The San Jose-by-Oakland duo of Edgewize and DJ Platurn mark the release of their debut EP, Apatheater, with a performance at Cafe Stritch’s weekly Wax Wednesday party. Layering dusty, deep-crate grooves with dense-yet-punchy lyrics, these two Bay Area hip-hop heads warrant the comparisons to Aesop Rock, Atmosphere and MF Doom. Taking on Silicon Valley’s complicity in our country’s yawning wealth gap can feel a bit heavy-handed when presented in song form, but on tracks like “Yada Yada” and “Goaltending,” Edgewize unearths metaphors as potent as they are effortless, while Platurn’s jazzy production maintain an infectious momentum.

Edgewize & Platurn
Wed, 8pm, Free
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

To those who grew up in the know, the so-called “Secret Sidewalk,” running through Niles Canyon in Fremont, was a place to go get weird. Formerly the Spring Valley Aqueduct, this graffiti-covered, rectangular channel once carried water, but eventually became a place for daytrippers to, um… trip. It’s unclear if musicians Alex Abalos, Mike Boo, Michael Reed and Marcus Stephens—who together form the Bay Area-based avant-electro-jazz outfit Secret Sidewalk—have named their project in homage to this stoner mecca, but their beautifully strange tunes would certainly provide an ideal soundtrack for a psychedelic journey through the East Bay foothills.

Secret Sidewalk
Wed, 8pm, Free
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

Back in June, Amy Dabalos (a.k.a. Amy D.) gave fans a taste of what she’s been working on, screening the video for her single “Like You”—a potent affirmation of women’s empowerment, agency and authenticity—at The Continental. This Friday, the local singer and San Jose Jazz regular will pull the curtain back on her full album with a party at Cafe Stritch. The collection showcases Dabalos’ raw vocal talent, which she has deployed in a number of styles over the years, including in the service of rueful soul, energetic R&B and lively reggae arrangements.

Amy D.
Fri, 8:30pm, $5
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

To watch the boys from Atta Kid perform is to see unbridled joy in the form of a musical performance. Founded in 2012, the group uses its technical prowess to craft tunes that are as academically impressive as they are toe-tappingly accessible. Blending elements of jazz and hip-hop with East Bay funk and New Orleans brass, Atta Kid produce bouncy beats punctuated by soulful horn punches, sneaky organ swells and scratchy rhythm guitar. More importantly, they clearly love playing—allowing the winding, improvisational paths of their songs to lead them in directions that are delightfully surprising, even to them.

Atta Kid
Fri, 8pm
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

Thrift shop art is often bad, but some is downright inspiring. The comedy duo of Jordan Cerminara and Jeremy Talamantes draw big laughs by taking aim at the Goodwilled misfits of the art world. Talamantes is from San Jose, but this is the pair’s first time bringing their Art Critique Comedy Show to town. In the past, they’ve ruminated on a “very nicely done” painting of Bruce Willis—with a demon peeking out where his bald head should be—and a cheap acrylic that Cerminara mused may have come from an “amateur tattoo artist’s sketchbook.” A pre-show Happy Hour and “Title This” competition at SJICA starts at 5pm.

Laugh Your Art Out
Fri, 6:30pm, Free
Café Stritch, San Jose

Bay Area musician Marinero crafts gauzy, laid-back indie rock,inflected with Spanish and island flourishes. His latest single, “Flor de Jamaica,” is a wispy number that sways lightly like a palm tree blown by a mild tropical breeze. The track features bright strokes of bittersweet guitar chords, glittering atop a calm ocean of wavy church organ and splashy drums. He’s set to release a full-length album this spring with the San Jose-based record store and label, Needle to the Groove. If all goes according to plan, the LP should be pressed and spinning on local turntables by April. Catch Marinero live at Cafe Stritch.

Marinero
Wed, 9pm, Free
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

Oakland-based The Younger Lovers don’t have time for just being young. They want to be even younger. Younger than Neil Young. Younger than Young Jeezy. Younger! Surfy, trashy and fuzzed out, these East Bay punks definitely have a youthful energy. Their songs are short and dirty, and sound a bit like Shannon & the Clams run through Hunks & His Punx. Burger Records—which put out the group’s Rock Flawless cassette back in 2012—is co-presenting this show in coordination with rising event curation collective The Come Up during Cafe Stritch’s weekly Wax Wednesday shindig.

The Younger Lovers
Wed, 9pm, Free
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

Ali Shaheed Muhammad and Adrian Younge grew up on opposite sides of the country. Muhammad hails from Brooklyn, while Younge is from Los Angeles. But musically speaking, the two have been on a collision course their entire lives.

What began as a very solitary odyssey for both men—spinning records and punching out beats on drum machines—would eventually lead Muhammad and Younge to find careers as producers, composers and collaborators with many great artists. Fans of Golden Era hip-hop will surely recognize Muhammad as the producer/ DJ for one of the most respected rap groups of all time, A Tribe Called Quest.

While Younge’s name may not carry the marquee prestige of Muhammad’s, his resume reads like a who’s who of hip-hop talent. He’s got production credits with Jay-Z, Kendrick Lamar, Schoolboy Q and Common. It was Younge’s work with Wu-Tang Clan founding father Ghostface Killah that put him on Muhammad’s radar.

Younge composed and produced Ghostface’s critically acclaimed 2013 record, Twelve Reasons to Die. On the tour in support of that album, Ghostface rapped along with a live band led by Younge. The tour was passing through New York when Muhammad tweeted at Younge.

“I was tripping, because I love Tribe so much,” Younge recalls. The pair met for lunch, and soon they were in the studio together. It was there that seeds were sown for The Midnight Hour, Muhammad and Younge’s collaborative album, which takes everything the two have learned from the world of hip-hop and spins it into a sprawling, 10-player neo-soul ensemble.

