Rolling Jazz Thread 2020

Yeah, that one quickly grew on me, ending up playing it three times in a row.

(listing these artists in the order on album cover and credits below, though it's damu's page)(also because he has a stupid name)
Archie Shepp, Damu The Fudgemunk, Raw Poetic, Ocean Bridges: good title for extended fluid grooves (Wurlitzer piano and vibes, framing and framed by selective guitar, tenacious bass, chop-and-roll drums, cut across by soprano and tenor sax, a little turntablism, and Raw Poetic's tuneful radio flow, switching back and forth from singing to rapping, sometimes syllable-to-syllable) between shorter, smaller-group, more down to earth exchanges (but still speculative and sometimes maybe splicey, slightly like riffling a deck of cards)("Professor Shepp's Agenda 1" is spoken, but brief and apt; the other 6 shorties are instrumental). Overall, it's pretty lengthy---the longest excursion, "Aperture," might be too diffuse---but I soon stopped thinking of taking a break; so far, it pulls me right through.
Hopeful, rueful, been around, ready for more, guess why they call it the blues.
released May 22, 2020

All songs written & performed by:
Archie Shepp: Tenor and Soprano Sax, Wurlitzer Electric Piano
Raw Poetic (Jason Moore): Vocals/Raps/Lyrics
Earl "Damu the Fudgemunk" Davis: Drums, Vibraphone, Backing Vocals, Turntable Scratching, Mixing/ Production
Pat Fritz: Guitar
Aaron Gause: Wurlitzer Electric Piano, Synthesizer
Luke Stewart: Acoustic and Electric bass
Jamal Moore: Tenor sax, Percussion
Bashi Rose: Drums, Percussion

Except: track 12 written by Pat Fritz and Jason Moore and tracks 3, 5, 7, 9, 11, 13 and 15 written by Archie Shepp

All Tracks Produced and Arranged by Raw Poetic

https://damuthefudgemunk.bandcamp.com/album/ocean-bridges

PS: also check https://bandcamp.com/search?q=Archie%20Shepp Incl. several albums I'd never heard of!

Oops, should have put Raw Poetic right behind Shepp, but Earl "Damu" Davis def right in there, as are they all.

Just got a really interesting album sent to me: History Gets Ahead of the Story is an organ trio date with Jeff Lederer on sax, John Medeski on organ, and Jeff Cosgrove (with whom I was not previously familiar, but he's got two albums with Matt Shipp on piano and William Parker on bass, so I'm gonna have to check those out for sure). Almost all the tunes are by Parker, written for his quartet (with Lewis "Flip" Barnes on trumpet, Rob Brown on alto sax, and Hamid Drake on drums; they occasionally add vocalist Leena Conquest and work under the name Raining On The Moon). The quartet and RotM have made some of my favorite Parker recordings, so I'm very intrigued to see how these three recast that music.

http://motiansickness.bandcamp.com/album/history-gets-ahead-of-the-story

apart from the releases under the ROTM moniker and the quartet stuff (or even within these), what william parker would you recommend ? i've checked out a few of the m. shipp trio recordings and also enjoyed 2018's "seraphic light" (with daniel carter and shipp) but apart from that i find his discography really daunting. any notable recordings where he shines as sideman, or notable compositions, or really any must-listens ?

(for unperson or anyone else who has an opinion)

I just learned Cosgrove lives in my small town!

not so boring anymore

Some of my favorite Parker recordings, as leader and sideman:

O'Neal's Porch (the first album by the quartet)
Painter's Spring (a trio disc featuring Daniel Carter on sax and Hamid Drake on drums)
Seraphic Light is great, as you mentioned
He did some great work with Bill Dixon: Thoughts and two volumes of Vade Mecum
Raincoat in the River, by the Little Huey Creative Music Orchestra
Other Dimensions in Music's Now!
Strata, by the Matthew Shipp Horn Quartet (Shipp, Parker, Daniel Carter and trumpeter Roy Campbell; no drums)
from the David S. Ware quartet, I like Godspelized and Surrendered best, and Live in the World (3 different live concerts) is pretty great too

re: William Parker as a leader, I highly recommend the Centering boxed set. It’s ‘70s and ‘80s recordings, large-group, duos (including a stunning one with Charles Gayle), and recordings with vocalists. Through Acceptance Of Mystery Peace is a similarly wonderful collection of ‘70s recordings. Testimony is one of the great solo-bass recordings, and Sunrise In The Tone World might be my favorite of his Little Huey Orchestra records.

