. I doubt that all of these numbers are nearly this high, though one or two of them might be (just a hunch, but I suspect it's the total number of records that's high and the number of spins that's low). I think lists which are constructed with authority are entertaining and sometimes even highly informative, but I have to be suspicious of the year-enders. Even if the critics themselves are authorities, the task they've chosen is one which under present conditions simply cannot be achieved authoritatively.
Classical music is, of course, a different and much more difficult situation. Maybe I really am living in the dark, but I've long been struck by the differences between how jazz and classical musicians go about their business. I think classical music badly needs an "underground" scene. I think classically trained players need to stop taking as a given that it's only a matter of time before they land a $200,000 a year gig playing in a top 5 orchestra. I think they then need to be willing to get to work building something better without the promise of an immediate union scale paycheck. String quartets playing Metallica covers in a classical style for coffee shop yuppies is not "underground." Jazz, its precarious condition notwithstanding, still has an underground. There are still compelling jazz performances and records being made in places and by people that the NEA and the yuppie DINKs they survey can't wrap their heads around. Can you say that about classical music? I can't. I see the same slick coating as the jazz world without the underground bearings that have kept it alive in contravention of so many professional listmakers' dire predictions. And I see a clear and simple explanation for this in the petit bourgeois self-importance of so many classical musicians. Jazz players collectively are not perfect, they are not saints, and of course they are getting more bourgeois by the day and will surely have to face this issue soon enough, but right this minute, their tradition is alive because they go underground and eat ramen when they have to. Meanwhile, the classical brats are floating higher and away, sipping merlot in a hot air balloon that's on fire. So I applaud the jazz critics' for including in their year-end lists music that was actually created this year! That means someone thought to make it, found a way to realize it, and got it into their hands. We should try it, classical folk. Grab your flannel shirts and PBR and let's get the fuck down to business already.
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