Malcome Gladwell

The term "concept album" is usually used in connection with rock, but jazz has had its concept albums as well (Charles Mingus' The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady and Miles Davis' Sketches of Spain, for example, are among jazz's most celebrated concept albums). Gladwell is a concept album from jazz guitarist/composer Julian Lage; in the liner notes, Lage explains that he envisioned this 2010 recording as an aural depiction of "an imaginary and forgotten town known as Gladwell." Lage doesn't use any lyrics to depict his fictional town: Gladwell is strictly instrumental. And Lage, who is heard on both acoustic and electric guitar, is appealingly melodic on his own compositions (which dominate Gladwell), as well as a performance of the standard "Autumn Leaves." As a guitarist, Lage favors an airy sound along the lines of Pat Metheny and Jim Hall, and as a composer, his influences range from Metheny to Oregon to Weather Report.