Get Your Groove On: Milt Jackson (with the Ray Brown Big Band) - "Memphis Jackson"

Get Your Groove On: Milt Jackson (with the Ray Brown Big Band) - "Memphis Jackson"

Milt Jackson teams up with Ray Brown once again in the late-1960s, this time in a big band setting led by Brown to create an underrated album of funky and soulful jazz that will appeal to both fans of modern jazz and rare groove collectors alike. 

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Music Of The Mind: Les McCann - "Layers"

Music Of The Mind: Les McCann - "Layers"

The concept behind Layers is simple enough: McCann wanted to make an album of the sounds he was hearing in his head using only electronic keyboards, synthesizers and overdubbing. He recorded over rhythm tracks laid down by a group of percussionists who had previously accompanied him, and the resulting jazz record is quite unlike anything that had come before it.

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Plugged-In To The Past: Hampton Hawes - "Northern Windows"

Plugged-In To The Past: Hampton Hawes - "Northern Windows"

Hampton Hawes spent 1972 through 1974 recording for Prestige Records where he explored the possibilities that electronic keyboards could provide in a jazz setting. David Axelrod serves as the arranger on the album, adding his unique set of funky skills as an arranger and producer to the proceedings.

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Let The Funk Flow: Joe Farrell - "Canned Funk"

Let The Funk Flow: Joe Farrell - "Canned Funk"

Canned Funk would be Joe Farrell's sixth (and second-to-last) album for CTI, and his last truly jazz-funk recording for the label. While it is not quite up to the awesome heights of his earlier CTI recordings, it is still a quality '70s funky outing that stays rooted in some excellent improvisation despite it's electric jazz and fusiony flourishes

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The Jazz Meets The Funk: Herbie Hancock - "Fat Albert Rotunda"

The Jazz Meets The Funk: Herbie Hancock - "Fat Albert Rotunda"

The jazz world generally looks at Herbie Hancock's 1973 jazz-funk opus Head Hunters as the keyboardist's first foray into combining the world of funk, soul and R&B rhythms with jazz improvisation, but in fact it was four years earlier with Fat Albert Rotunda that Herbie showed how funky jazz music could really be

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Freddie Hubbard - "Keep Your Soul Together"

Freddie Hubbard - "Keep Your Soul Together"

This record is a sweet little gem that came towards the end of Freddie Hubbard's time with CTI Records (it would be the second to last studio album he would cut for the label). It tends to get overlooked in the trumpeter's CTI discography, as his earlier electric jazz outings for Creed Taylor's imprint are generally the one's that get the most attention. 

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