Music Review: "Te Extraño Buenos Aires"

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Perhaps it’s my imagination, perhaps my ignorance, perhaps both, but it seems to me that of all the Latin American dance genres—the bossa nova, the rhumba, the samba—the tango has never really captured the attention of jazz artists with quite the same zeal. Of course even if true there are exceptions, and certainly one important exception is the pianist/composer Roger Davidson. With three albums of tango music under his belt, now comes Te Extraño Buenos Aires a collection of 15 of his original tangos, and the first of his recordings on which he is not playing.

Pointing out that composers want their music to be played by as many hands as possible, for this new album recorded in Buenos Aires, his music was entrusted to the cream of local musicians who clearly knew what to do with it. The 15 songs were divided between three Argentinian pianist/arrangers: Andrés Linetzky, Abel Rogantini and José “Pepe” Motta. Violinist Ramiro Gallo, bandoneonist Nicolás Enrich and bassist Pablo Aslan, the album’s producer, complete the ensemble. Each of the pianists was given the opportunity to take the music in his own direction while remaining close to Davidson’s tune. In effect Davidson’s lyrical music is given three different voices on the one album.

The result is a gorgeous blend of melody and rhythm, a blend in tunes like “No Importa,” which opens the set, “Si Lion de Toi” and “Tango Triste” likely to get even those with two left feet up on the dance floor. A song like “Perdida” has a definite jazz vibe; a song like “Alicia” is arranged in the classic tango style. Indeed most of the album seems to take that more classic approach to the genre, and that approach is not to be sneered at. 

While this musical approach is not particularly adventurous, while it is even music with a retro feel, it is lush and full blooded; it is music that excites.

Book Review: "90 Church: Inside America’s Notorious First Narcotics Squad" by Dean Unkefer

This article was first published at Blogcritics:

Before there was a DEA, America’s war on drugs was handled by an agency called the Federal Bureau of Narcotics. The New York office was headquartered at 90 Church, a retired post office in Lower Manhattan, hence the title of Federal Agent Dean Unkefer’s wildly violent memoir of his time with the Bureau, 90 Church: Inside America’s Notorious First Narcotics Squad. It is a story of a squad of agents bent on doing whatever it took to make cases against the drug hierarchy. They were uninterested in the small fish, unless they could be used to get to the bigger fish. They were not only firm believers in the idea that the ends justified the means, they also saw nothing wrong with using those means for their own benefit. It is an account of police authorities acting as badly as the criminals they seek, often worse.

Unkefer arrives with his family from the mid-west in 1964, a naif still wet behind the ears. He has all sorts of ideas about fighting for truth, justice and the American Way, a creed he learned as a child watching Superman, but it doesn’t take long for him to understand that at 90 Church things don’t quite work that way. His memoir is a collection of scams, shoot outs and double crosses, the kinds of stories you’d likely find in a James Elroy novel.

You meet agents like the wise cracking Dewey Paris and the master planner Michael Giovanni. You meet entrapped informants like the ad man Eliot Goldstein and the low level pusher Pepper. You meet organized crime big shots like Dominic Scarluci and the Medally Brothers. All drawn with the kind of realism that suggests that the narrator knows what he is talking about and no matter how hard to believe, what he is telling you is in fact what was going on.

Unkefer writes with conviction. Despite the fact that he has changed names, despite the fact that he invents conversations and dialogue, despite the fact that his account reads like a novel, the reader can’t help but wanting it all to be true, all to be just the way he describes it. Perhaps this is because he is as hard on himself and his own dishonorable behavior as he is on everyone else in the book. He never paints himself as a saint. He does drugs. He cheats on his wife. He uses junkies. He may feel bad about it at first, but he doesn’t stop. And if he’s willing to say these things about himself, what he says about others would have to be true. If this were a novel, Unkeefer would be the very model of the reliable narrator. He calls 90 Church a memoir, and I for one am willing to believe him.

And if the ‘good guys’ are sometimes just as bad as the ‘bad guys,’ indeed sometimes worse, that may well be a very accurate description of reality.

Music Review: Airelle Besson/Nelson Veras – ‘Prelude’

This article was first published at Blogcritics

Proving once again that musical preconceptions are worthless, comes Prelude, an album featuring an unlikely duo combining trumpet and guitar. Who would imagine that such a duo could hold an audience’s attention over the whole of an album? So perhaps it isn’t surprising that given that kind of preconception, it took me four months to give this January release a listen. The trouble is that when your duo combines a trumpeter as fine as Airelle Besson with a sensitive guitarist like Nelson Veras, preconceptions are meaningless, and in this case they unreasonably kept the album on the shelf gathering dust.

                                                           Photo credit: Airellebesson.com

Fine musical talent in almost any combination can be successful. You need to listen to the product to make any sort of adequate judgment, and listening to the dozen tracks laid down by Besson and Veras will very quickly demonstrate that truth. Prelude is filled with gorgeous music. Besson’s playing is often magical and Veras works hard to keep that magic front and center. These are artists that complement each other completely.

Whether they are reinvigorating a classic like “Body and Soul” or taking on an original composition like Veras’ “Vertiges,” they have an infectious passion for the strong melodic line. Theirs is music you want to listen to carefully as they develop and play with musical ideas. The atmospheric treatment of Antonio Carlos Jobim’s “O Grande Amor” is a further case in point.

The lion’s share of the album, however, is made up of Besson originals. A fine composer, Besson’s compositions are as high in quality as her work on the trumpet. The duo opens the album with her “Ma Ion,”which she introduces with a haunting solo, and then moves on to the quirky Latin rhythms of “Pouki Pouki.” “Neige,” “Full Moon in K,” and “Lulea’s Sunset” are programmatic pieces with cleverly evocative themes. “Virgule” is an improvised piece for Besson, and “Birsay” and “Time to Say Goodbye” round out the album.

Prelude is very convincing proof that music doesn’t have to be the same old same old to make for some fine listening.