Jan 21, 2025 7:54 PM
Southern California Fires Hit the Jazz Community
Roy McCurdy and his wife had just finished eating dinner and were relaxing over coffee in their Altadena home, when he…
Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog is set to release YRU Still Here? on April 27. The band includes drummer Ches Smith (left), bassist Shahzad Ismaily and guitarist Ribot.
(Photo: Ebru Yildiz)Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog is set to issue a new album that makes clear the bandleader’s opinion of the nation’s current political climate.
The guitarist, who’s joined in the trio by bassist Shahzad Ismaily and drummer Ches Smith, hasn’t turned in an album terribly burdened by the orthodoxy of the jazz genre. Instead, Ribot seems to have harnessed the adventurous nature of the music and used it to insinuate No Wave, funk and dashes of sitar to constitute YRU Still Hear?, which is being released by the Northern Spy imprint on April 27.
Below is a stream of the album cut “Muslim Jewish Resistance.”
It sports a familiar “never again” refrain while rattling off a list of contemporary political transgressors as the music veers from something that could have emerged from the 1980s rock underground to a skronky sax feature.
“Beyond being a disaster for those deported, imprisoned and living in fear, ICE is building a mass extra-legal prison system into which detainees may disappear without notice, and an armed force of agents who tear apart families and violate international human rights law on a daily basis,” Ribot said. “Does anyone believe that those carrying this out will suddenly refuse to follow orders just because the victims happen to be citizens?”
Prior to the release of the new album, Marc Ribot’s Ceramic Dog has dates planned in the Eastern U.S., including a stop at the Big Ears Festival in Knoxville, Tennessee, on March 24. For more information about the new album, visit Ribot’s website. DB
Gerald and John Clayton at the family home in Altadena during a photo shoot for the June 2022 cover of DownBeat. The house was lost during the Los Angeles fires.
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