I quit caring about George Benson after Breezin’ (1976) and Weekend in LA (1978). But recently I have been falling in love with George again based on his CTI era releases that I have been picking up in vinyl (late 60s to mid 70s).
This past weekend I saw this new release in the Best Buy Sunday circular and it caught my eye. With only 2 to 3 new releases earning the right to be in the Best Buy ad and the fact that this was a special Best Buy edition caught my eye – what is George and his label (Concord – which appears to be the place where old stars resurrect their careers these days) up too?
Well this is a very nice release. George plays pop-jazz along the lines of Breezin’. He does not try to be hip, but instead acts his age and plays delightful mid-70s pop jazz. Lots of clever covers, my favorite being the Beatles’ “I Want to Hold Your Hand” which is almost unrecognizable – until you figure it out – you get to see how inventive George can be with a simple pop melody.
If you loved Breezin’ and like me got bored with George trying to be hip for the last 30 years you will like this release.
I stumbled across this album sometime in the last year and I don’t know how. I had an MP3 that I got from who knows where and have been looking for a vinyl copy ever since. This past weekend I found one at one of my new favorite record stores: Discland in Bloomington Minnesota.
What I love about this LP is that it has a real soul feel. This was when Willie was on Atlantic Records and it was produced by Arif Mardin, Jerry Wexler and David Briggs (Neil Young).
The most famous song on the LP is Whiskey River. But I absolutely love the first cut: Shotgun Willie – it is a bit of typical country Willie, but added with some Memphis spice courtesy of the Memphis Horns (Stax Records).
I don’t think I have ever met a Willie record that I did not like, but this is a first among equals (AKA a masterpiece).
One of my great pleasures is the bi-monthly Minnesota Record Show. This past weekend I went and found a few pleasures.
I was not familiar with this album at all, but it had several tell-tale signs I was going to like it: it was on CTI records, it starred Chick Corea, Jack DeJohnette, Dave Holland, and John McLaughlin, and it was dated from 1970. Clearly this was going to be under the influence of Miles and Bitches Brew. An added bonus is that this was recorded at Van Gelder Studios and engineered by Rudy Van Gelder (naturally produced by Creed Taylor).
First off I got lucky and this was one pristine piece of vinyl. Second the music is mighty fine. Farrell and Corea are the most prominent.
This is not easy listening jazz. It is not a fusion album. This is pretty straight forward jazz bordering on avant-garde, but a touch mellower. This is not under the influence of Miles and Bitches Brew – but that is not a disappointment.
There is great horn playing by Farrell – we are treated to soprano and tenor sax, flute and oboe. Very progressive stuff and timeless too.
When this project was first announced I was very excited. I am a huge Stones fan and have generally been disappointed by Mick Jagger’s solo work. This sounded like it had more possibilities for greatness. Mick is messing in the studio with his buddy Dave Stewart (frequent collaborator and former Eurythmic). Dave had been working with Joss Stone so she enters the picture. Damian Marley is in neighboring studio – so he joins the mix. Somehow Indian film composer A.R. Rahman (Slum Dog Millionaire) joins the party.
This sounded like it was going to be some spicy stew.
Well I am pleased to report this album is a hoot. This mix of improbable collaborators actually works. It is fun to hear Jagger having fun for a change. He is even willing to make a bit of fool of himself by toasting a verse Damian Marley style – but mostly he plays Mick Jagger.
Everyone gets a chance to shine here, but Jagger and Marley stand out the most. Joss Stone is more of a backup singer and occasional spice added to the mix. A.R. Rahman add lots of nice and subtle Indian pop atmospherics.
Highly recommended to the open minded Stones fan.
I have no idea how I missed this 1978 release back in the day. It was produced by Becker and Fagen (Steely Dan) at the height of their Aja success. I was an emerging jazz head at the time – a regular reader of Downbeat. This is a great jazz record. A couple of tenor players I have never heard of blowing their brains out.
This is not jazz rock, this is not jazz lite, this is high quality post bop jazz. I am just getting into it, but after a couple of plays I really like it. Stay tuned as I learn more about this. I discovered this in one of emusic’s 6 degree articles (Six Degrees of Steely Dan’s Aja).
See All About Jazz for a a more informed review: Pete Christlieb/Warne Marsh Quintet: Apogee (2004)
I think every music-head (AKA music snob) has at least one genre of music they are a bit embarrassed by – for me that is pop metal (e.g. Def Leppard, Van Halen, Poison, Guns n’ Roses, etc.). This style of music seems crass compared to my alleged erudite taste.
But let’s face it there is time for a fine Itailian meal with good wine and there is time for White Castles and cheap (but cold) beer.
So along comes Chickenfoot’s second album. Unlike most sophomore albums this one is actually better than the debut.
For those of you not familar with Chickenfoot they are a “super group” made up of mega-guitarist Joe Satriani, Michael Anthony and Sammy Hager from Van Halen and Chad Smith of the Chili Peppers.
