Tzadik Archives

ALARM’s 51 Favorite Albums of 2013

Saving the best for last, we’ve chosen our 51 favorite albums of 2013, pulled from the acclaimed and the unsung — some of the best as well as most boundary-pushing releases from rock and beyond.

Jewish prog rock and sonic vertigo: Stream Les Rhinocéros’ new album

Stream the indescribable new album from Les Rhinocéros here, but be warned: you might leave with sonic vertigo and the sudden urge to score a film.

Hasidic doom jazz? Meet Deveykus

Trombonist Dan Blacksberg has made a career out of reinterpreting Ashkenazic Jewish music in interesting ways. Get to know his latest project, Deveykus, which filters Hasidic sounds through the eyes of doom metal.

Horns up: Prog-rock outfit Les Rhinocéros to release second album with Tzadik

ALARM’s 50 Favorite Albums of 2012

Another year, another torrential downpour of albums across our desks. As always, we encountered way too much amazing music, from Meshuggah to The Mars Volta, Converge, Killer Mike, P.O.S, and many more.

Timba Harris announces solo album on Tzadik

50 Unheralded Albums from 2011

In just one more trip around the sun, another swarm of immensely talented but under-recognized musicians has harnessed its collective talents and discharged its creations into the void. This list is but one fraction of those dedicated individuals who caught our ears with some serious jams.

100 Unheralded Albums from 2010

Among the thousands of under-appreciated or under-publicized albums that were released in 2010, hundreds became our favorites and were presented in ALARM and on AlarmPress.com. Of those, we pared down to 100 outstanding releases, leaving no genre unexplored in our list of this year’s overlooked gems.

Ben Goldberg: A Clarinetist’s Journey into “Radical Jewish Culture”

Ben Goldberg‘s infatuation with the clarinet inspired him to combine traditional Jewish klezmer music with jazz to create a wild, modern sound — but his work with the adventurous Tin Hat chamber ensemble might be his most challenging yet.

Morrow vs. Hajduch: John Zorn’s Ipsissimus

Scott Morrow is ALARM’s music editor. Patrick Hajduch is a very important lawyer. Each week they debate the merits of a different album.

John Zorn: Ipsissimus (Tzadik, 10/5/10)

John Zorn: “Warlock”
[audio:https://alarm-magazine.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/12/John_Zorn_Moonchild_Warlock.mp3|titles=John Zorn: “Warlock”]

Morrow: In 2006, indefatigable composer John Zorn launched another of his countless ensembles — Moonchild, a sludgy power trio built around vocalist Mike Patton, bassist Trevor Dunn, and drummer Joey Baron. In the four albums that began with Moonchild: Songs without Words, Zorn has used the group to explore heavy and spastic improvisations amid composed riffs and directed song structures.

The lineup has expanded a bit for a few releases, but that wild trio is the group’s heart, with Patton offering wordless shrieks, chants, and vocal spasms over Dunn and Baron’s distorted notes and progressive rhythms. Ipsissimus is the group’s fifth release in less than five years, and it’s the first to prominently feature the guitar work of Marc Ribot, who appeared on one track of the 2008 release The Crucible.

Hajduch: In description, this sounds like a whole lot of John Zorn’s projects (in the case of Naked City, you sub out Mike Patton and add Yamantaka Eye of Boredoms, but the description still fits to an extent). In practice, it’s very different. Patton feels extraneous to an extent — like Attila Csihar‘s work with Mayhem, it can seem sort of like there is just this guy, making noises. But also like Attila/Mayhem, there are moments where it just fits perfectly and feels exactly right.

Ahleuchatistas: Deconstructing Rock ‘n’ Roll

Instrumental avant-rock group Ahleuchatistas has less in common with mathematicians than mad scientists, tinkering with song structure and timbre to achieve desired results.

Wu Fei: Experimental Expression of Chinese Traditions

Wu Fei‘s work is a marriage between the East and West. Using traditional Chinese instruments such as the guzheng and erhu in unconventional ways, Fei strays from the strict, painterly elegance of the instrument’s usual genre, instead introducing improvised and experimental elements.