{"title":"Wilkes Records","description":"","products":[{"product_id":"sam-wilkes-public-records-performance-lp","title":"Sam Wilkes - Public Records Performance","description":"\u003cdiv class=\"tralbumData tralbum-about\"\u003eOn Public Records Performance, Wilkes debuts a dynamic set of new originals and arrangements, presenting a window into his syncretic approach to an ever-expanding contemporary songbook. The LP showcases Wilkes’ writing and bass playing, both as a soloist and as a member of a dominant rhythm section. The tight and communicative unit of multi-instrumentalists comprising his band features Wilkes on Fender Bass, Graefe on acoustic and electric guitar, Aidan Lombard on keyboards and guitar, Craig Weinrib on drums and guitar, and Shahzad Ismaily sitting in on Moog Rogue on the album's final track. Captured on August 6th, 2022, immediately after recording both his duo album The Doober with Sam Gendel and basses on Nothing with Louis Cole, this LP is a concise but expansive document of a musician at the height of a prolific streak.\u003c\/div\u003e","brand":"Sam Wilkes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":46648685035674,"sku":null,"price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0471\/5036\/6874\/files\/a1587703977_10_1.jpg?v=1759948354"},{"product_id":"sam-wilkes-dylan-day-chris-fishman-thom-gill-craig-weinrib-iiyo-iiyo-iiyo-live-in-kakegwa-tokyo-lp","title":"Sam Wilkes, Dylan Day, Chris Fishman, Thom Gill, Craig Weinrib – iiyo iiyo iiyo Live in Kakegwa \u0026 Tokyo","description":"\u003cp\u003e\u003cmeta charset=\"utf-8\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003eWhen Festival de Frue’s organizers asked Sam Wilkes to put together an ensemble for their 2022 festival, they initially asked for the band he created for his 2021 album “One Theme \u0026amp; Subsequent Improvisation.” With keyboardist Chris Fishman (Pat Metheny, Louis Cole) the only member of that group who was available, Wilkes asked that the organizers select one of two groups as an alternative: a Trio featuring drummer Craig Weinrib (Henry Threadgill, Amen Dunes) and guitarist Dylan Day (Jenny Lewis, Jackson Browne)—with whom Wilkes recently released a trio album—or a Quartet featuring Weinrib, Fishman, and keyboardist and guitarist Thom Gill (KNOWER, Joseph Shabason). “I couldn’t make the decision on which band I should bring, I felt very confused about it,” he says. Through a strange series of miscommunications—or simply a bit of serendipity—both Wilkes and the Frue organizers thought the other had suggested combining the ensembles into a Quintet including members of both groups. An idea that neither side voiced somehow became the obvious choice.\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003e\u003cspan\u003eThe combined Quintet represents what Wilkes calls “two disparate worlds in my community,” that of the “virtuosic, fast-paced grid” of music played with Fishman and Gill, “and this other thing with Dylan that’s coming from different elements of traditional\u003c\/span\u003e\u003cspan class=\"bcTruncateMore\"\u003e\u003cspan\u003e \u003c\/span\u003eAmerican music.” Luckily, Weinrib fits seamlessly into both worlds. While all members of the group played on Wilkes’ 2023 album Driving, they’d never all played together. They had one five-hour rehearsal in Tokyo, but, Wilkes says, “It was impossible for me to predict how this music was going to sound.” His strategy, after showing them the arrangements of several of his own compositions and a few covers, was to “allow everyone to blossom fully” with the hope that “what I’ll get is everyone’s personality being expressed unfettered.”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eiiyo iiyo iiyo is Sam Wilkes’ fifth album as bandleader and arranger, and the atmosphere is so rich it spills out of the speakers. The album, a document of the Quintet’s meeting, was recorded live at Festival de Frue in Kakegawa and at WWWX in Tokyo, where they played headlining sets for hundreds of people. Not that you’d know it from the intimate interplay between the players or the small-room feel of the recording. In opener “Descending,” which made its debut on Wilkes’ 2018 self-titled album, the mood is so cozy you’d swear the sound of kids at play in the back of the hall had been sampled in—another perfect bit of serendipity.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eFor Wilkes, setting the right tone for a performance or a recording is paramount, and it’s inseparable from how he understands his role as a bassist. “My entryway into understanding my thing, what I care about the most in music, was through accompaniment; focusing on time, feel, tone, form, and most importantly, listening.” he says. “There are things that are ineffable about that, which is the energy. But there are also conscious and subconscious decisions, where I’m arranging and orchestrating to create the ultimate environment for, say, Dylan to play his melody over, or Thom to play his. Those are choices as much as reactions, combining in equal parts in-depth preparation and total improvisation”\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eThe title iiyo iiyo iiyo is a Japanese expression used in response to an outpouring of gratitude, a cheeky way of brushing the accolades off of oneself. Accordingly, the record is full of charming, homespun personality. In a gorgeous version of the standard “I Wanna Be Loved,” Day plays the melody in a way that moves between washed-out ambient gauze and a traditionally beautiful run of lines that echoes the Dinah Washington original. While the band circulates the mantric melody in “Descending,” Fishman dots around it on his Moog One, opening a new seam in a song that’s quickly become a Wilkes standard. Weinrib’s patient, impressionistic brush strokes seem to swirl beneath the melody, while Gill fogs the room with thick, reverb-heavy accompaniment from his keys.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eAnd where is Wilkes in all this? He’s guiding his friends, helping them decorate a room that he himself built, drawing them deeper into the song’s wistful, hopeful, grounded atmosphere. His polyphonic voicings—a signature of his playing—sets out the song’s boundaries and acts as both its musical and emotional anchor.\u003cbr\u003e\u003cbr\u003eIt’s the approach Wilkes takes across the album, using his phrasing as both the music’s gravitational center and its heart, and he does it to perfection in the opening minute or so of “Girl.” The song originally appeared on Sam Wilkes “Sings” (2014–2016)” in what he calls a “psychotically different arrangement.” On stage in Kakegawa, he slows the song to a crawl and isolates its central chords. He plays them gently, patiently; he voices the chords with the clarity of a person who’s just cried out all of their confusion. As Wilkes says, his role as a bassist means that he’s the foundation of these songs, and foundations by their very nature tend to be obscured. Here, for one lovely moment, he strips everything back to the studs, revealing the lush architecture that holds this miraculous music together.\u003cbr\u003e\u003c\/span\u003e\u003c\/p\u003e","brand":"Sam Wilkes","offers":[{"title":"Default Title","offer_id":47972346527898,"sku":null,"price":28.0,"currency_code":"USD","in_stock":true}],"thumbnail_url":"\/\/cdn.shopify.com\/s\/files\/1\/0471\/5036\/6874\/files\/a3273234151_10.jpg?v=1777926433"}],"url":"https:\/\/club.insheepsclothinghifi.com\/collections\/wilkes-records.oembed","provider":"In Sheeps Clothing HiFi","version":"1.0","type":"link"}