The 2023 two-disc collection Blue Room: The 1979 Vara Studio Sessions in Holland spotlights the unexpected magic trumpeter/vocalist Chet Baker could conjure during the last decade of his life. Having achieved stardom on the West Coast in the '50s, Baker spent much of his career, from the '60s until his death in 1989, living and performing in Europe where his drug addiction and itinerant lifestyle were never as much of a barrier to getting work. Recorded in the Netherlands on two separate dates in 1979, the Blue Room sessions find Baker digging into some of his favorite standards, as well as a few unexpected song choices. The first session features one of his touring lineups of the period with pianist Phil Markowitz, bassist Jean-Louis Rassinfosse, and drummer Charles Rice. This is the more cohesive of the sessions, as Baker offers warm takes of some of favorite standards, including "Oh, You Crazy Moon" and "The Best Thing for You," both of which he had just recorded on his classic 1977 comeback album You Can't Go Home Again. There are also inspired renditions of Wayne Shorter's "Beautiful Black Eyes" and the Miles Davis blues number "Down," the latter of which was another staple of his final years. The second session, recorded several months later, was a more ad hoc affair with producer Edwin Rutten putting Baker in with a trio of European players, including pianist Frans Elsen, bassist Victor Kaihatu, and drummer Eric Ineke. Purportedly, Baker failed to bring lead sheets for the band and they had to figure out each song on the fly. While that led to some temerous moments, including a shaky version of "Old Devil Moon," other cuts surprised, as with sly blues number "Luscious Lou," a song composed by Baker's '50s bandmate, saxophonist Phil Urso. Toward the end of the session, they find their groove, settling into a bittersweet rendition of "My Ideal," a song Baker first recorded in the '50s whose lovelorn lyrics took on ever more nuanced meaning the further he got from that early golden boy period of his career. Even so, his performance, as with pretty much all of Blue Room, is entrancing.© Matt Collar /TiVo

While the jazz fascists (read: purists) may be screaming "sellout" because Diana Krall decided to record something other than standards this time out, the rest of us can enjoy the considerable fruit of her labors. The Girl in the Other Room is, without question, a jazz record in the same manner her other outings are. The fact that it isn't made up of musty and dusty "classics" may irk the narrow-minded and reactionary, but it doesn't change the fact that this bold recording is a jazz record made with care, creativity, and a wonderfully intimate aesthetic fueling its 12 songs. Produced by Tommy LiPuma and Krall, the non-original material ranges from the Mississippi-fueled jazzed-up blues of Mose Allison's "Stop This World" to contemporary songs that are reinvented in Krall's image by Tom Waits ("Temptation"), Joni Mitchell ("Black Crow"), Chris Smither ("Love Me Like a Man"), and her husband, Elvis Costello ("Almost Blue"). These covers are striking. Krall's read of Allison's tune rivals his and adds an entirely different shade of meaning, as does her swinging, jazzy, R&B-infused take on Smither's sexy nugget via its first hitmaker, Bonnie Raitt. Her interpretation of Waits' "Temptation" is far more sultry than Holly Cole's because Krall understands this pop song to be a jazz tune rather than a jazzy pop song. "Black Crow" exists in its own space in the terrain of the album, because Krall understands that jazz is not mere articulation but interpretation. Likewise, her reverent version of Costello's "Almost Blue" takes it out of its original countrypolitan setting and brings it back to the blues.As wonderful as these songs are, however, they serve a utilitarian purpose; they act as bridges to the startling, emotionally charged poetics in the material Krall has composed with Costello. Totaling half the album, this material is full of grief, darkness, and a tentative re-emergence from the shadows. It begins in the noir-ish melancholy of the title track, kissed with bittersweet agony by Gershwin's "Summertime." The grain in Krall's pained voice relates an edgy third-person tale that is harrowing in its lack of revelation and in the way it confounds the listener; it features John Clayton on bass and Jeff Hamilton on drums. In "I've Changed My Address," Krall evokes the voices of ghosts such as Louis Armstrong and Anita O'Day in a sturdy hip vernacular that channels the early beat jazz of Waits and Allison. The lyric is solid and wonderfully evocative not only of time and place, but of emotional terrain. Krall's solo in the tune is stunning. "Narrow Daylight," graced by gospel overtones, is a tentative step into hope with its opening line: "Narrow daylight enters the room, winter is over, summer is near." This glimmer of hope is short-lived, however, as "Abandoned Masquerade" reveals the shattered promise in the aftermath of dying love. "I'm Coming Through" and "Departure Bay," which close the set, are both underscored by the grief experienced at the loss of Krall's mother. They are far from sentimental, nor are they sophomoric, but through the eloquence of Krall's wonderfully sophisticated melodic architecture and rhythmic parlance they express the experience of longing, of death, and of acceptance. The former features a beautiful solo by guitarist Anthony Wilson and the latter, in its starkness, offers memory as reflection and instruction. This is a bold new direction by an artist who expresses great willingness to get dirt on her hands and to offer its traces and smudges as part and parcel of her own part in extending the jazz tradition, through confessional language and a wonderfully inventive application that is caressed by, not saturated in, elegant pop.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

