Starting with saxophonist Phil Denny’s holiday jazz gem, Local Spins’ Christmas shopping list of new releases includes Gifts or Creatures, Knight and Guild, Maybe Next Time and Lazy Genius.
Phil Denny plays a CD-release concert for his new holiday album in Grand Rapids on Monday.
Phil Denny
The Messenger
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Lansing smooth jazz artist Phil Denny has rightly earned praise and a fast-growing audience for his saxophone mastery, something dramatically evidenced by the thousands who turned out for his set at the 2013 GRandJazzFest in downtown Grand Rapids . But what makes the emerging jazz musician’s first Christmas album even more inviting are the smart, innovative arrangements of classic fare ranging from “Deck the Halls” to “God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen.”
Heck, backing vocals and a brief rap even give the normally tedious “Little Drummer Boy” a nice twist. Singers chime in with some Yuletide charm, too: Darnell Kendricks pairs up with Denny’s smart playing to brighten “This Christmas” and Jalen Seawright helps make “White Christmas” a new seasonal standard in the jazz realm. Those seeking a romantic, sit-by-the-fire holiday soundtrack can’t do much better than this.
Denny formally unveils “The Messenger” during a CD-release show at 7:30 p.m. Monday at The Top of The B.O.B., 20 Monroe Ave. NW, Grand Rapids. Tickets are $20 ($25 VIP) and available online here. Doors open at 6:30 p.m., with a CD-signing and photo session taking place after the show, which is sponsored in part by the West Michigan Jazz Society and GRandJazzFest.
Website: phildenny.com
Other shows: 8 p.m. Dec. 13 at Baker’s Keyboard Lounge in Detroit; 4 p.m. Dec. 14 at Mall of Monroe Holiday Festival in Monroe
Maybe Next Time
Nothing on the Surface
The first full-length studio album from Grand Rapids pop punk’s Maybe Next Time – singer Matthew Grodus, guitarists Sam Engelsman and Riley Aalderink, bassist Josiah Samy, drummer Miles Foster and keyboard player Mark Avery – doesn’t lack for lively hooks centered on familiar pop punk themes (“What You Said To Me,” “Tell Me You Remember,” “Life on a Treadmill”). The album, recorded and produced by Mike Cervantes at The Foxboro in Grand Rapids, ascends to its best and most blazing on tracks such as “Deep End” and “Footsteps” with aggressive guitars, synth accents and the sorts of pounding rhythms that keep pits moshing.
Website: facebook.com/maybenexttimemi
Lazy Genius
Dreamy
Step into the Lazy Genius time machine, ladies and gentlemen. If the 1.0 edition of Jefferson Airplane had somehow survived another 40 years, it might sound an awful lot like this Grand Rapids band with dashes of shoegaze and alt-punk tossed into the musical blender. On its third album, Lazy Genius – Patrick Wieland, Daniel Francis, Jonny Bruha, Adam Cavanaugh and Kristi Prindle – may have concocted its signature masterwork, recorded at Matt Ten Clay’s Amber Lit Audio, with some ethereal vocals recorded in Wieland’s bedroom and a trumpet in his living room. Released appropriately enough on vinyl (just like Jefferson Airplane), “Dreamy” is, indeed, just that. But it also pumps some iron with lush, grinding-guitar gems like “I’m Gonna Be Your Man.”
Website: facebook.com/Reallazygenius
Upcoming show: 9:30 p.m. Dec. 28 at Founders Brewing Co., a triple CD-release show with Matt Ten Clay & The Howlers and The Extra Texture, $5.
Gifts or Creatures
Yesteryear Western Darkness
It’s not so much darkness, but a rather dusky Western sunset that unfolds here on this Lansing roots duo’s sophomore CD. Brandon and Bethany Foote’s folklore-fired Americana is chock full of subdued harmonies, appropriately twangy guitars and insightful, penetrating lyrics. The duo gets a healthy boost from a cadre of well-known regional musicians, including Drew Howard, Seth Bernard and Ian Gorman, ensuring a desert-styled sheen for a Michigan-bred recording project.
Website: giftsorcreatures.com
Upcoming shows: 8 p.m. Dec. 13 at The Loft in Lansing (with Frontier Ruckus and The Crane Wives); 7 p.m. Dec. 29 at Short’s Brewery in Bellaire (with Breathe Owl Breathe)
Knight & Guild
Beautiful Distractions
Portage-based singer-songwriter Brian Koenigsknecht (Pillar to Post, Sad Ballad) has the sort of inviting rasp in his voice that gives his tender, cinematic and contemporary acoustic folk an emotional weight that complements his melancholy-yet-fetching themes of love and life. Although parts of the spare, intimate and restrained album don’t boast the sorts of sparks and production quality that might grab listeners from the outset, repeated playing has its rewards. Moody, building tracks such as “Istanbul Sky” effectively transport listeners to another space and place.
Website: facebook.com/pages/Knight-and-Guild
Email John Sinkevics at jsinkevics@gmail.com.
Copyright 2013, Spins on Music
