Bonus Tracks: The Official Blog of Spotlight On

Over the course of a few short months in early 1992, several albums I have spent a ton of time with came out: Tongues & Tails by Sophie B. Hawkins (April), Funky Divas by En Vogue and Ingénue by K.D. Lang (March). My favorite of the bunch…

It’s difficult today to imagine the impact the movie Alien had when it first debuted at midnight, May 25th, 1979, on the opening night of the fourth annual Seattle International Film Festival.  It’s so entrenched in our collective …

Gorillaz' The Fall is a full-length album recorded in a month, on an iPad, during the band's Escape To Plastic Beach Tour. If that sounds like a good 45 minutes to you, you might also dig this post. If you're unfamiliar with the Gorillaz, I'd recomm…

“What was your first concert?” Whenever I hear people answer that question, I typically witness either embarrassment or pride. I feel neither when I answer the question but I will say that I have never met someone with the same answer a…

Okay. I'm going out on a limb this week, I hope you'll join me. In adapting writing for this column from my blog, I've focused the Spotlight On albums that I both had already written about at length, and was excited to revisit in a new context. At …

Chaz Bundick Meets The Mattson 2's Star Stuff was my first exposure to both Chaz Bundick and The Mattson 2 and I think it's gotta be their best work. That album would make for a good post, actually, if we weren't just coming off the heels …

Batavia Collective are a three-piece electronic jazz ensemble from Jakarta, Indonesia. The members - Doni Joesran, Elfa Zulham and Kenny Gabriel – joined us for this long-distance discussion to mark the release of their new EP, BTVC,  on…

Welcome back to week three of the Spotlight On Blog's Three Weeks Of Toro y Moi Albums Event. That's what it's called I just decided. Two Tuesdays ago, for its birthday, we started things off with MAHAL, the act's latest outing. Then we took it back…

Taeko Kunishima is a pianist and composer who I first became aware of in 2011, around the release of her third album, Late Autumn. At the time, I reviewed that record for the website All About Jazz and have followed her music since. While new music…

More Toro y Moi this week. Thought I'd dish out some Soul Trash after MAHAL, while he's got the blog's attention. In retrospect, the mixtape's a strange sonic bridge between MAHAL and the very different, less good, Outer Peace (which'll maybe conclu…