Exploring vintage jazz vinyl with a focus on label and pressing details, discographical information and critical musings on the music found within the grooves.
Demon’s Dance was the final album Jackie McLean released on Blue Note, a fitting finale to a decade’s worth of recordings that saw McLean move from the hard bop sound he helped pioneer in the 1950s to a more complex and open form of modern jazz music.
Read MoreOrnette Coleman's radical ideas about melody and pitch in jazz have been so thoroughly absorbed by the jazz establishment that his early musical explorations simply seem like a natural progression of where jazz was headed at the time, and where much of it is today. There is, of course, one glaring exception to this rule, an album by Coleman that even today defies categorization and eludes easy explanation: Free Jazz.
Read MoreDuring his time with Miles, Shorter recorded a series of albums for Blue Note that were all outstanding and some are even considered stone-cold classics (Speak No Evil, JuJu, Adam's Apple). Towards the end of this run of recordings came Schizophrenia in 1967, a fantastic record that shows off the "two" sides of Shorter - his straight ahead compositions, along with those that moved more into the free jazz and post bop realms.
Read MoreIf not for the title track that opens the album, 1984 would be remembered as an excellent example of post bop as it was emerging in the mid-1960's. But, oh man, that title track: an 8 minute foray into another realm altogether, with Lateef blowing a whole array of wind instruments - some of his own making - and muttering low utterances through the large end of a cow's horn that lends the track much of it's otherworldly feel.
Read MoreWhile perusing eBay for Woody Shaw LPs that were missing from my collection, I came across an auction for a vintage copy of Song Of Songs, a record that I have long been keen to acquire, but it's one that doesn't come up often and when it does it is often an overpriced OJC reissue. This particular auction had less than a day left and remained at it's $25 starting price with no bids, plus the seller was offering free shipping. All of that peaked my interest...
Read MoreI always find myself conflicted about late-period Coltrane recordings: are they pure brilliance or just a whole bunch of noise? Meditations finds a middle ground for Trane's forays into the free jazz that he was beginning to explore towards the end of 1965. What makes it accessible to the less adventurous listener are the passages of quiet and relaxed beauty.
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