In 2016, prog metal progenitors Dream Theater issued the 130-minute conceptual opus The Astonishing, which all but left metal behind to pursue a classic prog direction. Widely acclaimed by mainstream rock media, it proved divisive among fans and the metal press. Whether they admit it or not, DT took note. When it was time to record for new label Inside Out, they collectively decamped to a rural spot and lived together for the four months it took to write and record Distance Over Time. Ultimately, they took full measure of their history together and made a nearly complete U-turn, heading (mostly) back to basics for an injection of inspiration and renewed force. First single and opener "Untethered Angel" is classic Dream Theater, offering an abominably heavy riff from bassist John Myung and guitarist John Petrucci. James LaBrie's clean vocals soar above Jordan Rudess' driving organ and synth and Mike Mangini's thundering double kick drums. It's replete with time and tempo changes. "Paralyzed," despite its 4:17 length, is a riotous crunch-and-crush jam with roiling snare and tom-tom thud; the unhinged grooves from Myung and Petrucci, along with Rudess' piano, add ballast and drama for LaBrie, and he delivers the lyrics with characteristic commitment and remarkable range. "Fall Into the Light" with its bell-like cymbals and crashing snares provides a backdrop for seriously heavy shredding, offering two of Petrucci's finest solos. Musically, "Barstool Warrior" and "Out of Reach" could have been part of The Astonishing (though they wouldn't fit its subject matter). Their hooky prog ranges from anthemic rock djent to ELP-esque keyboard runs to Peter Gabriel/Steve Hackett-era Genesis -- which all entwine and add an expansive dimension to Distance Over Time. "At Wit's End" is a creative peak that illustrates the band's preference for leaving the heaviest hitters near the album's end. It delivers a kaleidoscopic range of prog metal tenets with frenetic polyrhythms, screaming guitar and keyboard solos, chugging bass, and emotive, soulful vocal refrains. The eight-and-half-minute "Pale Blue Dot" is another. Using Carl Sagan's phrase for describing earth from space, it commences with an ambient sci-fi intro that balances intense heaviness, knotty, time-stretching progressions, near-symphonic bombast, a taut hook, a foreboding chorus, and killer solos from Petrucci and Rudess that aggressively engage counterpoint. Vintage-era Deep Purple were a big influence on Dream Theater. The bonus track "Viper King" is a charged yet radio-friendly tribute to the Ritchie Blackmore/Jon Lord/Ian Gillan era, with its punched-up hard/prog rock swing showcasing insane collisions of organ, with unhinged guitar and bass exchanges prodded by maniacal drumming in supporting a loping cinematic chorus. Dream Theater reaffirm their identity on Distance Over Time, displaying a collective hunger, abundant energy, creativity, and musical (re)discovery. This set should erase the schism between fans and win the band a whole slew of new ones.© Thom Jurek /TiVo

