Antibalas Members & alums: New collaborations, works, tours

Trumpeter Jordan McLean's label System Dialing just released "New Vocabulary", a new album with saxophonist Ornette Coleman with McLean, drummer Amir Ziv and keyboardist Adam Holzman.

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Drummer Miles Arntzen is out on the road with Will Butler of Arcade Fire playing songs off the new album "Policy" on Merge Records. His band EMEFE just released a new video (WATCH) and released a new album on May 3.

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Antibalas horns Ray Mason, Martín Perna, Jordan McLean, and Jas Walton can be heard on Mark Ronson's new album "Uptown Special."

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The full Antibalas band is featured on two songs co-written by Martín Perna:  "Melagioco" and "Libera" on the new release "2015cc" by Lorenzo Cherubini aka Jovanotti. The horns are featured on a third tune, "Ragazza Magica."

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Ray Mason, Reinaldo de Jesus, and Martín Perna recorded on the Mark Ronson-produced soundtrack to the film "Mortdecai" starring Johnny Depp and Gwyneth Paltrow.

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Antibalas founder / baritone saxophonist Martín Perna has entered the world of standup comedy. He has performed at the Comedy Cellar Village Underground, Eastville, and StandUp New York.

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Antibalas tenor sax emeritus Stuart Bogie is leading his band Superhuman Happiness (feat. longtime Antibalas trumpeter Eric Biondo) on a tour of the west coast with Marco Benevento.

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Nikhil Yerawadekar (bass) and Timothy Allen (guitar) are in California for two record release shows with the Sway Machinery. Nikhil and his group "Low Mentality have a new 45 rpm out called "Reel It In" on 3rd Generation Recordings. Here's the VIDEO.

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Trumpeter emeritus Todd Simon just won a Grammy in the category of Best Reggae Album for his performance and horn arranging work on Ziggy Marley's "Fly Rasta." His LA-based ensemble Ethio Cali has a new residency in LA at Acabar.

On tour now with Zap Mama

The tour with Zap Mama has been great so far. We have our 9th of 29 shows tomorrow at Penn State University's Eisenhower Center. Below is a video of us preparing for the tour in Brooklyn a few weeks ago:

Here's a few reviews from our recent shows:

• Variety Playhouse Atlanta, GA
• House of Blues, Orlando, FL

On the Road with Zap Mama

Greetings from Tampa. We're two shows into a 29 show tour with the amazing Zap Mama taking us across the US (and one show in Toronto). What a treat to start the tour in warm sunny Florida, far away from the bitter cold of Brooklyn. We'll be here for three more shows (West Palm Beach, Miami, and Orlando) before making our way back north via Atlanta, Richmond, Newport News, and DC, and then to some of the coldest parts of the US...

The tour has been unique in that we're collaborating with Zap Mama...we've learned some of their songs, and they've learned some of ours, and the bulk of the set features the twelve of us and four of them singing and making music together. In addition to Zap Mama's tunes, we're performing mostly new original material...songs composed by lead vocalist Amayo and Antibalas founder/baritone saxophonist Martín Perna. In the mix so far: "Action Time", "Hook and Crook", and "Tombstown". We're also doing a trademark Antibalas arrangement of the 1984 Rockwell/Michael Jackson jam "Somebody's Watching Me" which seemed like a silly paranoid fantasy at the time it hit the radio, but now 30 years later has proven to be prophetic. Audiences are loving it in the way that you can love a song that tells the bitter truth about a sad, absurd reality.

Zap Mama is amazing and it has been a pleasure working with them. After seventeen years of Antibalas being an all-male band, their presence has created a refreshing and necessary equilibrium of yin and yang energy onstage. They are consummate professionals, excellent vocal performers, great dancers, sharp dressers (we've had to really step up our clothing game) and all-around nice people. It's been a family vibe with Marie and Lene each bringing their children out for the first leg of the tour.

We'll be posting some live recordings on our Soundcloud page (and mirrored here) as well as photos and video of the tour. You can follow it virtually, but nothing will come close to the experience of seeing this rare collaboration live in person.

Stay tuned.