Stars Like Grains of Sand

Maurice McIntyre Humility in the Light of Creator ★★ ★ ★ Starting anew, and most likely less frequently. But all the same I hope to keep listening to as much new music as possible. And I'm happy to have stumbled upon Maurice McIntyre's Humility in the Light of Creator . The cover can tell you a few things: the era this music was created in, with the boteh or paisley shirt pattern and background. The Eastern, Middle Eastern, and African influences were continuing to develop in American music and very much so in jazz. The Delmark label was also a great platform for independent or more "out" musicians to record and release their music. McIntyre himself was a leader and important member in the conception of the AACM or the Association for the Advancement of Creative Musicians. This Chicago scene helped secure a home for creative and avant jazz that came after the Coltrane era. Its musicians continue to put out music and they have served as leaders and contr...

Loscil Endless Falls ★★★½ Loscil hasn't been a name in ambient music that has stuck out to me really. I like a couple of his albums and I remember Submers being especially important in my journey throughout ambient soundscapes. That album was like being slowly lowered down into the Marianas Trench, feeling all the pressure build up as darkness and bubbles surround you. It has beats in it, an ambient techno form that appears to be a constant decrease in your elevation as you sink down to the deepest part of the Earth. Submers was an album that made me sit down, put my headphones on, and close my eyes. It was a world within itself and it felt right creating your own surroundings, and that's part of what made me so excited about the ambient genre. Loscil has transformed his style and message as time has gone by; about a decade after Submers was released,  Endless Falls dropped down from the stormy gray clouds. There is a different theme here for sure, and I don'...