Kiss The Originals I

The Tunnel of Love tour again? That’s surely a sentiment some are expressing with this month’s release of New York 5/16/88, the outstanding opening night performance from the final, five-show stand on the US leg of the 1988 tour.

Johnny Smith - The Complete Roost Johnny Smith Small Group Sessions (1952-64) {8CD Box Set Mosaic MD8-216 rel 2002}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 2.55 Gb | MP3 @320 -> 1.29 Gb
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© 1952-64, 2002 Roost / Mosaic Records / EMI | MD8-216
Jazz / Cool / Guitar

Johnny Smith is an exquisite jazz guitarist known mostly to fellow musicians and serious jazz fans. This beautifully packaged and expertly annotated eight-CD limited-edition boxed set from Mosaic includes his complete small-group recordings for Roost, most of which have languished out of print for decades. Smith's unique voicings on his instrument set him apart from other players, yet he maintains a lush, crystal-clear tone no matter the tempo or setting.

For anyone in their mid-teens in the mid-5Os, and into music, it had to be rock'n'roll - American rock'n roll. There was no British equivalent to the sound. In the UK, it was Chuck Berry, Elvis Presley, The Platters, Alan Freed, Radio Luxembourg, Voice Of America.

Kiss is one of the most shocking, charismatic and long-lived bands in rock history. From their beginnings, in the early 70's, until today, they have been always active, impacting crowds with their particular combination of rock and roll, hard rock, glam and disco rock, but always with pop sensibilities. In addition, Kiss fans are famous for being among the most faithful in the world. In this new volume of the successful collection The Many Faces, dedicated to explore the world of the definitive artists in the history of rock, we pay a deserved tribute to Kiss.

Through the latter half of the 20th century, an enduring cult figure in modern jazz was the Boston-based composer, academic, and pianist Ran Blake. In addition to his duties as the Chair of Contemporary Improvisation at the New England Conservatory of Music, Blake has recorded sporadically, usually in solo or duo settings, creating a small but knotty category of near-abstract originals and quirky deconstructions of jazz standards. This is worth mentioning, because on first listen (if not second or third), the first solo album by bandleader/pianist Pandelis Karayorgis sounds startlingly like one of Ran Blake's solo records…

David Budway - A New Kiss (2011) {MaxJazz Piano Series MXJ 222 rec 2009}
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© 2009, 2011 MaxJazz | MXJ 222 | MaxJazz Piano Series
Jazz / Post Bop / Bop / Piano

A versatile pianist who has worked with singers, symphony orchestras, and jazz groups, David Budway, also has worked with drummer Jeff "Tain" Watts and Hubert Laws, in addition to recording several self-issued CDs prior to this Maxjazz release. With Watts and bassist Eric Revis as his rhythm section mates, Budway's session is filled with striking, thoughtful originals and well-conceived settings of familiar works. Marcus Strickland guests on soprano sax for his turbocharged "Japanese Brunch," which is marked by its tense post-bop rhythm and the leader's darting piano. Branford Marsalis is the soprano saxophonist for Budway's melancholy "Lonely Cane," a spacious ballad with an emotional impact.