Marc Ribot

If I need peace after a long day of noise and heavy activity, for some reason I turn to skronky, chaotic music, and it blisses me out. Today I am listening to Marc Ribot's tribute to alto sax skronk god Albert Ayler, SPIRITUAL UNITY. Ribot is best known to the general public as Tom Waits' studio and tour guitarist during the RAIN DOGS/FRANK'S WILD YEARS years, but the man can do purt-near everything interestingly and never stoops to acoustic mellowshit. His sound is metallic, vibrato'd to the max, humorously off-kilter (like Thelonious Monk, whom he's often covered), and embued with swelling emotion. It's also ALIVE; hard to predict where he's going from moment to moment. This album really does justice to Ayler's commitment to simplicity, feeling, and freedom. That's the great triumvirate I need right now.