SO MANY SUAVES

Hey kids, it's been a little while since my last music post, so I'll make this one thick. Don't worry, though, because there'll be plenty of pictures.

(Disclaimer: I'm used to writing about jazz music, which is a little pretentious to begin with, so I apologize if I butcher writing about rock music, a subject I know fairly little about.)

First up is a band named 25 Suaves, which I picked up because. . .well, because the band is named 25 Suaves. It was just sitting out on a shelf at the station, like it was meant to be.

The music itself is very guitar and drum driven, to the point that there's really no bass to speak of. Lyrics are there, but are damn hard to distinguish, even more so than most rock music. When you can hear him, the vocalist seems very similar to Blood Sweat and Tears, but with more yelling.

The guitar and drum work is quite heavy, almost industrial, but never without energy. The instrumental parts seem darker than the lyrics, when you can actually make them out.

While this stuff certainly isn't bad, I'd say it would be unremarkable if they weren't named 25 Suaves. Oh well.

Back to jazz, with Urban Reception, a release from the Aoki/Wong/Pavkovic trio, a local Chicago group. I've been a fan of Tatsu Aoki, the bass player, since my first day at the station when I randomly picked up a CD of him because he had an asian name. He has an impressivly diverse range array of recordings, from upright bass and laptop duo to a full japanese taiko drum section.

Musically, Urban Reception is another great album. The tracks are accessable enough to be listenable by the public, and experimental enough to be interesting. Instrumentation is varied, featuring mostly sax, with touches of violin and clarinet.

While not related to the music, per se, I also like the badass cover. Imagine it without WNUR JAZZ scrawled all over it with a sharpie, an attempt to prevent people from stealing the CDs. You can't really tell by the picture, but the paper is a sort of matte graphite color, like dark gray clay with irridescent particles suspended in it. The inside cover also features a poem, which I originally thought was just a really cool artistic addition, but then realized it contains all the track names, like "Rice Cake," "Welcome Home," and "Wheat Thin." What I don't know is whether the track names or poem came first. It's a mystery.

I haven't listened to these next two albums, but I feel like I have to say something about their covers.
Any band named Menstruation Sisters deserves a mention, especially if they're Australian.

Art Ensemble of Chicago is pretty badass, in general, and this cover supports that finding. Two things stand out to me: I never want to get on the third guy's bad side, and I really want a pair of glasses like the first guy.

Damn, that is one thick post. Ok, Bob out.