Recoils from fame usually aren't as subdued as Norah Jones' third album, Not Too Late, but such understatement is customary for this gentlest of singer/songwriters. Not Too Late may not be as barbed or alienating as either In Utero or Kid A -- it's not an ornery intensification of her sound nor a chilly exploration of its furthest limits -- but make no mistake, it is indeed a conscious abdication of her position as a comfortable coffeehouse crooner and a move toward art for art's sake. And, frankly, who can blame Jones for wanting to shake off the Starbucks stigmata? Although a large part of her appeal has always been that she sounds familiar, like a forgotten favorite from the early '70s, Jones is too young and too much of a New York bohemian to settle into a role as a nostalgia peddler, so it made sense that she started to stretch a little after her 2004 sophomore set, Feels Like Home, proved that her surprise blockbuster 2002 debut, Come Away with Me, was no fluke. First, there was the cabaret country of her Little Willies side band, then there was her appearance on gonzo art rocker Mike Patton's Peeping Tom project, and finally there's this hushed record, her first containing nothing but original compositions. It's also her first album recorded without legendary producer Arif Mardin, who helmed her first two albums, giving them a warm, burnished feel that was nearly as pivotal to Jones' success has her sweet, languid voice. Mardin died in the summer of 2006, and in his absence, Jones recorded Not Too Late at the home studio she shares with her collaborator, bassist and boyfriend Lee Alexander. Although it shares many of the same sonic characteristics as Jones' first two albums, Not Too Late boasts many subtle differences that add up to a distinctly different aesthetic. Jones and Alexander have stripped Norah's music to its core. Gone are any covers of pop standards, gone are the studio pros, gone is the enveloping lushness that made Come Away with Me so easy to embrace, something that Not Too Late is most decidedly not. While this might not have the rough edges of a four-track demo, Not Too Late is most certainly music that was made at home with little or no consideration of an audience much larger than Jones and Alexander. It's spare, sometimes skeletal, often sleepy and lackadaisical, wandering from tunes plucked out on acoustic guitars and pianos to those with richer full-band arrangements. Norah Jones has never exactly been lively -- part of her charm was her sultry slowness, ideal for both Sunday afternoons and late nights -- but the atmosphere here is stultifying even if it's not exactly unpleasant. After all, unpleasantness seems to run contrary to Jones' nature, and even if she dabbles in Tom Waits-ian carnivalesque stomps ("Sinkin' Soon") or tentatively stabs at politics ("My Dear Country"), it never feels out of place; often, the shift is so subtle that it's hard to notice. That subtlety is the biggest Achilles' heel on Not Too Late, as it manifests itself in songs that aren't particularly distinctive or performances that are particularly varied. There are exceptions to the rule and they all arrive with full-band arrangements, whether it's the lazy jazz shuffle of "Until the End," the country-tinged "Be My Somebody," or the wonderful laid-back soul of "Thinking About You." These are songs that not only sound full but they sound complete, songs that have a purposeful flow and are memorable for both their melody and sentiment. They would have been standouts on Feels Like Home, but here they are even more distinctive because the rest of the record plays like a sketchbook, capturing Jones and Alexander figuring out how to move forward after such great success. Instead of being the end result of those experiments, the completed painting after the sketch, Not Too Late captures their process, which is interesting if not quite compelling. But its very release is a clear statement of artistic purpose for Jones: its ragged, unfinished nature illustrates that she's more interested in pursuing her art than recycling Come Away with Me, and if this third album isn't as satisfying as that debut, it nevertheless is a welcome transitional effort that proves her artistic heart is in the right place.© Stephen Thomas Erlewine /TiVo

