To the indifference of many, jazz struggles to stay relevant. And by that I mean alive and popular, because it's relevance really is not in question. An experienced but still fresh voice in the genre is Christian Scott, a trumpeter who continues to draw distracting comparisons to Miles Davis and John Coltrane. Forget that part and listen to him in his own right. His new CD comes out March 30, which I will pick up that very day at my local independent, Oz Music. Several things leave me in ecstatic anticipation. First, his 2007 album "Anthem" is trance-inducing fantastic, consisting mostly of great compositions by Scott himself. Also, the readily available listen to his cover of Thom Yorke's Eraser off the new album makes you wonder about the need to decide whether it's jazz, rock, fusion, or anything but great music. Scott is not new to the scene having put out four previous CDs under his own name, including a live performance, since 2002, and playing on the side for others since before then. But his voice gets fresher each time. Here are the You Tube versions of Eraser from both artists.
