The Used Jazz Record Bin

It's not quite dead, yet.  There is no point in complaining about the steady disappearance of jazz sections in record stores when record stores are all but extinct.  It was a little disconcerting when I discovered that the modern jazz section of the Music Factory in New Orleans was all but gone.  It is pretty clear that jazz artists aren't going to sell their recordings at those venues.  However, this is not really anything new.  How many record stores have ever carried good jazz sections or even good alternative rock sections for that matter?  No record store in my hometown ever carried Patti Smith's great recordings.  What is new is that you can get almost anything you want online. 

What I am really sad to see go are the bins where you could find good second hand jazz CDs.  I did manage to find a couple of gems this weekend at Cheapo Records in the Twin Cities.  I have a respectable collection of Elvin Jones recordings, but I didn't have the double album Illumination/Dear John C. until now.  Well, I did have Illumination.  I was glad to get the second half for a very good price. 

Dear John C., as you might have guessed, is a tribute to Trane.  The lineup is Elvin Jones on drums, Charlie Mariano on alto sax, Roland Hanna and Hank Jones on piano, and Richard Davis on bass.  It's worth a listen.  I am playing the title cut and 'Love Bird'. 

I picked up Natural Illusions by Bobby Hutcherson.  It is a 1972 recording that seems to be rather lack luster, but it does fill out my Hutcherson collection. 

I was pleased to find Revue, by the World Saxophone Quartet.  This all star, all sax group is something you want to check out if you think, as I do, that the saxophone is the main register of modern jazz.  The quartet features Hamiet Bluiett on baritone sax and also clarinet; Julius Hemphill on alto, soprano, and flute; Oliver Lake on the same; and David Murray on tenor sax and bass clarinet.  There is enough texture here that you could float on it. 

I am playing the title cut and 'David's Tune'. 

Bassdrumbone

I hesitated over downloading this album.  What pushed me over the edge was the shear beauty of the trio's name.  Bassdrumbone.  That's jazz methodology applied to word play!  Another thing that led me to this album was an interest in Gerry Hemingway. 

Drummers and bass players have a position in a combo that is analogous to that of a catcher in baseball.  Either can sit (or stand) at the point from which the entire field is visible.  Paul Motian ranks as perhaps the most influential percussionist in modern jazz precisely because he played that position so well.  Maybe Hemingway is another such drummer. 

Anyway, The Other Parade (2011) is a splendid trio album, richly inventive and gorgeously recorded.  Here is the trio:

• Double Bass – Mark Helias
• Drums – Gerry Hemingway
• Trombone – Ray Anderson

The consonance achieved by the three is hardly surprising, since they have been recording together since 1977.  I am guessing that one can hear a lot more in this recording than was possible back then.  Every guttural thump of the bass, every snort of the trombone and scrape of the drums is audible and tangible.  I wonder how much if at all it affects their playing to know that so much is going onto the signal.   

Here is one to spend a few eMusic dollars on.  I am playing 'Show Truck' and 'The Blue Light Down the Line'. 

The Gerry Hemingway Quartet

From time to time as I explore the Penguin Guide to Jazz (may it be praised) I find an artist who reminds me of what all this jazz is about.  Tonight it was the Gerry Hemingway Quartet.  Hemingway is a drummer largely devoted to avant garde.  He has played with Anthony Braxton and appears, I believe, on one of the Reggie Workman albums that I frequently feature. 

I am playing 'Back Again Some Time' from Devil's Paradise.  This album blends the avant garde sensibility to solid, bluesy melodies in a way that will move you way past the red line.  Here is the lineup:

• Double Bass – Mark Dresser
• Drums – Gerry Hemingway
• Saxophone – Ellery Eskelin
• Trombone – Ray Anderson

You might think that Mark Dresser is a warning sign.  Don't worry.  This is no space music experience.  It is a digging down to the mother lode of jazz flavor.

I am also playing 'Waitin', from The Whimbler.  

• Acoustic Bass, Electric Bass – Mark Helias
• Drums, Producer [Recording], Composed By – Gerry Hemingway
• Tenor Saxophone – Ellery Eskelin
• Trumpet – Herb Robertson

 The horn work on both albums is glowing.  I especially liked Anderson's trombone. 

A little Trane

I have added some Coltrane to my L365 station.  I finally got around to purchasing Interstellar Space (1974).  I believe it was Trane's last studio album.  It's a duet with  Rashied Ali on drums.  It is very avant garde in spirit, but any Coltrane fan will appreciate it.  I am playing 'Venus'.

I also added 'The Believer' from the box set Fearless Leader.   This is from an album released ten years earlier but was recorded in 1958.  That was the title cut.  I am adding another cut from the same sparse album 'Do I Love You Because You're Beautiful'.  The Believer featured the great rhythm section of Garland, Chambers, and Taylor.   This was the heroic period in jazz. 