Montreal's Arcade Fire successfully avoided the sophomore slump with 2007's apocalyptic Neon Bible. Heavier and more uncertain than their nearly perfect, darkly optimistic 2004 debut, the album aimed for the nosebleed section and left a red mess. Having already fled the cold comforts of suburbia on Funeral and suffered beneath the weight of the world on Neon Bible, it seems fitting that a band once so consumed with spiritual and social middle-class fury should find peace "under the overpass in the parking lot." If nostalgia is just pain recalled, repaired, and resold, then The Suburbs is its sales manual. Inspired by brothers Win and William Butler's suburban Houston, Texas upbringing, the 16-track record plays out like a long lost summer weekend, with the jaunty but melancholy Kinks/Bowie-esque title cut serving as its bookends. Meticulously paced and conservatively grand, fans looking for the instant gratification of past anthems like "Wake Up" and "Intervention" will find themselves reluctantly defending The Suburbs upon first listen, but anyone who remembers excitedly jumping into a friend's car on a sleepy Friday night armed with heartache, hope, and no agenda knows that patience is key. Multiple spins reveal a work that's as triumphant and soul-slamming as it is sentimental and mature. At its most spirited, like on "Empty Room," "Rococo," "City with No Children," "Half Light II (No Celebration)," "We Used to Wait," and the glorious Régine Chassagne-led "Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains)," the latter of which threatens to break into Blondie's "Heart of Glass" at any moment, Arcade Fire make the suburbs feel positively electric. Quieter moments reveal a changing of the guard, as Win trades in the Springsteen-isms of Neon Bible for Neil Young on "Wasted Hours," and the ornate rage of Funeral for the simplicity of a line like "Let's go for a drive and see the town tonight/There's nothing to do, but I don't mind when I'm with you," from album highlight "Suburban War." The Suburbs feels like Richard Linklater's Dazed & Confused for the Y generation. It's serious without being preachy, cynical without dissolving into apathy, and whimsical enough to keep both sentiments in line, and of all of their records, it may be the one that ages the best.© James Christopher Monger /TiVo

The commercial and artistic peak of the ambient-house movement, U.F.Orb strides past the debut with more periods of free-form ambience and less reliance on a standard 4/4 beat. From the opening "O.O.B.E." through the bass-heavy gait of "Blue Room" and "Towers of Dub," the flow is more natural and ranges farther than most would have expected. The bevy of contributors (including Steve Hillage, Jah Wobble, Youth, Thomas Fehlmann, and Slam) never threatens to overload the proceedings, though the minimalist sampling of Ultraworld is replaced by a production focus much more dense and busy, especially on the "rain forest on Saturn" ethno-ambience of "Close Encounters." Elsewhere, Paterson maintains his fascination with the earthy dub basslines of Mad Professor and Lee Perry, even while he's indulging in flights of fancy indebted to Sun Ra.© John Bush /TiVo

In 2010, Arcade Fire surprised everyone with The Suburbs. This third studio album was released in a Deluxe edition with two previously unreleased tracks: Culture War and Speaking In Tongues. Although the Canadian band caught the attention of audiences in the early 2000s with a slightly dark first album (Funeral), they avoided locking themselves into this macabre atmosphere. The Suburbs offer much different colours, as Win Butler went through his predecessors’ records to get inspired by influences ready to be modernised. With great affection for music rich in instrumentals and an undeniable gift for highlighting different musical phrases, The Suburbs marked a turning point. Arcade Fire matured, without turning to elitist and inaccessible music. Proof that their pop-coloured rock has far surpassed what their early days might have suggested. There is an English quality to their style, in the vein of Paul Weller or David Bowie, but also elements from T-Rex’s glam rock, particularly in the lyrics and the energy Butler brings. Rococo or Ready To Start look at childhood and give credit to what we may have experienced and thought in our younger years… Are Arcade Fire a little nostalgic of the good old days? It’s often what happens when one takes a new maturity leap and looks back to compare the past with the present. This Deluxe edition offers an arranged version of Wasted Hours and a cover of the Talking Heads’ Speaking In Tongues with David Byrne under the influence. An album inspired by the Butler brothers’ youth that will make you want to watch a Spike Jonze short, Scenes From The Suburbs, made for the first version of The Suburbs in 2011. © Clara Bismuth/Qobuz