But before Muhammad and Younge made The Midnight Hour—a 20-song set featuring guest appearances from the likes of Raphael Saadiq, CeeLo Green, Luther Vandross and Bilal—they embarked upon what was arguably an even larger project: scoring two seasons of Luke Cage, a Marvel Comics-inspired series, which ran on Netflix from 2016 to 2018.

While working on the show, the pair sharpened their craft even more, as they were expected to produce anywhere from 30 to 50 minutes of music per episode under tight deadlines.

“We learned how to make great music in less time,” Younge says of the experience. “We were finishing multiple songs in a day. When you streamline your process and have to do things under a television deadline, you become better.”

Muhammad, who admits he had been accustomed to the “luxury” of working on his own timeline, says the two years on the show changed the way he approaches writing. Specifically, he says, he no longer accepts the excuse that he simply isn’t feeling the vibe of a song.

“I don’t do that anymore,” he says. “This is the idea of the song. I’m going to do it. I’m going to complete it and move on. You can advance a song every day. Writer’s block shouldn’t last long.”

That’s not to say that genuine inspiration and interpersonal connection aren’t essential to making music. Muhammad and Younge know that, considering how well they work as a team.

“When Adrian and I got together and started working with each other, it was like an instant connection,” Muhammad recalls of their early sessions in the studio. Younge agrees: “It’s a kinship I’ve never really had with another producer.”

That kinship extends to the pair’s shared interest in history. A Tribe Called Quest’s music often stood out from that of contemporaries thanks to Muhammad’s knack for infusing the group’s beats with a jazzy swagger. Similarly, as a producer, Younge first made a name for himself by riffing on the sounds he picked up in his parents’ classic soul and R&B records.

From a philosophical perspective, Muhammad notes, jazz, blues, funk, soul and R&B are all inextricably linked to the African American experience. “The music came out of a place of being oppressed,” Muhammad says. “The same happened for hip-hop.”

Younge agrees, adding that hip-hop is both literally and figuratively a collage. Songs are constructed by piecing together scraps of older music while weaving in bits of the new. And while it’s true that The Midnight Hour is working with live instruments as opposed to snippets of sampled vinyl, the goal remains the same.

“I think that what we are trying to do is to tap into the experience of our forefathers,” Muhammad says.

The Midnight Hour
Dec 22, 11pm, $25
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

The South Bay’s jazz scene is one of the best in the Bay Area. That’s thanks in large part to San Jose Jazz. The organization hosts two seasonal soirees—Summer Fest and Winter Fest—and regularly puts on stellar shows at Café Stritch (another key to our region’s thriving jazz community).

Now with the release of a new album of tunes celebrating the work of a jazz legend, another San Jose Jazz project, the SJZ Collective, is adding to the region’s mix of great live jazz.

SJZ Collective Reimagines Monk is the debut album from a group of working local musicians that explores the fascinating and entrancing breadth of Thelonious Monk’s catalog. And it all comes on the eve of the musician’s centennial.

Born out of both the success of the San Jose Jazz Summer Jazz Camp, and the cranial innerworkings of Silicon Valley-based drummer and DRUM! Magazine contributor, Wally Schnalle, the SJZ Collective is on a mission to bring together an ever-evolving and expanding list of the best jazz musicians in the area to create great music that honors the complex and fascinating history of jazz—all while still striking out on its own. Currently, the collective features drummer and founder, Schnalle, trumpeter and flugelhorn player John L. Worley Jr., guitarist Hristo Vitchev, saxophonist Oscar Pangilinan, organist Brian Ho, and bassist Saul Sierra; but founder Schnalle hopes to add even more eminent musicians to the mix.

Up until now, the SJZ Collective has kept its energy in jazz’s relative inner-circle—appearing this year at SJZ Summer Fest, as well as at Café Pink House, Impulse Room and Café Stritch, among others. But the release of a new album, which initially debuted as a project at San Jose Jazz Winter Fest 2018, has set the Collective’s sights on the main stage.

“Monk’s music as always resonated with [us],” Schnalle says before adding: “Monk’s compositional voice and performances cannot be replicated. His musical identity was singular.”

As such, the album presents original arrangements of classic Thelonious Monk jams. It is an explosive yet thoughtful mix of classic tunes with contemporary twists. Featuring four compositions, originally recorded at San Jose’s Valley Christian High School studio, SJZ Collective Reimagines Monk hits all the right notes, bringing together jazz newbies and jazzophiles alike.

“I want the audience to experience these great musicians supporting each other’s musical identities while they play some great arrangements of Monk compositions,” says Schnalle on his hopes for the album’s reception. “The recording represents that in an excellent way, Schnalle says, adding: “but the best way to get the full experience is to come out and see us do it live.”

More than just a musical group, the SJZ Collective is also a global ambassador of San Jose Jazz and the South Bay jazz community. The Collective just finished up an October tour of select concerts in Taiwan.

SJZ Collective
Dec 14, 8:30pm, Free
Cafe Stritch, San Jose

Some people think of the ukulele as a souvenir, says the Hawaiian born uke virtuoso Taimane. She doesn’t take offense. In fact, she likes it, as it sets audience expectations low. That’s when she comes in and blows minds. With 24 years’ experience on the diminutive “underdog of instruments,” Taimane is comfortable shredding through Bach, Led Zeppelin or her own material. She comes to town courtesy of San Jose Jazz and in support of her new album, Elemental—a suite of songs about earth, wind, fire, water, ether and the underworld—due out June 5. (NV)

Taimane
Sat, 6pm, $30
Cafe Stritch, San Jose