Chris Thile & Brad Mehldau is an album by Chris Thile and Brad Mehldau. It was released by Nonesuch Records on January 27, 2017.
The album contains a mix of originals and covers. The latter "include Bob Dylan's 'Don't Think Twice It's Alright', Joni Mitchell's 'Marcie', Elliott Smith's 'Independence Day' as well as a composition by late 16th /early 17th century Irish harpist and composer Ruaidri Dáll Ó Catháin".
Thile's singing covers a range of effects, including "invoking an ethereal falsetto, the imploring call of a '50s teenage crooner, a nasal Dylanesque snarl, or a rural bluesman's grouchy defiance".
The music was recorded in Avatar Studios in New York City on December 30, 2015, and January 2–3, 2016. The album was released by Nonesuch Records on January 27, 2017.
Chris Thile & Brad Mehldau is the collaboration between bluegrass mandolin player Chris Thile and jazz pianist Brad Mehldau. This album certainly works as it seems like the artists have worked together for ages and the resulting sound is organic and natural. Too bad it's a bit boring at times. For example the cover of the majestic Elliott Smith song "Independence Day" is forgettable. Then again "Don't Think Twice, It's All Right" is a cover that is one of the best I heard. So I get a bag of mixed feelings when listening to this album.
Wow what an interesting, lovely listen! Had no idea what to expect but this mandolin/piano combo made one fantastic album. There are a lot of influences I detected here... everything from jazz to bluegrass to full on country seems to have been thrown into the blender and whipped to create something that I completely enjoyed listening to. How great would this be to see live?
Great albums keep coming even after the original 1001 list is far back in my rear-view mirror... I did not expect this to continue as it has and had no idea how much else there was out there to discover.
This sounds like music they'd play in some strange joint you randomly stumble into while on vacation that has like 2 reviews on Google Maps but makes the most heavenly coffee you've ever had. I fuck with it.
Weird album cover by the way, thought this would be hip hop or something.
I like Chris Thile, even saw Nickel Creek live not long before they announced their 2007 hiatus. Not sure where this fits. It was all good but nothing really grabbed me aside from a couple of the covers.
The way this LP started off had me gripped, exceptional guitar-piano duets with some confrontational and abstracted chord progressions that invoked Thom Yorke at points. It was disappointing to hear the album quickly slough off into typical singer-songwriter banalities, and approach near-hodunk levels at its end with twangy guitar and bargain-bin love song lyricism. Big letdown all in all.
This album was an interesting mix of jazzy guitar work and subtle vocals. This felt like the kind of music some artsy person would claim is spectacular while the guests who are forced to listen slowly daze off. The bob dylan cover was not great and an odd rendition. Overall it just felt like it was trying to be more than they were capable of. 4.9/10
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