Chris Barton for LOS ANGELES TIMES – In a year when disaster seemed only a tweet away, music seemed more precious than ever. Capable of both providing shelter and uniting us, the sounds on these albums amplify voices — some new, some familiar — that demanded to be heard, whether in the pointed interstellar imaginings of Nicole Mitchell, the maximalist virtuosity of L.A.’s Cameron Graves or the dignified cornet of Ron Miles in a record that drew from the civil rights struggle. Instead of the current chaos, the best of 2017 always focused on what lay ahead.
Cameron Graves, “Planetary Prince” (Mack Avenue): One of the many albums that resulted from the marathon L.A. recording sessions that yielded Kamasi Washington’s zeitgeist-capturing “The Epic,” this debut from one of the West Coast Get Down’s keyboardists shares many of that record’s personnel and carries a similarly cathartic power brimming with cosmic soul-jazz virtuosity.