The best music has always been made by those who defy easy categorization, as exemplified by not one but two posthumous releases from Texas jazz giants. Fort Worth’s Dewey Redman was a glass-half-empty kind of guy who saw his career accomplishments as merely wins in a long battle—so the title of 1982’s The Struggle Continues (ECM) is not surprising. What is surprising is that it took until now for this superb session to make it onto CD. Though the tenor saxophonist was integral to the New York avant-garde—Ornette Coleman introduced him to the scene—he was also a stylistic chameleon: Here, on arguably his most well-rounded effort, there’s some beautifully inventive straight-ahead blowing alongside his more mind-blowing excursions. Then there’s Kenny Dorham, a highly expressive player who also resisted his bebop typecast. As the percussive and explosive Latin jazz testifies on his newly remastered mid-fifties classic Afro-Cuban (Blue Note), the Austin trumpeter—who died at 48—knew how to explore every obtuse angle of creativity. Reviewed by Jeff McCord
There’s a quality—an easygoing, lyrical storytelling manner that eschews stridency or pretension—that all folksingers strive for and few attain. But Danny Schmidt has it in abundance: With seductive simplicity, his music demands your attention. Schmidt is a native Austinite who honed his craft amid the music scene in Charlottesville, Virginia, yet despite heaps of notable critical praise and a 2007 New Folk Award from the Kerrville Folk Festival, he remains a bit below the radar. His fifth album, Little Grey Sheep (Waterbug), might manage to alter his coordinates: This is a sparse yet mature and immensely enjoyable piece of work. Songs like “California’s on Fire” and “Adios to Tejasito” possess a John Prine–like aw-shucks appeal—even if their tone is darker—and as the mood changes from song to song, the musicality of Sheep unifies the material. Some folk purists will likely wish the songs plumbed deeper, but it’s precisely his lack of overreaching that keeps Schmidt from sounding a false note. Reviewed by Jeff McCord
Now on DVD: Ghostland Observatory
Maybe you love sequencers and robotic electronic dance beats. Maybe you don’t. Yet how you feel about this Austin electro-rock duo, a budding national phenomenon whose ferocious energy explodes on Live From Austin TX (New West)—originally a July 2007 Austin City Limits taping—really comes down to one thing: your take on Aaron Behrens’s vocals. An acquired taste, Behrens’s AC/DC yelping hovers in the same range for every tune. He makes up for it by being a commanding front man, strutting with Jagger-esque attitude, while his more static bandmate, the caped Thomas Turner, plays live drums and keys mixed with all manner of preprogrammed beats. But the real magic occurs when Behrens dons the guitar and the pair stretches out. Reviewed by Jeff McCord
Jesse Dayton
Courtesy of Bullet Records
The talented Beaumont-born singer has just released Holdin’ Our Own and Other Country Gold Duets (Stag), a joint album with Austin’s Brennen Leigh. Though it recalls a Nashville of yesteryear, it comprises mostly new material. He also recently scored big as the creative force behind a fictional country band, Banjo and Sullivan, in Rob Zombie’s film The Devil’s Rejects.
How did the duets album come about?
I met Brennen, of all places, at a music festival in France. I was backstage singing a George Jones tune, and she came in and started singing it with me. I was like, “Hey, you wanna come onstage tonight?” The song “Holdin’ Our Own” is the only one I wrote without Brennen. I had it on the burner, just thinking, “Hey, if I can find a girl who knows country music, then I can write a whole [album].” Well, we ended up writing all the songs in a week.
The album from your Banjo and Sullivan project was a bit of a windfall for you.
It’s been great. It’s kept me from having to be anything that I’m not. I’m never gonna be the guy next door for the Texas frat boy music scene. I’m never gonna be the Nashville guy. So it feels good to be able to be exactly who I wanna be. (Read the full interview.)
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