As a sideman...yeah, “daunting” is the word. My personal favorites are Bill Dixon’s Vade Mecum and Vade Mecum II; Cecil Taylor’s Looking (Berlin Version) The Feel Trio, In Florescence, and The Eighth (but really, any Cecil with William shouldn’t be passed up); and Jimmy Lyons’ Wee Sneezawee.

his In Order To Survive ensemble's The Peach Orchid album from '98 is another excellent one worth checking out.

a lot of interesting things to check out here (how did i forget about the bill dixon recordings?) thanks very much !

one of the great solo-bass recordings

here's an interesting category. the only two that come immediately to mind for me: kent carter's "beauvais cathedral" (sort of cheating) and barre phillips' "journal violone"

what else is worth seeking out ?

Peter Kowald’s Was Da Ist and Was Da Ist Live (though the latter may only be available as part of an out-of-print and probably expensive FMP boxed set). Barry Guy has a great solo piece on the Evan Parker Trio’s Atlanta, but his solo bass record Fizzles didn’t really do it for me, for some reason (though I should probably revisit it).

Also, Alan Silva’s Innersong.

here's a cool video of WP from this year that i found while looking for solo bass stuff

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-IOhQIRdJs

Cecil Taylor’s Looking

^^

great album is this - i didn't even know Parker was on it tbh

I wrote about the Looking albums (there are three) in January of this year.

Solo bass album? How is Dave Holland's Emerald Tears?

it's unreal what a master Cecil was, can't imagine another musical artiste like him ever occurring before we are all die lol!

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2020-07-18/central-avenue-los-angeles-jazz

Kareem Abdul-Jabbar on Central Avenue in Los Angeles jazz history

Great stuff, thanks. Among other things always interested to hear about Dolphin’s of Hollywood and “Huggy Boy.”

Maybe not for this thread but just read the bizarre fact that Bruce Johnston was at Dolphin’s of Hollywood when John Dolphin got shot and saw the whole thing. He was there to pitch a Kim Fowler demo. https://becomingthebeachboys.com/2015/07/21/bruce-johnston/

More on this from Rudy Ray Moore: https://rockinsteve.wordpress.com/2007/08/29/the-death-of-john-dolphin/

Is anyone familiar here with this Italian label? The last three Bandcamp releases include Anthony Braxton, Roscoe Mitchell, Hamid Drake and Peter Brotzmann.

Is anyone familiar here with this Italian label? The last three Bandcamp releases include Anthony Braxton, Roscoe Mitchell, Hamid Drake and Peter Brotzmann.

i'm not, but was coming here to post that this release looks interesting:

https://idischidiangelica.bandcamp.com/album/the-catch-of-a-ghost

Peter Brötzmann: tenor saxophone, tarogato
Maâlem Moukhtar Gania: guembri, voice
Hamid Drake: drums

guembri player Maalem Mokhtar Gania, last representative of a legendary line of Gnawa music masters, brother of Maalem Mahmoud Gania

!

I wrote about that album, along with three other recent Brötzmann releases, yesterday. It's pretty good.

i'll have to check out "the wels concert"

i like that full blast album art aesthetic is such a throwback to classic FMP

I think this was posted upthread, but here's a high quality version of the Redman/Mehldau/McBride/Blade reunion. Seeing this rhythm section play is a delight, and that they're having fun doing it:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SVNKQtPvv00

I had been planning on including the Thelonious Monk live album Palo Alto in my latest Stereogum column, but then the first track, "Epistrophy," disappeared from streaming services. So I emailed the label to find out what was up, and just got this response:

"We are very sorry to tell you / let you know that the Thelonious Monk Palo Alto release is being postponed, due to circumstances beyond the label’s control. We will let you know if a new release date is scheduled. Please accept our apologies for this inconvenience." (emphasis mine)

Finally being reissued, after 54 years:

Milford Graves & Don Pullen: The Complete Yale Concert, 1966

I knew a collector who had a hand-painted copy of Volume 1. He paid $300 for it, which sounded INSANE at the time (1998), and he actually thought he might've overpaid for it. 20 years later, I saw a copy go on Ebay for $3000.