They make wonderfully mindless white bread pop metal. If you regularly listen to a classic rock station you should like this. I like classic rock, but I am so bored with the same tunes I have heard for the last 40 years. So I am grateful when dinosaur rockers bring some new quality material to the table.
This is a pretty diverse album – a couple of tunes would not sound out of place on a late 80’s Van Halen album and a couple would not sound out of place on a late 80’s John Mellencamp album. So put on you sunglasses, roll down the windows, rev the engine, turn up the stereo and rock out to the latest Chickenfoot.
Wow – what a return to form. This is like a greatest hits package. Styles from across Wilco’s varied career – songs that would not sound out of place on any of their past albums, but this is not a discombobulated mess – it ties together. Now granted I am reflecting on just one listen (see http://www.npr.org/2011/09/19/140476897/first-listen-wilco-the-whole-love for a free stream). But my first pass is true love. I have to admit the last couple of Wilco albums have kind of bored me, but this one is exciting me.
A more complete review is forth coming based on a more serious listen.
I am a sucker for baseball movies and my wife is a sucker for Brad Pitt. The weekend we went to see Moneyball and we were both pleased. This is a really good movie made out of a not so easy story to tell: how some guys used statistics as their tool to renovate a MLB team. The acting is great and the story telling is wonderful.
What I found most interesting was the bravery of taking something that was only slightly broken and fixing it with a completely new approach. The A’s that Billy Beane messed with were not complete failures – they had won the division the year before. But Beane realized that his business model could not successfully compete with the Yankees and he was going to have to take a whole new approach.
This movie is fun to watch, but also very thought provoking. Highly recommended.
One of the great jazz labels of all time for me is ECM. I first discovered ECM as it was Pat Metheny’s original label. ECM releases have a distinctive feel – generally mellow, chamber jazz with a bit of a folk feel.
On of my garage sale finds this past summer was Ralph Towner/Gary Burton – Match Book. I picked it up for several reasons: it was an ECM release (which have never failed me), Ralph Towner (I am a huge fan of his band Oregon) and Gary Burton (who was Pat Metheny’s mentor and am a big fan of Gary owning several of his releases).
Gary play the vibes in a very distinctive style – he generally is generous about letting the vibes resonate. And he plays with two mallets in each hand – so he is playing both cords and individual notes.
Ralph plays acoustic guitars. Two my ear he mixes classical and folk stylings.
On this piece Gary plays with slow style that really allows the vibes to resonate. Ralph play both a classic guitar and a twelve stings. At times he is playing conventionally, but other times very percusively.
Together Gary and Ralph play beautiful duets – complementing each instrument – not so much in harmony but percussively. This is beautifully simple, yet complex music. It is engaging enough for intent listening, yet gentle enough to use a background music. In my mind this is an amazing feat to have engaging music for the active listening and yet still serve as unobtrusive background/ambient music.
I highly recommend this LP. Given how quite the music is you will want a very pristine vinyl copy or the CD. I got lucky and go a pretty clean vinyl copy for a buck at a garage sale – with a good cleaning it sounds absolutely amazing. Given this is from 1974 it was originally issued on LP (so the preferred source) – I have never heard a CD edition so I have no idea of the quality of the CD (but ECM is a quality label and rarely disappoints on reissues).
Finally I recommend the review on “beyond sound and space” blog of the LP: http://ecmreviews.com/2010/12/05/matchbook/
In January of 2007 Marsalis did a similar concert with Willie Nelson. For those of you not fully familiar with Willie this was not really an odd match up. Willie has a jazz/swing side and has always had impeccable ear for the great American songbook.
The match up with Clapton makes sense given Clapton’s encyclopedic knowledge of the blues. What makes this fun is that Clapton does not do his typical electric blues or even acoustic blues, but instead turns the reins over to Marsalis’ New Orleans traditional jazz aesthetics. These are wonderful arrangements of traditional blues songs.
I am not very educated in this style of music, but you really get the idea of what is going on when the band rearranges Clapton’s Layla as a New Orleans styled jazz funeral dirge – it re-imagines that familiar tune in a wonderful way. I really enjoyed hearing Clapton in this context.
A real treat for me was hearing Marsalis band – these are amazing players who have amazing chops and tone. Particularly notable was trombonist Chris Crenshaw – his tone is wonderfully nasty.
My only real disappointment was the recording quality – this also marred the Willie Nelson set too. It does not really capture the concert hall – there is a narrowness and harshness to the recording. But like a classic old vinyl recording with crackle and pops in the grooves this is pretty easy to overlook because the underlying music is so wonderful.
Be warned if you are a pop-Clapton fan you may not like this, but if you are open to jazz or to Clapton’s more traditional blues work you will not be disappointed.
Added note on Clapton – I have utmost respect for this guy, but he has put out so many duds over the years – why? I have a theory that Eric is only truly inspired when he is with the right players (he is always with great players, just not always the “right” players). Get him with the right players and he is amazing, get him with the wrong players (sorry Phil Collins) and he is sappy. Marsalis is the right player.
Axl's Catch Groove 