Henry Threadgill - Little Pocket Sized Demons
The world of weird big band music is sadly under-explored. Were you to venture in with your land roving satellite, you would find that something about having to keep that many weird players in some form of coherent sound all while playing weird compositions in weird ways creates a particular tapestry of of interplay that can only ever arise under weird these weird big band conditions.
Henry Threadgill is a living master of this. From the unsettling harmonies to the unsettling melody to the unsettlingly mingled acoustic and electric textures is formed something that simultaneously grooves, swings, skronks, and rocks out. When guitarists Brandon Ross and Masujaa come in for solos, they straight up shred, weird 80's style and yet it sounds totally natural. Along with his own mad sax skills, the Threadgill shows that ultimate bandleader accomplishment: making all this shit work together while still retaining the band's overall guiding/compositional voice. What more can you ask for?
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