• Bass – Paul Chambers (3)
• Drums – Arthur Taylor* (tracks: B2), Louis Hayes
• Piano – Red Garland
• Tenor Saxophone – John Coltrane
• Trumpet – Donald Byrd, Freddie Hubbard (tracks: B2)

John Lindberg

I have had admired bassist John Lindberg's work for some time, but I haven't listened to it recently.  What a pleasure!  Lindberg recorded three albums in the early 90's with Albert Mangelsdorff on trombone and Eric Watson on piano: Dodging Bullets, Quartet Afterstorm, and Resurrection of a Dormant Soul.  The latter two included Ed Thigpen on drums.  Together, the three make for a very fine document of a brilliant jazz leader and bass player.  Sitting down and listening to the three together will be one powerful jazz experience. 

Lindberg's sentimentality certainly tilts to the avant garde.  These albums keep close, however, to the hard bop taste.  I can't think that any jazz fan will not find something here to treasure.

I am playing the title cuts from the first two albums and 'E.t.p.' from the last.  I would note that Eric Watson's playing on the last album is channeling Thelonious Monk.  Listen to it, if you are a Monk fan and tell me you don't wonder if master's ghost is in the keys. 

This is wonderful music. 

Two Daves

I have been playing a lot of Dave Holland on my Live365 station.  Holland is a brilliant bass player and equally brilliant band leader.  He has his own label now, Dare2Records.  I purchased a two record recording from the site, including Pathways, by the Dave Holland Octet, and a Flamenco duet with Holland and guitarist Pepe Habichuela.  The latter isn't jazz, but it is great if you have been in Madrid recently. 

Pathways is well worth listening to.  I am playing 'Blue Jean'.   Here is the lineup:

• Antonio Hart (Alto Sax and Flute), 
• Chris Potter (Tenor Sax and Soprano Sax), 
• Gary Smulyan (Baritone Sax), 
• Alex "Sasha" Sipiagin (Trumpet & Flugelhorn), 
• Robin Eubanks (Trombone), 
• Steve Nelson (Vibraphone and Marimba), 
• Dave Holland (bass), 
• Nate Smith (drums)

 I am also playing a cut from Extensions (1990) by the Dave Holland Quartet.  This is an interesting, slightly fusionesque offering (chiefly due to the electric guitar sound).  Here is the lineup:

• Bass – Dave Holland
• Drums – Marvin "Smitty" Smith
• Guitar – Kevin Eubanks
• Saxophone – Steve Coleman

Meanwhile I have added a couple of numbers from Dave Murray's Black Saint Quartet (2008).  From the Live in Berlin album: 'Dirty Laundry' and 'Banished'.  This is one of the many truly great jazz albums that go without recognition.  Please seek it out and nail it down. 

• Bass Clarinet, Tenor Saxophone – David Murray
• Composed By – David Murray
• Double Bass – Jaribu Shahid
• Drums – Hamid Drake
• Piano – Lafayette Gilchrist

Sonny Simmons' Unsung Genuis

There are a lot of Sonny’s in jazz.  It takes more than few clicks to scroll through my IPod library from Sonny Clark to Sonny Stitt.  Tonight I added a couple of albums by alto sax man Sonny Simmons.  Simmons has by God paid his dues.  He was born in 1933 and played with a number of jazz greats in the 1960’s, including Mingus, Dolphy, and Elvin Jones.  Then he disappeared for a couple of decades, apparently living on the streets for a spell.  He reemerged in the mid 90’s. 

Simmons is described in the Penguin Guide as one of the most underappreciated jazz masters.  From what I have been listening to, I am inclined to agree. 

I am playing cuts from the two albums both recorded in 1966.  The Penguin Guide suggests Music from the Spheres as the first Simmons album you ought to have.  It is certainly a robust new thing document, leaving no doubt that you are listening to an alto virtuoso and a compositional genius.  I am playing ‘Zarak’s Symphony’ and ‘Dolphy’s Days’.  The latter is a superb bit of chameleon jazz.  You want Eric Dolphy?  I can be Eric Dolphy!  From Discogs, here is the lineup:

1.       Alto Saxophone, Written-By – Sonny Simmons

2.      Bass – Juney Booth*

3.      Drums – James Zitro

4.      Piano – Michael Cohen (2)

5.      Trumpet – Barbara Donald

I am also playing ‘Metamorphosis’ from Staying on the Watch.  If Simmons was very explicitly channeling Dolphy in the other album, here he is evidently channeling Ornette Coleman. 

1.       Alto Saxophone – Sonny Simmons

2.      Bass – Teddy Smith

3.      Percussion – Marvin Pattillo

4.      Piano – John Hicks

5.      Trumpet – Barbara Donald

This is very energetic, compelling avant garde jazz.  The piano work by Hicks has to be noted as brilliant.  I haven’t yet heard any of Simmons’ later work.  I will be hunting.