Thinking at Half Speed

Since I became ill, jazz has become essential. Not background music — actual sustenance. The kind of thing I need most days.

It started eight years ago with Kind of Blue. Miles Davis, 1959. I play it almost every day still. “So What,” “Freddie Freeloader,” “Blue in Green” — they create this suspended space where time slows down and opens up. I can just inhabit it without having to follow anything or interpret anything.

From there I discovered I wasn’t after modal jazz as a formula. I wanted hard bop and soul jazz with groove and momentum. Music with life and pulse. Lee Morgan, Kenny Burrell, Art Blakey, Ahmad Jamal, Donald Byrd. That 1957-1962 Blue Note era when everything clicked perfectly.

Lyrics are cognitively exhausting — they demand attention I don’t have. Instrumental jazz lets me float. It creates brain wave patterns that sync me up and keep me going.

This section documents albums that have mattered. Not reviews — just what they do, why they work, what I hear in them.