Brooklyn’s Howard Fishman, a New York favorite for his lively shows that mesh New Orleans soul, New York jazz and Americana folk, hasn’t released an album since a project two years ago where he interpreted Bob Dylan’s Basement Tapes. But 2010 will be dramatically different.
In the next few weeks, he’ll put out BETTER GET RIGHT, the first of a trilogy of albums that will release in 2010. Recorded simultaneously in 2009, the three recordings feature Howard fronting an overlapping ensemble of musicians exploring life in three distinct musical locales. BETTER GET RIGHT is inspired by New Orleans, where he began his music career. Howard says that the other two, NO FURTHER INSTRUCTIONS and `THE WORLD WILL BE DIFFERENT occupy entirely different musical and geographic landcapes: Romania and Brooklyn, NY, respectively.
Mark your calendar for a CD Release party on April 28th at New York’s Joe’s Pub. See full lineup of tour dates here. You can pre-order BETTER GET RIGHT on Howard’s Web site. For the eager, he has already posted a sampler of the album for download on bandcamp. Sounds great so far…especially “Since You’ve Been Gone,” which is much better than Kelly Clarkson’s song of the same title.
Howard keeps good company, playing with regular band members like Mazz Swift (violin), Ian Riggs (bass), Jordan Perlson (drums) and Roland Barber (trombone). He’s one of my all time favorites to see live…which is why I asked him play at my wedding (and he was cool enough to say yes).
Visit this post on grass clippings blog for a few clips including “Down By The Riverside,” live from Joe’s Pub, and “Bessie Smith,” a Basement Tapes performance at Housing Works.
