Tony Williams: His First Outing

By cobwebsandstrange on 7/5/10 7:32pm
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Tony Williams is easily one of the top five most important drummers to record in the second half of the twentieth century. To deny that is to be a fool. It’s that simple.

Basically a child prodigy, Williams began recording during his teenage years with his first being Grachan Moncur III stultifying Evolution. Earning the spot on that album, Williams had already cemented the trajectory his career would follow, being associated with some of the most open minded players in the genre.

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Wally Shoup Qtet: An Ensemble Spread Out Over a Nation (Part One)

By cobwebsandstrange on 7/4/10 7:06am
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A musician must find his space in the world. Some are satisfied in one spot. Some feel an inclination to move around, to ramble. But these experiences affect their playing. During this tumult, the innate human endeavor to find companionship presents itself as a doubly difficult task for musicians. In addition to finding a mate to live with and not want to fight, a musical mate must also be sought. In some ways this might be a more difficult task than finding love. No, you don’t have to live in close proximity or even in the same city, but communication, interaction and understanding is still tantamount to success. With the various outlets for free music, a strain proffered by Coltrane and his disciples, Seattle services not just Bumbershoot.

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Charles Brackeen: Intermediary, Talented Improviser

By cobwebsandstrange on 7/1/10 10:22am
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It’s probably not to heavy or theoretically deep to being this write up by saying that Charles Brackeen’s playing here has a good deal to do with the Ornette Coleman ensembles from the late fifties.

A decade on, finding most of Coleman’s band – Ed Blackwell on drums and Charlie Haden on bass - contributing to Brackeen’s 1968 album Rhythm X should make the set enjoyable to a huge swath of the jazz music listening audience.

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Zs Figures the New World Order on New Slaves

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/29/10 6:40pm
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Switching up players for damn near ever release should have rendered Zs a confusing ensemble to get a grip on. It’s sound, though, is going to present more troubles than the variants in performers, though. Oddly, over the band’s existence, which sports a number of relatively short offerings ranking as EP’s if not necessarily proper full lengths, Zs is able to move around with whatever now constitutes noise while maintaining just the slightest hints of free jazz, as it moves ever closer towards free improvisation. Well, almost.

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Stanley Turrentine Hustles Some Early Soul Jazz

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/29/10 5:24pm
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Stanley Turrentine’s most long lasting contributions to the American art form of jazz might come in the form of various samples that his playing resulted in during the hip hop era – everyone including deejay Premier’s made use of this man’s music. And while these snatched up snippets usually comprise simple rhythmic figures, Turrentine’s saxophone work on not just his solo dates, but backing folks like Jimmy Smith and Max Roach.

While his time recording from CTI yielded some of his most culturally impactful work, there were scores of recordings issued through other imprints. And for his 1964 date entitled Hustlin’ the Blue Note imprint was lucky enough to issue the disc.

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Michael Gregory Jackson: An Acoustic Exploration of Free Music

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/29/10 9:27am
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When mentioning guitar within the world of jazz, it’d be understandable if most folks thought of the electrified version – or even old tyme, hollow bodies that were amplified in some way as opposed to nylon stringed instruments we might associate more with classical styles. Michael Gregory Jackson, who recorded under his first and middle name to alleviate the obvious confusion, seemed to enjoy working with whatever guitar he had, not just electric. And on his first date as a session leader, the 1976 Clarity, listeners will find Jackson’s inclination towards the inclusion of that nylon stringed instrument to jive pretty well with the supporting music.

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Willie Bobo's Funky Drum Party

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/28/10 12:57pm
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Willie Bobo might not be the best known name in jazz percussion, but he serves as the connective tissue between the nascent Latin Jazz thing spawned during the fifties and the eventually inclusion of live percussion in hip hop. That’s a lot of ground to cover, but Bobo did it all himself – well, kinda.

Growing up in Spanish Harlem granted Bobo an early audience with Mongo Santamaria, probably the best known Latin Jazz drummer in recorded history apart from Tito Puente, who we’ll get to. Being associated with such a huge name in the business immediately allowed for Bobo to record as a session man as well as working alongside his avowed mentor.

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Dave Burrell Ditches the Amish to Play Jazz

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/27/10 1:29pm
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Being born in Middletown, Ohio assures a person of one thing. If you’re not Amish, you’re going to be necessitated to move elsewhere in order to pursue just about anything in life. There’s nothing wrong with horse drawn buggies, cheese and well wrought furniture. But there’s not too much else to get into around that part of Ohio – especially if you’re interested in music and specifically jazz music.

Realizing all of that, pianist Dave Burrell high-tailed it out of town to attend school in Hawaii for a bit prior to transferring to Boston’s Berklee School of Music. It’s not surprising that an student from that latter institution would go on to work with some difficult musics. But before even that happened on a large school, Burrell would perform on any number of important free jazz dates and eventually met trombonist Grachan Moncur III.

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Alice Coltrane - Harp Solo (Video)

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/25/10 8:52am
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This will be understood as sacrilegious, but I'm more likely to toss on and enjoy work from Alice as opposed to John. Her music, in my mind, actually makes sense the entire time. And while there's something to be said for playing from the gut, there's more to music than that.

TWOFR: Dave Holland Quintet x Steven Bernstein

By cobwebsandstrange on 6/23/10 5:08pm
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Dave Holland Quintet

Critical Mass

(Sunnyside Communications, 2006)

There’s a difference in sound quality that one can hear when listening to the horn tonality and general overall production in jazz from previous eras and current technologies. Rudy van Gelder recorded jazz masterpieces in his living room for Blue Note Records for long enough to make current recording procedures seem rather ridiculous. And while this Dave Holland lead group most certainly sounds slicker and well produced than bands from decades ago the recording sports good players and polished production. Critical Mass is comprised of original tunes from each member of the group and is still able to maintain a certain kind of cohesive feel that makes the album sensible. More often than not the main statements in each track are standard in nature, but occasionally the soloists have a chance to get free. On “Vicissitudes” a Latin tinged melody and rhythm is exploited by Chris Potter as his sax gets a good work out. Apart from Holland himself, who shares as much space on bass as any melodic instrument, Steve Nelson and his vibes really go a long way to making this album distinctive. From the first track, “The Eyes Have It” to “Secret Garden” the vibes go off on some tangential journey, but Nelson always has the sense to regroup and come back from that place he goes amidst the solos. A well rehearsed group on Critical Mass makes listening more interactive than on normal albums, even if the production values are more pop related than jazz.

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