New album: Somewhere Between Here and Nowhere
Artist: Black Hollies
Label: Ernest Jenning
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
Many fans of rock music will go to their graves thinking the 1960s were the golden age of pop music. There's not enough space here to entertain that theory, but for musicians in love with that era it can be tough following a muse that's out of step with "American Idol" nation.
The Black Hollies fourth album, "Somewhere Between Here and Nowhere," is a good example of how to channel a love for all things garage/psychedelic into a modern context.
Group leader Justin Morey's latest batch of songs are still coated with plenty of lysergic glaze, but there are no more blatant nods to the past. The Smithereens, The Grip Weeds and Kula Shaker found ways to reinvent rock's heyday, and it seems the Black Hollies are the latest band to pick the lock.
Highlights abound, be it the surging grind of "When It's Time To Come Down" or the “Velvet Underground-ish "Daydreams," but the trio of songs that close the album may be the highlight of the Black Hollies' career.
The three part "Lunatic Influenza" is 11 minutes of symphonic garage rock with enough Leslie speaker swirl to choke George Martin. If keyboard virtuoso Mike Pinder had never left the Moody Blues, this might be the type of lush, textured music he'd be writing for the band in 2013.
Although it's a three-part song, the pieces are knit together with care and never devolve into prog rock noodling. Black Holllie's keysman Jon Gonnelli is truly one of modern rock's unique instrumentalists.
Everything on "Something Between Here and Nowhere" sounds faintly familiar, but you've never heard anything quite like it. Hopefully the Black Hollies can keep making great records such as this one.
Classic album: Inventions and Dimensions
Artist: Herbie Hancock
Label: Blue Note
Rating: 5 stars out of 5
Children of the 1980s remember Herbie Hancock as the guy who wrote and performed the instrumental hit "Rocket," but that song was an anomaly. To anyone with a curiosity or birth certificate that meanders further back than 1983, Hancock is known as one of the most influential jazz musicians of all time.
"Inventions and Dimensions" was Hancock's third solo album, and upon its release in 1964 it was seen as a departure from traditional jazz.
Enlisting the help of sidemen Osvaldo Martinez (percussion), Paul Chambers (bass) and Willie Bobo (drums), the music would take on a distinctly Latin flavor that was more in line with Tito Puente than Miles Davis or John Coltrane.
Although Hancock would feel the scorn of a stodgy jazz press when he helped Miles Davis go electric a few years later, "Inventions and Dimensions" suffered no such scorn.
The interplay between Hancock and his band is impeccable. Whether the arrangements were rehearsed or winged in the studio is hard to say, but the exploratory melodies running through "Triangle" and "Mimosa" seem almost serendipitous.
No one expects (or wants) jazz to be as formulaic as a pop song, but a loose structure is always preferred over endless exploration. Hancock's ability to insert just the right amounts of improvisation among the song's skeletons is unsurpassed in the world of jazz or any other type of music.
The influence of closing track "A Jump Ahead" can be heard in the contemporary sounds of jazz greats Medeski, Martin and Wood and Robert Glasper, not to mention legions of jam and fusion bands over the past 50 years.
Anyone who thinks jazz begins and ends with that Starbucks CD sampler you received with your last $8 cup of coffee should investigate "Inventions and Dimensions."
Jon Dawson's album reviews appear every Thursday in The Free Press. Contact Jon at 252-559-1092 or jon.dawson@kinston.com. Purchase Jon's book "Making Gravy In Public" at Amazon.com and jondawson.com.