Secret Confession

Okay look. I'll admit that Darcy James Argue's new record, Infernal Machines, confirmed what I had suspected about his music, namely that it is, to an extent, not my thing. It is not to my taste. But I'm going to pretend for five seconds that I'm a grown-up and admit, too, that it's mostly my own fault that I don't connect with a debut album composed, orchestrated and performed with such astonishing assurance. (And maybe that's what keeps me out? Do I wish this album were less assured, less polished, more ragged somehow?) At any rate, composer/bandleader DJA is such an essential part of New York's new-music scene, and the release of this disc is by any measure such an event, that I would be remiss if I didn't at least mention it in this space. Kind of like how you'd be remiss if you didn't at least click here, right now, and give it a listen. Whether or not you fall in love with it, I think you'll recognize it as the start of something huge.