Jazz is dead: Take it from a popular touring jam band launched in 1998, or a popular recording label founded in 2017. It's the name of both. The same doomsday outlook has recently been assumed — with some validity depending on the geographic market and especially locally — regarding the chances of finding either affordable or quality live music in general. And especially … [Read more...]
311’s long fade from creativity mirrors SunFest’s slowdown
SunFest turned 40 years old this year, and the West Palm Beach institution slowed down accordingly within its new middle-aged bracket. What had previously been “Florida's largest waterfront music and art festival” was a five-day event for most of its existence, but downshifted to four days in 2018. On May 5-7, SunFest presented the first three-day format in its history — on … [Read more...]
Music of the Dead brings jazz group back alive
In 1998, a studio album called Blue Light Rain by the Grateful Dead tribute quartet Jazz Is Dead (www.facebook.com/JazzIsDead.Tour) turned both the jazz/fusion and Dead worlds on their collective ears. For that album’s 25th anniversary, and the 50th anniversary of the release of the 1973 Grateful Dead LP Wake of the Flood, a revamped Jazz Is Dead has returned from the … [Read more...]
For Florida political junkies, Crowley is the last word
For everyone who’s attained any level of celebrity, there’s almost always an Achilles heel — and it usually involves, overtly or covertly, that person taking themselves too seriously. Brian Crowley, author of his online Crowley Political Report (crowleypoliticalreport.com) and political analyst on the weekly Sunday morning To the Point program on WPTV, certainly doesn’t … [Read more...]
Mr. Ho’s Orchestrotica promises out-of-the-box music-making at the Norton
In 1971, British comedy troupe Monty Python released And Now For Something Completely Different, its absurdist first feature film. Roughly 35 years later, percussionist Brian O'Neill formed Mr. Ho's Orchestrotica (orchestrotica.com), a group that's taken that title concept into musical terrain ever since. Featuring O'Neill on vibraphone and hand percussion, Geni Skendo … [Read more...]
West Palm drummer’s T’s Express sings jazz gospel of Corea, Hancock
In case you hadn't noticed, even though it's hard to miss, tribute acts have become all the rage by offering discounted versions of the material that lowest-common-denominator fans — especially of classic rock — can't seem to get more than enough of. As a result, tributes are sadly turning up in South Florida concert venues and clubs that in previous years booked much more … [Read more...]
Koch’s searing followup Boca gig cements his stellar reputation
Greg Koch (www.gregkoch.com) refers to himself as "one of the most famous unknown guitar players in the world" on his website. After his show last September at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton, and the recent one there March 11, it may be time for a rewrite. Last year's performance by the singing guitarist, whose trio is rounded out by his son Dylan Koch on drums and Toby … [Read more...]
The best guitarist working today? That might be Greg Koch
To anyone who was there uninitiated, a show last September 22 at the Funky Biscuit in Boca Raton likely proved to be a revelation. The Koch Marshall Trio performed two sets, featuring guitarist/vocalist Greg Koch (www.gregkoch.com), his son Dylan Koch on drums, and Toby Lee Marshall on Hammond organ and backing vocals. A near-capacity crowd sauntered in, mostly musicians in … [Read more...]
Multi-instrumentalist Regis spearheads Delray Jazz Collective
As anyone who knows him realizes, Tom Regis literally wears a lot of different hats. And as anyone familiar with his work as a musician knows, he figuratively wears even more. In his Delray Jazz Collective, the Swampscott, Mass., native and Delray Beach resident alternates between being the band's keyboardist or drummer. That involves two hats. Yet Regis also plays acoustic … [Read more...]
‘Billy’ Billingham: Lake Worth Beach’s tough guy reality TV star
Of all the things one might expect to find along an otherwise nondescript street in southern Lake Worth Beach, a reality TV star's residence would probably not be among them. But that's where Mark "Billy" Billingham (markbillybillingham.com), of the Fox network's Wednesday night show Special Forces: World's Toughest Test, lives when he's not flying around the globe for … [Read more...]