Field & Stream October 2020

Recorded October 16, 2019, Tanya Tucker's Live From The Troubadour features a cache of her #1 hits, like Tucker’s smash first single "Delta Dawn" plus "Strong Enough To Bend," "What's Your Mama's Name," and "Would You Lay with Me (In a Field of Stone)”. With a sublime medley of Springsteen's "I'm on Fire" & Cash's "Ring of Fire" and tracks from GRAMMY-winning Country Album Of The Year, While I'm Livin', like "Mustang Ridge," "The Wheels of Laredo," "Hard Luck," and the poignant title track.

With his riveting performance in the inaugural Sequesterfest online festival in April 2020, Ken Vandermark inspired the Black Cross Solo Sessions. Already in the early days of lockdown, making good on the promise – or threat – of protracted off-road time, Vandermark had dedicated himself to the creation of a new book of works for solo reed instruments, which he debuted that day. The result of this watershed moment for the Chicago-based improvisor and composer was a body of works that reassert his seriousness and test his ability to reflect and reevaluate. The compositions, which are platforms for invention, are dealt with in relatively economical, almost stripped-down fashion, ringing with a kind of bell-like clarity and focus. Most tracks are on the shorter side, straight to the point, featuring the rippling intensity that is a Vandermark hallmark, but with an altogether reborn sense of purpose.

On The Beths’ new album Expert In A Dying Field, Elizabeth Stokes’ songwriting positions her somewhere between being a novelist and a documentarian. The songs collected here are autobiographical, but they’re also character sketches of relationships – platonic, familial, romantic – and more importantly, their aftermaths. The shapes and ghosts left in absences. The question that hangs in the air: what do you do with how intimately versed you’ve become in a person, once they’re gone from your life?

Renowned Finnish jazz innovator and band leader Iro Haarla takes a detour towards progressive rock. Known for her large number of works in the field of acoustic free jazz, Iro Haarla is a notablek Finnish pianist, composer, arranger and band leader. Now, having inked a deal with Finnish cult label Svart Records, Haarla takes an eye-opening sidestep towards progressive rock. Her new band consisting of renowned Finnish musicians, Iro Haarla Electric Ensemble weaves a vastly colourful world of sound around Haarla’s peculiar melodies, and welcomes us to new sonic territory: a vibrant world where black music influenced rhythms, acoustic instruments, analog synthesizers and spacelike, valiant electric guitars converge.

Night falls in diverse ways in Magdalena Hoffmann's debut album. Nightscapes sees the German harpist dive deep into the intimate, mysterious, magical world of night music, as well as exploring the theme of dance. Its track list spans everything from the austere beauty of Britten's Suite for Harp Op. 83 to the folk-like colors of Tournier's La danse du moujik. The recording comprises both original pieces for solo harp and compositions for piano, skillfully transcribed by Hoffmann herself.

Spanish instrumental progressive rock and fusion band formed in 2003. They started roughly in the vein of avant-prog King Crimson, and moved on mixing contemporary, classical and jazz elements, in the "Rock in Opposition" field of Henry Cow, Present and Univers Zero. OCTOBER EQUUS is definitely one of Spain's most pleasant in the world of prog and avant-garde rock nowadays. Formed in 2003, its well-catalyzed mixture of KING CRIMSON-inspired vibe and PRESENT-inspired ballsy RIO recreates the oppressive moods and sinister atmospheres of avant-garde prof's primal sources with amazing vitality and freshness, not unlike other contemporary acts such as DR. NERVE and HAPPY FAMILY, to mention just a couple of examples.