The Living Music List #1: On Jazz and Stolen Art
Is our self-expression truly new and unique in the way that Jazz feels?
Just want to see the new music recommendations? Click the button below to check out the Living Music List. Otherwise, read on for this week’s reflection and the full list of new additions to the LML summarized.
Reflection
Hello, friend.
What have you been listening to these days? Have your new discoveries come from some place old and familiar? Or have you stumbled your way into new territories like me?
Lately, I’ve felt like the wide genre of jazz has not-so-subtly reached out to me, pulling me in with its sexy saxophone riffs and irregular drum patterns.
It’s shown up in unexpected places, championed triumphantly by unexpected artists such as WILLOW in her newest album empathogen.
I’ve happened upon it in artists completely new to me, like Arooj Aftab, whose newest record Night Reign soothingly winds jazz sensibilities around echoes of soft bossa nova guitar twang and smoky downtempo ballads.
Other records like Let Go by Robert Glasper and Subtle Movements by Surya Botofasina, Nate Mercereau, and Carlos Niño stray into ambient spaces with drawn out synth frequencies (check out the 18-minute-long opening track of the latter album).
Old and New
I didn’t grow up listening to much jazz beyond the occasional John Coltrane or Miles Davis song. In recent years, though, my appreciation for the sheer skill and musicianship that those jazz pioneers demonstrated has grown immensely.
Jazz is an exciting genre still today because it is constantly evolving in a way that other genres cannot—because jazz itself is evolution.
Jazz is freestyling, freewheeling, cathartic emotional release displayed in some of the most intensely gripping instrumentation and collaboration you’ll ever witness a band produce.
But it can also be soft. Sweet. Meandering.
As someone who is rather untalented in terms of instrumental skill and music theory, I listen in awe at the mastery that Miles Davis had over his trumpet. Charlie Parker’s relationship with his alto saxophone encourages me to kneel and make a deal with the devil for his kind of greatness (I’ve truly come to understand the character Andrew’s motivation in Damien Chazelle’s film, Whiplash).
I love that some of these newer records are proving that jazz continues to deliver new sounds while incorporate bits of other genres. It’s a microcosm of this new, referential age of music when most records seem to defy categorization, when artists insist on paying homage to their heroes and end up breaking new ground.
Those Who Came Before
Other writers and creators have spoken about this famous Pablo Picasso quote:
“Lesser artists borrow, great artists steal.”
Ironically, it’s likely that the Picasso quote morphed out of a longer, but similar T. S. Eliot quote.
I think the Picasso quote means that we as artists are unavoidably influenced by the many generations who came before us, and it’s likely that some (most?) of “our own ideas” are actually retreads of art that came before.
Don’t fret, though. This doesn’t mean that you don’t have original ideas or aren’t worthy of making something new for the world to enjoy. This newsletter I’ve started, for example, isn’t the first music newsletter to exist. It’s not the first to offer new music recommendations, or personal insights into the ambient genre, or profiles on DIY artists.
But my words are still my own, because my experiences are mine alone, and my emotions are mine alone, and my desire to express it all in a way that’s worth receiving is mine.
Sure, I’ll dip my bread into another writer’s plate of olive oil to see if it tastes different from mine. I’ll thrift a coat that was worn by 3 others musicians before me to see if it brings me the same comfort they felt. But the context of my life, my surroundings, and the zeitgeist I tap into—it changes everything about what I end up creating. And it changes everything about the experiences for those who receive it.
It’s why John Coltrane’s album, A Love Supreme, recorded 60 years ago in a New Jersey studio, is still being played in my New Jersey apartment today. It’s as emotionally resonant and stimulating as it was then. But now it has 60 years of additional context behind it. It has students and copycats.
We don’t just compare all new art to the art that came before it—we compare it to the art that will follow. We look at a piece and ponder, “Will this impact someone 100 years from now? How about 1000?”
Express Yourself
Art is never a solo project. We make it because we want others to take it and use it to make their own. We want to feel seen and validated about our art—our small blips on the timeline of human self-expression—in the same way we feel validated by the art of others.
Jazz is beautifully representative of this. Many great traditional jazz records sprang from live sessions that could never be captured the same way a second time. Musicians talk about the thrill of live performance a lot because it is inherently different from the careful crafting process of writing and recording something without the stakes of a live audience, without the pressure of a spotlight or hundreds of pairs of eyes on your hands hovering over the keys.
