Rewind: Tourist Class

St Germain, Tourist

Jazz happened for me in 1970 with Miles Davis' weird electric experiment, Bitches Brew.  It baffled me, with John McLaughlin's staccato guitar, Wayne Shorter's otherworldly sax and, everywhere, Davis' echo-plexed trumpet. This was Davis' fusion masterpiece and it would be another four years before I heard and fell for the "cool jazz" that had won Davis reknown in the '50's.

For a time I was mesmerized by Bitches; I loved its shifts, from dark to light, from stillness to

motion. If there was story here -- hinted at by John Berg's Afro-psychedelic cover -- I never cracked the code.  But it forever changed how I listened to music.

Fifteen year-old Tourist sounds nothing like Bitches Brew; by most lights, it isn't a jazz record at all.   But in its shiftiness and indecipherability, it reminds me of Davis' record. Now a "lounge music" classic, Tourist is a rapid fire journey through genres and world music styles from the changing collective that producer Ludovic Navarre calls St. Germain.


Tourist plainly touched a global nerve;  I've heard its tracks in shops and bars from Williamsburg to Amsterdam to Johannesburg.  A homebrew of dub, some deep house, gospel sounds, a little French-fried pop, Grover Washington- and Latin influenced jazz, it never lets you rest.  It's aural caffeine.

We now live in a world where this kind of disruptivness is celebrated.  Tourist invites you to go with it on tracks like this down-tempo classic, "Sure Thing":

Or on "So Flute," which starts like Herbie Mann on speed -- in a good way:

Pack your bags.





Coachella To Go



A weekend in the Palm Desert is not in the cards for me just now, but that doesn't stop me from daydreaming about Coachella and the wide ranging lineup there.  Which makes the perfect excuse for this playlist of new favorites from their performers list, and a celebration of a sooner-than-expected reunion among last weekend's sets.

James Bay, Let It Go - A folky and soulful young Brit, Bay sounds nothing like Van Morrison but recalls him all the same.

Chris Stapleton, Tennessee Whiskey - There's room at Coachella for old school country and Stapleton -- son of Kentucky coal miner -- is as real as they come.





HÆLOS, Dust - Straight outta East London with a debt to Bjork.

Låpsley, Silverlake - It just isn't fair to have your shit this much together at 19. 

DJ Koze, Cicely - German techno, there's a novel idea.  This percolates like an overboiling pot.

LCD Soundsystem, I Can Change - Who believed James Murphy would stay "retired"?  This gem was from his "final" effort.

R.I.P.