Drat... again there are too many to pick from -(it's horrible!). Here's a flimsy, not really airtight way of getting around the low numerical restriction:
Inside:
-Mogwai/Government Commissions -(Pocupine Tree, Tortoise and Floyd fans check this one out).
-Sweeter Than The Day/Live at the Rendezvous -(2cd, usually priced about the same as a single. Wayne Horvitz and band are great as usual, way better sound than most live discs).
-Normand Guilbeault Ensemble/Mingus Erectus -(As if Mingus lovers didn't already have enough to be grateful for. The Actuell/Ambience Magnetiques label is just incredibly good).
-Enrico Rava/Full of Life -(Probably one of Rava's best, which means it's %$$#@!!! great. The 3 standards on it are nowhere near being stale, they really don't drag things down at all).
The Claudia Quintet/Semi-Formal -(Praise all dieties!! Uncle Meat is not dead. This is gorgeous, we're seriously lucky to have this stuff around).
Outside:
-Denman Maroney-Mark Dresser/Time Changes -(A few of the tracks have female vocals on em' and it kinda bugs me, but large chunks of the disc are like the audio eqivalent of amazingly well recorded analytical cubism. If you dig this disc, get Denman Maroney's Fluxation).
-Crater -(There's probably not much you can get from mescaline or peyote that's not already on this disc. This is gonna be edited alot better too in most cases. If you're into Can or some of the more twisted King Crimson, snag this).
-Gerry Hemingway Quartet/The Whimbler -(When you see a disc w/ Herb Robertson, Ellery Eskelin, Mark Helias and Gerry Hemingway there's plenty of reason to have super high expectations. This is among the finest progeny of records like Ornette's "Art Of Improvisers". The recording quality is excellent. It's kind of sad that guys like Dolphy never got to make records that sounded like this).
-The Vandermark 5/The Color Of Memory -(Vandermark smacks another one out of the park! He's easily one of the richest veins in modern music, calling it inside or outside is kind of dumb and the superfine recording quality is just icing).
-Bar Kokhba Sextet -(This is a 3cd set w/Marc Ribot, Mark Feldman, Erik Friedlander, Greg Cohen, Joey Baron and Cyro Baptista with John Zorn conducting. This one avoids falling into a klezmer rut. Percussively it stays pretty interesting and Ribot's guitar is just beautifully nasty in a lot of key places. Also The sometimes nasal or whining tone of alto sax is completely absent. This one really isn't any more outside than the first five either).
