Veteran guitarist and composer Amanda Monaco announces vinyl-only release of new music from long-standing ensemble Deathblow

Due out October 11, 2025, DEATHBLOW is a set of new compositions from one of modern jazz's most tuneful yet exploratory players.

“The name is a red herring: there’s nothing inherently deathly about Deathblow. A project of the guitarist Amanda Monaco, its sound, evasive but hardly confrontational, is a result of Ms. Monaco’s writing.” – Nate Chinen, The New York Times

Album release events:

Saturday, October 11 – Michiko Studios, New York NY / Saturday, October 18 – Lilypad Inman, Cambridge, MA

As the battle between the overly cerebral and doggedly hidebound continues to rage in the jazz landscape, a battle-tested warrior has returned, armed with whimsy and melody, to give succor to a populace starving for memorable sounds: DEATHBLOW, the freebopping alter-ego of guitarist Amanda Monaco. She embodies the anime-style portrait on this limited edition, vinyl-only release: limber, focused, drawing you in before slicing you to ribbons.

DEATHBLOW is Monaco's sixth album, released on her revived Genevieve Records label and with her band of many years in Michael Attias (saxophones), Sean Conly (bass) and Satoshi Takeishi (drums): "Sean and I went to college together at William Paterson. We became fast friends and always kept in touch. Satoshi was recommended to me by my friend Adam Levy, and we’ve been playing together since the late '90s. Michael was someone I met through Sean. When I had a deal with LateSet Records in 2008, I asked them to record with me. The band has been together ever since."

While Monaco's influences include Jim Hall, Grant Green, Attila Zoller and John McLaughlin, the seeds of her approach came much earlier. "An early influence was The Muppet Show," she says. "Every episode featured a jazz standard in a wacky way. The music was wild at times and fun and creative." It was that balance of upending tradition that would inform her music going forward. As to where she sees herself in the jazz firmament, she says "I’m not a flashy player, so that often has me 'under the radar' in the jazz guitar world. I’m OK with that, as long as the melody is strong."

The album begins with "Aw Gee, Thanks", an oddly lilting theme whose foundation is constantly shifting. "Submarine Nuke Officer" is a drunken waltz, wah-wah pedal adding extra room spin, while "Post-Toenail Theory" shows how she has absorbed advanced musical concepts into her unique aesthetic. If "Ya!" could be the soundtrack to a merry-go-round flying off its tracks to the terror/delight of its passengers, "Four People" has the complexity of modern drama. The album closes with the post-industrial noir of "J. Walter Hawkes Will Save The Day" and caffeinated jitteriness of "A Nespresso Moment". For those accustomed to albums where each song fits neatly into a premeditated slot and moves in expected directions, DEATHBLOW will provide constant surprise. Monaco's music is evocative: "A lot of times I’ll come up with a song title before I write the tune itself," she observes.

While it took a while for life to get out of the way of Monaco releasing DEATHBLOW—"We recorded the album when I started teaching at Berklee, then I started the non-profit Convergence Arts and another band, my Pirkei Avot Project, made a couple of records, and then I made another record with my quartet Glitter and then with my collective Lioness"—it gave time for her cousin Mia, just born when the album was made, to blossom as an artist: "I knew she was the one to design the cover. I sent her a photograph and she adapted it to a fun drawing."

Just as she focuses on the essentials as a teacher, she brings the same purpose to her playing: "I try to practice what I preach. I really focus on the music and what I’m hearing, being in the moment and allowing what’s there to come out."

AMANDA MONACO – DEATHBLOW (Genevieve 30604)

Release date October 11th, 2025 amandamonaco.com