Piano and trumpet duets are relatively rare. In 1928, while recording Weather Bird, Louis Armstrong and Earl Hines kicked things off, followed much later by Chet Baker and Paul Bley (with Diane in 1985), Tom Harrell and Jacky Terrasson (Moon and Sand in 1991), Martial Solal and Eric le Lann (Portrait in Black and White in 2000), Martial Solal and Dave Douglas (Rue de Seine in 2006), Uri Caine and Paolo Fresu (Things in 2006), Enrico Rava and Stefano Bollani (Rava Plays Rava in 1999 and The Third Man in 2007), Oscar Peterson on five albums (with Dizzy Gillespie, Roy Eldridge, Clark Terry, Jon Faddis and Harry “Sweets” Edison), Clark Terry’s One On One in 2000 (with fourteen different pianists!) and, most recently, Vijay Iyer and Wadada Leo Smith (A Cosmic Rhythm With Each Stroke in 2016)... Avishai Cohen and Yonathan Avishai have known each other since their teens in Tel Aviv. The pianist even featured on the trumpeter’s two ECM albums, Into the Silence and Cross My Palm With Silver. Their innate complicity allows them to improvise freely, playfully, and intensely on Playing the Room, their first work as a duo. As the title suggests, the two Israelis also incorporate the room – in this case the Auditorio Stelio Molo RSI studio in Lugano – into their sound and they make full use of its resonant acoustics. They each sign a theme in turn before embarking on an eclectic repertoire by John Coltrane (Cresent), Duke Ellington (Azalea), Abdullah Ibrahim (Kofifi Blue), Ornette Coleman (Dee Dee), Milt Jackson (Ralph’s New Blues), Alexander Argov (Shir Eres) and Stevie Wonder (Sir Duke). And they transform this heterogeneous programme into utterly moving chamber jazz. © Marc Zisman/Qobuz

Miles Davis' first studio session for Prestige Records took place on January 17, 1951, with a front line of Sonny Rollins on tenor and Bennie Green on trombone. Two years later, Davis made his second session of 1953 in the company of two tenor men deeply touched by the work of Lester Young and Charlie Parker: Al Cohn and Zoot Sims, two of Woody Herman's famous Four Brothers. These two sessions, featuring a pair of three-horn front lines, make up the music on Miles and Horns. The John Lewis opener "Morpheus" proceeds from where Birth of the Cool left off, with the horns harmonizing off a sustained bass vamp/cymbal roll, then introducing a Roy Haynes drum break with fleet lines that pave the way for boppish solos. Davis' own "Down" is an early snapshot of the trumpeter's pensive blues work, with some contrasting Rollins bluster. Other highlights are Lewis' spectral chordal prologue to "Blue Room" and his Basie-style intro to "Whispering," a song on which Davis' attack and tone really come together. "I Know" is a Rollins feature, with Davis on piano. The 1953 date is a delightful blowing session, with Kenny Clarke providing plenty of percussive salsa, and Al Cohn providing masterful charts. Cohn, Sims, and Davis team up to provide distinctive, rich harmonies on themes such as the slow, soulful "Tasty Pudding" and "For Adults Only," with their introspective features. "Willie the Wailer" borrows its intro from Benny Goodman's "Soft Winds" and provides Davis and Cohn with plenty of swing drive. The call and response of "Floppy" leads to powerful Davis-Clarke interplay, a taut John Lewis solo, and an anthemic Cohn-Sims exchanges.© TiVo

The Toy Dolls are all about fun, and their long-awaited full-length debut, 1982's Dig That Groove Baby, is an absolute punk gem. Bandleader Olga (aka Michael Algar) is capable of jaw-droppingly fast guitar picking, while lending his purposefully effeminate voice to numerous silly characters. Besides containing the definitive version of their classic "Nellie the Elephant," the album finds Olga tackling other comedic ditties such as "Spiders in the Dressing Room," "Glenda and the Test Tube Baby," and the long-winded "Queen Alexandra Road Is Where She Said She'd Be, But Was She There to Meet Me...No Chance." You get the picture. If all this doesn't do it for you, then the band's 100-mph cover of "Blue Suede Shoes" certainly will.© Eduardo Rivadavia /TiVo