Ballad Time

 

Fort Lauderdale meets Cape Town, or: mister Shepp teams up with mister Brand. What can possibly go wrong? 

Archie Shepp & Dollar Brand - Left Alone

United

Waving goodbye to 2019 with a swinging six pack of fine jazz tracks I've been grooving to of late. Just dig in and dig.

Archie Shepp - Naima
Ahmed Abdul-Malik - Summertime
Kenny Drew - Weird-O
Sonny Clark - Blues Blue
Charles Mingus - Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting
Larry Young - The Moontrane

Pray On

Jazz, soul, gospel even? Who the cap fits. Presenting a lovely track from that other wonderful album of 'trans-African music' Archie Shepp recorded in the early seventies - his tour de force Attica Blues being its counterpart of course. Give praise.

Archie Shepp -  A Prayer

Know What I Mean?

Been listening to quite a bit of jazz lately, and thought a hot little six pack would be just the thing for a dreary Monday like this one. So without further ado...

Cannonball Adderley with Bill Evans - Who Cares?

Bud Shank - All The Things You Are
Lee Konitz - People Will Say We're In Love
Blue Mitchell - The Thing To Do
Kenny Clarke - Bohemia After Dark
Archie Shepp & Mal Waldron - Left Alone

Wild Weekend Vol. 42

It´s just another Wild Weekend as we jazz it up revolutionary style with mr. Shepp, take L Dopa with mr. Albini and preview El Classico with mr. Smith. Plus we´ve got a Cohen protégé, an sixties acid folkie and a new bluesy talent to watch. Enjoy and please do have a wild one.

And we´re off in jazz mode with Archie Shepp and a soulful monster from his ´72 masterpiece Attica Blues. Grooves like hell, lamenting in the meantime the miserable fate of activist George Jackson, the famous Black Panther and Soledad Brother who was shot by guards at Saint Quentin prison in an alleged escape attempt. Shepp had his doubts about this, and probably with good reason. Next up: renowned producer Steve Albini´s both revolutionary and uncompromising eighties power trio Big Black. Short but sweet sample track L Dopa hails from a certain razor sharp album with a sleeve and a title to die for. Alright?

Archie Shepp - Blues For Brother George Jackson MP3

Big Black - L Dopa MP3

El Classico will be played in Barcelona this Monday, which is an incredibly big thing in Spain, and especially in my dearest Catalunya. Barça vs. Real Madrid is a game drenched in history, which guarantees an electrical atmosphere in the Camp Nou. Better believe me, as I witnessed a couple of amazing encounters between the blaugrana and the blancos there myself. Forza Barça! Find Mark E. Smith´s ode to the match of matches on what´s possibly the Fall´s finest: Hex Enduction Hour. For something completely different, we turn to Charlie Parr. I read an enthusiastic piece about his last album in my newspaper of all places, checked out one of his bluesy Americana songs on the Hype Machine and immediately ordered When The Devil Goes Blind straight from the lion´s mouth. Yes, he´s that good.

The Fall - The Classical MP3

Charlie Parr - I Dreamed I Saw Jesse James Last Night MP3

A while back, reader Holly alerted me in a comment to an interesting album on the legendary underground label ESP by some weirdo who called himself MIJ. And indeed, Yodeling Astrologer (from ´69) does sound quite unique, as the acid drenched Grok (Martian Love Call) illustrates. Freakfolk avant la lettre. And we´ve come to the end of another Wild Weekend with a sunny sounding popsong by Neema, a Canadian singer from Egyptian and Lebanese descent who lives quite close to Leonard Cohen. "It´s a foggy night in the streets of Montreal..." The ageing master must have been rather smitten by his near-neighbour, as he co-produced her album Watching You Think, and drew its cover too. Quite a recommendation methinks.

MIJ - Grok (Martian Love Call) MP3

Neema - Escape MP3

Way out there

I first came across Archie Shepp through Nick Cave. Way back in the eighties I was listening to a Dutch radio show in which Saint Nick was asked to present his favourite music. I vaguely recall him spinning some old blues stuff, some Elvis, Dylan and Cash; the usual suspects so to speak.

But then he played a song called Blasé by jazzman Archie Shepp and that bowled me right over. What a sound! Bluesy, way out there and not like anything I´d heard before. Worth the price of admission alone for that threatening piano intro. Shepp´s tenor playing is sparse but very effective and the inclusion of 2 blues harmonicas towards the end works surprisingly well.

There´s some seriously heavy shit going on in the lyrics: "Blasé ain´t you big daddy? You who shot your sperm into me, but never set me free". Right on. Jeanne Lee is the singer and yes that´s the mighty Philly Joe Jones on drums. The other 4 songs on the Blasé album (´69) aren´t half bad either by the way. "This ain´t a hate thing, it´s a love thing". Thanks for the tip Nick.

Archie Shepp - Blasé MP3