Improvisation is the bush around which I’ve been beating. The act of playing without a sheet of music as a guide. Seeing what comes up from inside, what forces its way out of your hands. When I write, even now, I feel the intoxicating tingle of it.
This is the moment you create something new. Something that immediately feels like it isn’t wholly yours. And yet, it is all yours at the same time. It’s coming from somewhere, and from many someones. It might mean one thing to you right now, but it will mean infinitely other things to many others after you.
Only you can improvise those new moments into existence so that someone else can steal from them later. And so goes the cycle of art.
Music Recommendations
Hello again, friend.
Thanks for reading this far. I hope you found something inspiring in today’s reflection. Maybe you’ll find even greater inspiration in this very first issue of The Living Music List.
I’m excited to kick off the list with 2 batches of very solid releases that I’m still working my way through.
A note for all future issues of The Living Music List: I will typically deliver updates on Fridays, after a new week of releases has come to a closer (many major releases go out at midnight on Friday). However, for this first issue, I had to catch up and give the list a foundation.
Another note: The spreadsheet version of The Living Music List (linked via the button above) has far more details about each release, including subgenres, release dates, links to Bandcamp, etc.
Without further ado, here’s this week’s addition’s to The Living Music List:
The Living Music List—All Genres
Format: Title by Artist(s) (type / primary genre)
empathogen by WILLOW (album / jazz)
Night Reign by Arooj Aftab (album / jazz)
Let Go by Robert Glasper (album / jazz)
Russian Roulette by Porter Robinson (single / alternative)
places to be by Fred Again.., Anderson .Paak & CHIKA (single / electronic)
You Won’t Go Before You’re Supposed To by Knocked Loose (album / metal)
In Bloom by Jon Foreman (album / alternative)
LUSTWERK III by Galcher Lustwerk (album / electronic)
Breathe… Godspeed by Verraco (EP / electronic)
>>>> by Beak> (album / indie rock)
Pick Me Up, Turn Me Upside Down by Another Michael (album / indie rock)
You Said You’d Hold My Hand Through The Fire by Iceboy Violet & Nueen (album / electronic)
BRAT by Charli XCX (album / dance pop)
TIMELESS by Kaytranada (album / electronic)
Gemelo by Angélica Garcia (album / alternative)
NO HANDS by Joey Valence & Brae (album / alt hip-hop)
Tunes for Late Spring by Gus Dapperton (EP / alt pop)
Prism of Pleasure by Elkka (album / electronic)
I Hear You by Peggy Gou (album / electronic)
What Happened To The Game by AURORA (album / pop)
Time by The Game (album / hip-hop/rap)
Below the Waste by Goat Girl (album / alternative)
Decade by Broken English Club (album / electronic)
Heart of the Artichoke by Bloomsday (album / indie folk)
Thrown Around by James Blake (single / alt electronic)
The Living Music List—Ambient
Format: Title by Artist(s) (type / primary subgenre)
Subtle Movements by Surya Botofasina, Nate Mercereau & Carlos Niño (album / jazz)
Statik by Actress (album / electronic)*
Umbel by Loscil (album / drone)
Place by Rhucle (album / ambient piano)
Capsule by Jogging House (single / soft/quiet)
Surrender by John Butler (EP / electroacoustic)
Acts of Union by Turtle (album / drone)
Ajasphére Vol.II by AJA (album / electronica)
Cycle by H TO O, H.Takahashi & Kohei Oyamada (album / electronica)*
Apodelia by Hotspring (album / electronic)
Space I - Solaris x Lunaris by Wally Maloney & ABC Ambient (album / new age)
Infinite Probabilities by France Jobin (album / noise)
Grycksboexpressen by Take Me There (album / electroacoustic)
Shimmer by ASC & Sam KDC (single / drone)
Green Corridor by Viul (album / drone)
All of Your Design by cdg noir & Polarlicht (album / noise)
*Releases marked with an asterisk are not solely ambient throughout, but obviously genre is weird and always up for debate. Anything included on the ambient list is, in my opinion, closely adjacent enough to ambient to earn a spot here.
Thanks again for reading, and enjoy the music. Until next time.
Your friend,
Melted Form
Remember to listen to the hum, buzz, & hiss of the world around you—there is music to be heard there.
Want to suggest music for me to listen to? Have questions? Leave a comment or email me at meltedform@substack.com.
