Karl plays at music review:

People often have this column on the right side of their blog telling people what they are listening to and what they are reading. I’ve been thinking about adding that. Actually I am thinking about a total redesign and a shift in location away from blogspot. That aside, I want to tell you about what I have been listening to. And Michelle, we do have a plan in the works for T-shirts of a slightly different kind than expected (more on that later).

About ten years ago I lost interest in most of popular music and I gave in to my love for cool Jazz. I’d grown up on big band, Dave Brubeck, Duke Ellington, Count Basie, etc. Brubeck was my gateway drug into Coltrane, Miles Davis, Sunny Rollins, etc. Maybe two years ago I started getting into Dizzy Gillespie. Dizzy has taken me to Cuba and to the Buena Vista Social Club. So right now I am obsessively listening to Cachaito Lopez. This disc, simply labeled Cachaito, is a masterpiece of post cool Cuban jazz. It’s the most complete new Jazz recording that I’ve heard in the past five years.

Track five, Cachaito In Laboratory, uses sampling and playback in a way that evokes early Run DMC while at the same time maintaining the Afro Cuban Jazz essence of the entire CD. Cachaito is a Jazz bassist, and it is his rhythm that ties all the departures together, whether they be surprise vocals on Wahira or the reggae organ that occasionally appears like a Caiman surfacing to catch his breath. When you have a group of seasoned musicians who are willing to take risks you can produce inspiring music that bends genre and advances the form. It’s already established that the Buena Vista Social Club was the safety deposit box for and the school of the most talented jazz musicians of a generation; it’s clear from this recording that new growth has come from that cradle and both vine and root are strong.