Looking back at dates featuring players who would soon go on to be huge names, its interesting to see what sort of freedom each is given on any given recording. Yusef Lateef is probably one of the better known out-players of the sixties even if he wasn’t really too experimental apart from his choice of instrumentation. But he had to begin somewhere and as a fellow Detroit native led a 1960 session called Soulnik, the young multi-instrumentalist was taped to contribute a few compositions and play flute, oboe and sax.

Doug Watkins helmed that date. It would be his last as a leader and only the second of his career. He died shortly after. But the bassist had earned the chance to organize groups and send them on various jazz journeys. Beginning in the initial incarnation of the Jazz Messengers, Watkins eventually left the fold because of players’ pervasive drug use. Vacating that spot, though, enabled the bassist to work on any number of other dates – he even landed a spot in the rhythm section that appears on Sonny Rollins’ Saxophone Collosus. If that disc was to be Watkins’ only recorded appearance in the genre, we’d still probably be talking about him today.

Working with an assortment of adventurous players – including Charles Mingus, Jackie McLean, Gene Ammons and Art Farmer amongst others – found Watkins seeking to augment traditional tropes associated with his instrument. And in 1960, he tried the cello and was supported by another bassist on Soulnik. Even with that odd choice of voicings, Watkins turned in a relatively staid bop recording only occasionally sporting moments of note – thanks to Lateef, of course.

None of this is meant to denigrate Watkins’ as a date leader or composer – although he only contributes a single track here. But there’s just not too much fire in these tunes. It’s mostly blues based stuff arranged to allow for various instrumental features.

The date leader’s lone contribution, “Andre’s Bag,” begins with a languid bass line as Hugh Lawson comes in on piano to follow the progression. There’s nothing to dislike about the effort, or even anything to critique. The song just kind of doesn’t go anywhere, even if Lateef’s solos are all light, airy and pleasant. Some of the problem might have to do with the fact that there’s not really too much in the way of tempo changes making the majority of this song specifically, and the album as a whole, come off as less than imaginative.

There’re a few standards tossed in for good measure as well as a pair of Lateef originals. The only thing separating one track from the next, though, is Lateef switching instruments, even if most tracks find him on flute. So on his “One Guy,” there’s a bit of flute and during the title track he switches over to the oboe (I think, it might well be a soprano sax).

If basic bop stuff is your bag, though, and you somehow haven’t gotten your fill, Soulnik’s gonna be a nice find. It’s just that the rewards stem mainly from Lateef as opposed to Watkins.