June 14, 1957
While trumpeter Webster Young pays tribute to Billie Holiday on this, his only studio date as a leader, the set is equally a tribute to Young's musical role model, Miles Davis. Young has Miles' soft-focus tone from the early to mid-'50s and, according to Ira Gitler's liner notes, he is actually playing Miles' cornet on the date. The similarities between the two players make this 1957 session a satisfying companion to Miles' work circa 1951-1953.
October 23, 2015
On his third album, John Grant couples his always incisive, insightful songwriting with increasingly adventurous sounds. Building on the electronics of his previous albums with blobby synths and taut funk and new wave underpinnings, Grant is caught between existential humor and terror, youth's lingering ambitions and the disappointments of age on some of his angriest, saddest, and funniest songs.