Chicago jazz and improvised-music linchpin Joshua Abrams could continue to explore the outer reaches of minimalism with his Natural Information Society ensemble for decades and have no trouble maintaining a hypnotic atmosphere. The eight-piece band’s upcoming fifth album, Mandatory Reality (Eremite), opens with two sprawling tracks. The group is so successful at casting spells that […]
Tag: Joshua Abrams
Posted inMusic
Chicago jazz mainstay bassist Joshua Abrams switches gears with a rigorously visceral new solo album
Bassist Joshua Abrams’s importance to Chicago’s jazz and improvised music scene over the last few decades is indisputable. He’s laid down the harmonic anchor in loads of disparate ensembles, providing muscle and shape to bands led by reedists Dave Rempis, Ernest Dawkins, and Jason Stein; cornetists Rob Mazurek and Josh Berman; flutist Nicole Mitchell; and […]
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Pitchfork outflanks its festival competition with left-field bookings
Circuit des Yeux, Joshua Abrams & Natural Information Society, Irreversible Entanglements, and This Is Not This Heat don’t sell tickets like Fleet Foxes, but they help keep the Pitchfork Music Festival interesting.
Posted inBlogs
Chicago musical polymath Ben LaMar Gay breaks even his own shape-shifting mold on his solo debut
Ben LaMar Gay took seven years to make Downtown Castles Can Never Block the Sun, which fuses R&B, funk, jazz, electro, Brazilian music, and more.
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Chicago bass clarinetist Jason Stein isn’t kidding around
Not even arena gigs with his famous sister, comedian Amy Schumer, can tempt Jason Stein from his drive to make better jazz.
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The brightest lights at the 2017 World Music Festival
The World Music Festival is a constellation of international stars—including Afrobeat scion Seun Kuti, rambunctious Cape Verdean accordionist Bitori, and Afro-Venezuelan flame keeper Betsayda Machado.
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With Natural Information Society, Joshua Abrams expands his sonic palette while remaining locked-in on modal trance
The power of Joshua Abrams’s Natural Information Society is in large measure derived from a singular sense of purpose: to lock in on a single chord and with subtle, kaleidoscopic modality cast a spell at the nexus of a hypnotic groove. That intent is carried forth on the Chicago band’s fourth and best album, Simultonality […]
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The Jazz Record Art Collective celebrates the music of Ornette Coleman onstage
New quartet Garden of Souls plays Ornette Coleman’s 1968 albums New York Is Now! and Love Call on Wednesday.
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Check out some deep 60s funk from the Crescent City
Mary Jane Hooper’s obscure jam “I’ve Got What You Need” features unfuckwithable playing by great New Orleans drummer James Black.
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Now Is Podcast host Ben Remsen on the jazz giants who walk among us
Current musical obsessions of Axons drummer Amanda Kraus, Now Is Podcast host Ben Remsen, and Reader music editor Philip Montoro
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A must-see free-jazz trio begins its February residency at the Owl this weekend
The three-piece will be recording a live record over the course of the month.
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Our favorite music of 2014
Six Reader music writers share their favorites from 2014 with year-end lists that do more than just put the same records in a different order.
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Track premiere: Local drummer Makaya McCraven’s ‘Three Fifths a Man’
A sneak preview of the drummer’s forthcoming album on the new International Anthem imprint
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Reader’s Agenda Thu 7/3: Eyes to the Skies festival, International Festival of Life, and Singleman Affair
What’s on the Reader‘s Agenda for Thursday, July 3.
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Gossip Wolf: Riot Fest lineup predictions
Riot Fest predictions, For Practically Everyone Records revs up for spring, and more