I'm happy to announce that I've joined forces with a small portland jazz label called Diatic Records(www.diaticrecords.com). Run by saxophonist Dusty York, it's been a uniting the PDX jazz underground and helping build a real community of great musicians and people. With about ten releases so far, Diatic brings the extremes old school drummer Mel Brown and barely-out-of school Ben Darwish under the same roof. I feel that Dusty is doing this town a real service by seeing the potential of the players around here and encouraging them to make non-conformist original music. Making records with established local players like Brown, Dave Frishberg, John Gross, and Gordon Lee gives the label a certain amount of recognizable names, which serves the younger players like myself, Darwish, Farnell Newton, etc. by providing some reputation to align ourselves with.
The Old Church has been a site for label mate shows that showcase a couple of the bands on the label sharing a bill. I'm hoping there will be more of this, as I would love to be sharing a bill with any and all of these guys. The Ben Darwish Trio record that just came out is particularly killing. Ben is a serious writer and pianist, and the trio with drummer Drew Shoals and Bassist Zack Wallmark play all the tunes with a light tightness. It's really worth checking out if you're into the Bad Plus kind of aesthetic and attitude.
As for my forthcoming record, it's beginning to come together in my head with it's tone, flow and content. I think it will be called Life in the Cloud. It will be mostly on my Washburn hb-35, with little micro or fretless playing. I've been enjoying the writing process that's been happening, and feel like it's going to come together very cohesively. Part of that cohesiveness will come from a certain loyalty to a certain tone system. We'll be in the studio in a few months....
