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Nick Colionne: Keepin’ It Cool Label: Narada Released: 2006

Ha! You didn’t see this one coming, did you? Nope. You were all sitting back and talking smack like, “Josh will never review a smooth jazz record. No way. And if he does review a smooth jazz record, he’ll kill it.” I break the rules, kids, ‘cause rules are meant to be broken. And I need the money… Just kidding. I live on love and soup.

So yeah, it’s a smooth jazz record. I can throw around the George Benson lingo and tell you that Nick’s phrasing is vaguely reminiscent of Wes Montgomery and all that crap, but who cares. I find reviews of jazz records to be as pompous as the folks that write them, so I’m not going to travel down that road.

A very wise sage once told me something that will ring true for the rest of my days, and it’s a bit of knowledge that I will hopefully pass on to my grandchildren. And those words of wisdom are: You can’t screw to Arlo Guthrie. When you stop and think about it, it’s true. You can’t. So it’s my guess that, with a similar philosophy in mind, Nick Colionne set out to make a record you could screw to. Or, at the very least, get to second base. I think he achieved his goal.

Believe it or not, I went to school with people that probably went on to make records just like this one. I actually use to live in the South End of Boston and because I was in music school, I had to go home and practice for, like, eight hours a day. I was fine with putting in that kind of time on the instrument because I was young and didn’t know any better. I lived very close to the Prudential building, and that’s where all of the local radio stations put their antennas, because it was the highest point in the city. Anyway, the signal was so strong that it would come through my guitar amp when I tried to practice, and the strongest signal that came through my amp was the signal from the smooth jazz station. I’d be there trying to bust out my freshly gleaned metal riffs, and smooth jazz would be pumping through my guitar amp. It was only after I wrapped my entire living room in tin foil that I was able to rock out without busting out some instrumental karaoke to the local smooth jazz station.

I’m not sure what the preceding story had to do with anything. Maybe it’s a metaphor. You know, like, even though I wrapped my living room in tin foil, I can’t escape my affinity for smooth jazz, as it has been ingrained in my soul. I don’t know. I just write reviews.