This month, I’m going to jump ahead a little and review some new releases I’ve downloaded that I haven’t yet received on vinyl (as one of them was released a few days ago and is only available shipped from Switzerland). In addition, I highlight a handful of favorite holiday records in my collection – some new, some classic. ’Tis the season!
Nik Bärtsch’s Ronin: Spin
Ronin Rhythm Clan: Moonday (EP)
Ronin Rhythm Records
Spin, released November 29, 2024, is the first group album from Nik Bärtsch since 2018’s Awase. (His Entendré album of 2021 was a solo piano recording for ECM Records.) But Nik Bärtsch’s groups Ronin and Mobile are never on hiatus. Bärtsch is co-owner of the EXIL club in Zurich, Switzerland where he and/or his group members perform every Monday night (Montags) in various configurations with the groups Ronin or Mobile, often with a guest. This gives Bärtsch and his unique compositions, called moduls, time to develop and evolve. Moduls are not so much songs as they are sketches of a musical pattern or rhythm that underly the structure and improvisation on top of them. Moduls evolve and grow over time, and are used in combinations.
Spin features a different production approach from his preceding albums for ECM (and even those on his own label, Ronin Rhythm Records), described as a “compact” band sound. Indeed, the new “Modul 66” that leads off the album is more structured and song-like than the intricate patterns of repetition featured on his many ECM recordings. The other two moduls are “Modul 63,” and “Modul 70_51,” which is a new modul in combination with a section from “Modul 51” (which appears on his 2010 album Llyria). “Modul 14” and “Modul 23” are older moduls that have evolved and grown from their initial appearances on early Bärtsch recordings (Randori and Rea, respectively); the challenge here is to identify what remains of the original recordings while appreciating what has been added.
Founding member Kaspar Rast remains on drums, while sax and bass clarinet player Sha has been with the group for 20 years now. Jeremias Keller is the band’s newest member, taking over the bass chair from Thomy Jordi in 2020.
Moonday is a limited edition EP released in early 2024 as a tribute to Bärtsch’s 1,000th Monday performance at EXIL. The enhanced Ronin lineup is called the Ronin Rhythm Clan and features a three-piece brass section and electric guitar recorded live. “Modul 23” is so funky that it could teach James Brown a lesson or two! The same lineup is featured in a pair of videos (Set 1, Set 2) from EXIL on Bärtsch’s YouTube channel; the first set closes with “Modul 35,” which is even funkier!
Both Spin and Moonday are available from Nik Bärtsch’s Bandcamp page as FLAC downloads in resolutions as high as 24-bit/96kHz, and on physical media (CD, vinyl).
Jeremias Keller: Alloy
Ronin Rhythm Records
The current bassist in Nik Bärtsch’s Ronin, Jeremias Keller, released Alloy in 2023, a collection of five songs named after elements in the periodic table, all based on Bärtsch’s moduls. Hearing his transformations of these moduls is an exciting and involving experience, as he adds numerous instruments (all self-played) to the basic ideas in the moduls, while also expanding on them with new countermelodies and ambient elements that take the music to an entirely new level. One thinks of soundtrack music, ambient recordings, world music, even touches of Isao Tomita among the sounds, and it is fascinating ride, especially if you know the originals.
Keller demonstrates on this recording how the moduls are like sketches where an artist can paint in the rest of the picture with their own unique style. You can sample Alloy on Bandcamp but, if you’re a fan of Nik Bärtsch like I am, you be tempted to buy a copy of it as I did.
Holiday Music
I always watched A Charlie Brown Christmas when the TV special aired each year, but never owned a copy of the Vince Guaraldi soundtrack until the CD version came out in 1986. I missed the 2006 Steve Hoffman/Kevin Gray 45-RPM set on Analogue Productions, but Kevin Gray cut a 33⅓-RPM version in 2014 for the label that is a perfect consolation prize. It sounds incredible! The detail on the instruments is refreshing, and the voices in the children’s choir are clear enough that you can pick out individual voices. But you can’t buy one for under $150 these days; $250 if you want your copy sealed. A bargain…if you consider the 45-RPM sells for $500 or more!
There are umpteen reissues of this record now. Fantasy seems to reissue this yearly in various colored vinyl versions as well as “foil” album cover treatments, with many being store exclusives. However, there is a notable 2022 version for Craft Recordings also cut by Kevin Gray featuring a new stereo mix and new mastering by Paul Blakemore from the original analog tapes, along with a second disc of studio outtakes.
