His name might not be instantly familiar to rock fans, but saxophonist Karl Denson was once a member of Lenny Kravitz’s band and has been a touring member of The Rolling Stones since 2014.
Regarding his jazz and funk oriented day job, he co-founded the excellent jazz-funk band Greyboy Allstars and has recorded with Jack DeJohnette, Stanton Moore, Dave Holland and others, as well as maintaining a fairly prolific solo career with his own Tiny Universe.
In 2017, King Black Acid returned with the ‘Twin Flames’ EP. Their best recording to date, the new material fused dream pop, prog rock and tinges of Mercury Rev to create a true underground classic. Later that year, a full length collaboration with The Crystal Unicorn gave the world a record that, although a little uneven, at its very best sounded like the music Flaming Lips had long forgotten how to make.
Irish singer songwriter Lisa Hannigan has been recording for seventeen years. She first came to fame via her appearances on Damien Rice’s early albums, but her own ‘Sea Sew’ album from 2008 propelled her to stardom and earnt her a Mercury Prize nomination for the song ‘Lille’.
Each of her subsequent albums have been critically acclaimed and her career has continued to thrill fans. In May, Lisa will release her first full length live album, ‘Live In Dublin’, recorded with Stargaze.
France isn’t necessarily the first location that comes to mind for pop punk exports, but a few great bands have emerged over the past few years including Connies and the truly excellent Shapers.
Here’s another new band from France – South Berkley, a four piece outfit that should appeal to lovers of post-‘Take Off Your Pants…’ era blink-182. Their second single ‘Glass N Sparks’ provides a decent teaser for their debut LP (‘Too Slow’), which is due this summer.
For the uninitiated, Hostile are a groove metal band from the West Midlands. Their work values a heavy riff in the tradition of Pantera and Lamb of God and their first two albums were produced by the legendary KK Downing. So far, they’ve shared stages with Megadeth, Soulfly and Machine Head and their career is going from strength to strength.