New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Mehliana: Taming the Dragon , the debut album from the electric duo of Brad Mehldau and Mark Guiliana , is out now on Nonesuch Records. Mehldau and Guiliana have been performing for several years, with Mehldau playing Fender Rhodes and synthesizers and Guiliana on drums and effects, as they are on the record. Mehliana comprises 12 original tunes-six written by the duo and six written by Mehldau-and was engineered and mixed by Greg Koller (Jon Brion, Kanye West). The vinyl edition of the album, due March 18, includes two 140-gram LPs pressed at Pallas MFG in Diepholz, Germany, and a CD of the album.
Following earlier posts of videos from a 2013 Mehliana performance at Largo in Los Angeles, a video from the session of the album track "Sleeping Giant" premiered on Citizenjazz yesterday. You can watch the video below via YouTube and at nonesuch.com/media . Tune in to BBC
Radio 2's
Jamie Cullum show at 7 PM GMT to hear an interview with Brad Mehldau as part of Cullum's celebratory 200th episode.
To pick up the album, head to iTunes or the Nonesuch Store , where CD orders and vinyl pre-orders include an instant download of the complete album at checkout. The album is also available to purchase there as MP3s and FLAC lossless files. The audiophile 44.1khz/24bit edition is available at HDtracks .
Mehliana: Taming the Dragon is "astonishing," exclaims Jazzwise magazine, "one of the best albums of 2014."
Mehliana earns four stars from the Guardian and from MusicOMH , which calls the album "wholly absorbing, as Mehldau's playfulness and Guiliana's taut, interwoven grooves create an inescapable tension. Pieces such as the delightful, slow building 'Hungry Ghos't even seem to draw from the approaches of post rock acts such as Sigur Rós or Tortoise." The album, concludes MusicOMH reviewer
Daniel Paton, offers "an intuitive, compelling dialogue between the two musicians, and between the musicians and their machines."
"Ranging from lush dreamscapes to febrile urban funk workouts," says MOJO , "the album resonates like an imaginary '80s film score."
Watch Brad Mehldau and Mark Guiliana performing "Sleeping Giant," from Mehliana: Taming the Dragon, at Largo in Los Angeles:
Brad Mehldau played in a number of different ensembles, including label mate Joshua
Redman 's quartet, before becoming a bandleader himself in the 1990s. The Brad Mehldau Trio , which tours the world extensively, made eight acclaimed recordings for Warner Bros., including the five widely praised Art of the Trio albums with former drummer
Jorge Rossy (released as a boxed set by Nonesuch in 2011). The pianist's nine years with Nonesuch have been equally productive, beginning with the solo disc Live in Tokyo and including six trio records Day Is Done , House on Hill , Live , Ode , and Where Do You Start , as well as a collaboration with soprano Renée Fleming, Love
Sublime ; a chamber ensemble album, Highway Rider ; two collaborations with label mate Pat Metheny, Metheny Mehldau and Quartet , the latter of which also includes Trio members Jeff Ballard and Larry Grenadier; a CD/DVD set of live solo performances, Live in Marciac ; and collaborations with genre-crossing musicians on
Modern Music , with composer/pianist
Kevin Hays and composer/arranger Patrick Zimmerli. Additionally, he produced saxophonist Joshua Redman's 2013 release Walking
Shadows .
According to
Modern Drummer , Mark Guiliana is "at the forefront of an exciting new style of drumming." The New Jersey native's unique and un-compromised approach to playing the drums has earned him international acclaim as both a leader and a sideman. In 2004, Guiliana created HEERNT, an "experimental-garage-jazz" trio based in New York. The band's debut record, Locked in a Basement, was called the record "the most exuberant, dramatic, beautiful, sassy, genre-busting little outing that I've heard since I don't know when" by legendary drummer Bill Bruford (Yes, King Crimson). As a sideman, Guiliana's longest partnership has been with world-renowned jazz bassist Avishai Cohen. He toured all over the world with Cohen from 2003 until 2008, performing on six studio records and a live DVD recorded at the Blue Note in Manhattan. Guiliana has also recorded and/or performed with Meshell Ndegeocello, Dhafer Youssef, Wayne Krantz, Matisyahu, Jazz Mandolin Project, Jason Lindner, Brad Shepik,
Bobby McFerrin, Tigran Hamasyan, and many more. His debut solo record, Beat
Music , which was co-produced by Ndegeocello, was released in the spring of 2013. Guiliana plays Gretsch drums, Sabian cymbals, Vic Firth sticks, and Evans drumheads.
