On an infrequent but regular basis this website showcases non-Scotland based composers and bands, given that (as has been said previously) it feels as important that we look outwards as inwards. This writer believes Alex Paxton is a star in the UK music firmament, whose music although more often classified as Classical, breathes Jazz!
Photo Credit: Rui Camilo
Candyfolk Space Drum by Alex Paxton, released by Jonah Records, on CD and Digital on 3rd April 2026.
“.. it is clear that Alex Paxton’s sound is as clever and demanding of the listener, as it is eccentric. This latest album is yet another tour de force”.
Candyfolk Space Drum’s opening track Your Tongue demonstrates the hyperkinetic, jubilant maximalism that is Alex Paxton’s trademark. While electronics and children’s chorus are prominent – also some pre-verbal vocalisations of an infant in this particular track – it is Paxton’s storied injections of trombone which converse with all the other elements, that engage this listener the most. And this sense of speeding through multiple pop references continues throughout the rest of this astonishing album.
This is composer, jazz trombonist and producer Alex Paxton’s fifth album in the last 5 years, this one being a collection of, he says, his own favourites. Although at times feeling borderline out of control, boundaryless even, and often sounding improvised, as ever with Paxton this album is mostly through-composed.
Paxton plays on all twenty-one tracks, generally sounding the most out-there, notwithstanding the large cast.
Blue Chew Cheerio (tracks 1 to 8) feature Riot Ensemble, Dreammusics Ensemble and Orchestra and Children’s Chorus of Belham Primary while Candyfolk Space Drum accounts for tracks 10 – 20, and features jazz drummer David Ingamells, the Children’s Chorus of Belham Primary School and the London Sinfonietta.
Track 9 is PullBackHat Biome Dunk, features again Dreammusics Ensemble and Orchestra, with soloists Paxton and Jennifer Walshe improvising.
The final (21st) track, Car-Pig, as complex a sound tapestry as you could wish for, features electronics artist Zubin Kanga on synthesizers and sampled keyboards.
The huge number of cultural references that flash by in this album feels intoxicating and often overwhelming. The Steve Reichian feel of Nasty Caterpillar Strut, the church organ-like chords in the lovely Wind And Rain And Other Types of Song, the Irish-style melody of I Know, You Need Help: the kaleidoscope rarely stops.
Scattered through the album there are a few slight hints of that inevitable flip side of exhilaration: despair. Note for example that hoarse scream at the end of painfully fast Your Mom Still Laughing.
A final thought. The fleeting slow sections of this album demonstrate some lovely glimpses of melody and measured feeling from Paxton’s trombone. One wonders whether future compositions may showcase more of these?
Whatever, it is clear that Alex Paxton’s sound is as clever and demanding of the listener, as it is eccentric. This latest album is yet another tour de force.
Buy Candyfolk Space Drum here: https://alexpaxton.bandcamp.com/album/candyfolk-space-drum