I just received this record a day before writing this article, and I’m pleased to say that the new mix sounds very fresh and detailed, while remaining very faithful to the originally-released version. Only someone putting this record under the proverbial microscope might find subtle differences but for the rest of us, it is an excellent new version that I highly recommend, especially if you missed both of the Analogue Productions versions mentioned above.
The second record in the set is nothing remarkable, but the bossa nova arrangement of “Greensleeves” would have made a great standalone bonus track. This album is also the only release I’ve ever seen with “Jingle Bells,” which plays a part during one of the scenes featuring Schroeder at his piano. The only track that hasn’t resurfaced, except on a CD from the 2000s, is “Surfin’ Snoopy” which appears early in the television program.
Here are some other vinyl highlights of mine throughout the decades.
In my younger years, I played some of the following records around the house, and one of the mainstays in the “good” Magnavox console in the living room (which I wasn’t allowed to use that often) was the Herb Alpert & The Tijuana Brass Christmas Album. Back in 2015, Alpert’s own label Herb Alpert Presents reissued this favorite on vinyl, remastered by Bernie Grundman, and I have a copy of that record as well as an original pressing. Unique to any Tijuana Brass record were the arrangements, and on this record Herb has put his own unique spin on a handful of holiday standards (“Jingle Bells,” “Winter Wonderland,” “Jingle Bell Rock,” and others), with Shorty Rogers arranging the wordless vocal parts. Herb takes a vocal turn on the Bacharach song “The Bell That Couldn’t Jingle,” and there is a low-key version of “Jesu, Joy of Man’s Desiring” which closes out the album.
This is also timely in that Alpert is touring with a new Tijuana Brass in early 2025, after not having had the band together since the tour for his 1984 Bullish album. This also coincides with his 90th birthday on March 31, 2025. Sounds like a celebration is in order!
I mentioned The Mavericks’ Hey! Merry Christmas! last year in my list of holiday music favorites, but since it is one of the few holiday albums I play regularly, I had to mention it here. I did not get the rare white vinyl pressing, just a standard black version. But I enjoyed the music so much (especially the originals) that it became my gateway drug to the Mavericks’ style of music. Much of the album has a Spector-ish vibe to it, like “Christmas Time Is (Coming ‘Round Again),” “Santa Does,” and the band’s cover of “Christmas (Baby Please Come Home).” There’s also the playful double-entendre of “Santa Wants to Take You for a Ride.”
I bought Ella Fitzerald’s Ella Wishes You a Swinging Christmas on a lark when I saw it in the CD bins back in the 1990s. I’ve owned a vinyl version in Universal’s Back to Black series, but got a good deal on the newer remastering by Craft Records (in the Verve Acoustic Sounds series), which is the best I’ve ever heard this title. The Frank DeVol arrangements are hip with a swinging 1960s cocktail lounge vibe, and that makes them all the more charming. The only song I don’t care for is “Good Morning Blues,” but the rest swing out brightly or gently depending on the mood, and the two album openers (“Jingle Bells” and “Santa Claus is Coming to Town”) set a pace the rest of the album easily keeps up with. For 2024, there is a new two-LP deluxe edition from Verve which adds a second disc containing her Decca Christmas recordings.
I found the original Lou Rawls holiday album Merry Christmas Ho! Ho! Ho! just a few years ago. My folks had this Rawls version of “Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas” on a 1968 Capitol Records compilation The Best of Christmas. This LP of course continues in the same jazzy, soulful style that Rawls had back in this era, which is one of my favorite eras of his career. One aspect of this album that appeals to me is that there is a handful of lesser-known songs sprinkled throughout.
The Ramsey Lewis Trio recorded a holiday record, Sound of Christmas, during his years at Chess Records. This featured his trio with Eldee Young (bass) and Red Holt (drums), with some tracks featuring strings arranged and conducted by Riley Hampton. Most of the songs are familiar (including a bluesy “Merry Christmas, Baby”), but the title track is a charming Lewis original, as is his “Christmas Blues.” Easygoing and relaxing, this one is always a welcome spin at Casa Rudy.
I do have other holiday-themed records but I’ll save some for next year. I hope you enjoy the coming holiday season…whichever way you celebrate!
Header image: holiday and other records from Rudy's collection. Four of the six are Christmas records (the transparent red and green records are Herb Alpert's The Christmas Wish, the turquoise is JD McPherson's Socks, and the one at the bottom left is the Stax Christmas record), the fifth is winter-related (Tomita's Snowflakes are Dancing), and the red record on top is a Music On Vinyl pressing of the West Side Story soundtrack.
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