Just pre-ordered. Thanks for the tip!

Bone to pick with that descriptive copy though
His experience playing timbales in Latin bands had been formative, suggesting that the snare could be used as accent rather than beat-keeper,

Snare as beat keeper is more of an exception than a rule over the course of jazz history.

OTM.

awesome, thanks Tarfumes.

as another poster said on one of the rolling jazz threads of yesteryear: now do "alabama feeling" !!!

Snare as beat keeper is more of an exception than a rule over the course of jazz history

If you discount everything from the 1920s to the 1940s, sure. Snare-as-accent came in with Kenny Clarke and Max Roach, and it was 100% a break from tradition.

That's true, but there's also a period/tradition of swing drumming that was more cymbal-based, but the kick and snare were also playing consistent timekeeping patterns rather than only syncopated accents. I think keeping both hands on the snare was more of A New Orleans thing coming out of translating brass band drumming to the trap kit.

as another poster said on one of the rolling jazz threads of yesteryear: now do "alabama feeling" !!!

Never shoulda sold my copy.

yeah the rank and file RE cd / lp both are very $

Regardless of swing music, point is there was nothing remarkable about snare as accent-maker rather than timekeeper by the time Milford Graves came around

Really enjoying the studio Redman/Mehldau/McBride/Blade album, even though you don't get to see Brian Blade smiling

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kRr8Q43ejGk

^ also a great candidate for the "one band member refuses to play along" thread

Lol, both in terms of smiling and not wearing flannel.

Btw it was posted on the Roscoe Mitchell thread, but apparently he transcribed live improvisations, and then orchestrated them, love the concept:
https://idischidiangelica.bandcamp.com/album/splatter

Yeah, he's got a few albums like that. They can sound pretty amazing.

I'd like to hear that. The only other examples I can think of are more, um, commercial--chiefly Supersax--refresh my memory, wiki:
Supersax was a jazz group created in 1972 by saxophonist Med Flory and bassist Buddy Clark as a tribute to saxophonist Charlie Parker. The group's music consisted of harmonized arrangements of Parker's improvisations[1] played by a saxophone section (2 altos, 2 tenors, and a baritone), rhythm section (bass, piano, drums), and a brass instrument (trombone or trumpet), Notable brass soloists that recorded with the group included Conte Candoli (trumpet), Frank Rosolino (trombone) and Carl Fontana (trombone). On the group's recordings their music was tightly orchestrated, with arrangements by Flory that contained little or no calls for improvisation (although members of the band would often solo at live performances).[2]

Saxophonist Warne Marsh was a member in the first edition of the group, and although he was never given freedom to solo on any officially released materials, Lee Konitz has stated that there are bootleg tapes of the group where Warne played a solo.[3] Jeez, they even had Blue Mitchell in there for a while. What the hell, it was a living. Ironic that a jazz-based concept group had so little room for inprov (they played the jazz festivals, of course).

They won the Grammy Award for Best Jazz Performance by a Group in 1974. They were also part of the Grammy-nominated 1983 recording "Supersax & L.A. Voices, Volume 1", in which the L.A. Voices were nominated for Best Jazz Vocal Performance - Duo Or Group. Med Flory also wrote the vocal arrangements for this recording.[4]

Maybe the inspiration for Jazz At Lincoln Center concerts of yore, featuring the historically correct solos of even yore-er, recreated before your eyes (oh yeah, ears too).

One that still gets Sunday afternoon play on my local jazz etc. station: Quincy Jones cover of Herbie Hancock's "Tell Me A Bedtime Story," with strings sailing through arrangement based on transcription of Hancock's keyboard solos, worked up by violinist Harry Lookofsky, Dad of Left Banke's Michael Brown. Sweet! But would def like to hear such means taken further.

Oh god, Supersax sounds terrible.

Did JaLC really do that (play transcribed solos off the record)?

At least one concert on PBS, think it was a certain Ellington live album being re-created. This was early in Wynton's tenure, though; he got less-tight-assed later.

It was while he was under the evil influence of Albert Murray and Stanley Crouch, in the Giddens telling.

Supersax is pretty meh -- my hs jazz band teacher was a slightly cheesy alto player and made us listen to it