Big Floyd fan here myself and, yeah, I hear a lot of jazz in Richard Wright's playing- much moreso than other Prog keyboardists like, say, Tony Banks or Rick Wakeman. Two great examples of Richard's jazz playing off the top of my head are "San Tropez" and the intro to "Sheep". Hell, that intro to "Sheep" could very well be how I fell in love with the sound of the Fender Rhodes Ha! Filles was a sober Discogs purchase for me last week Cover and vinyl are probably VG at best, but the LP sounds better than it looks.
I like those early Wynton albums as well. Any with Kenny Kirkland are worth checking out imo. He left us way too soon. Tragic.
A Japanese critique, great Shoichi Yui, once wrote that if you are a jazz beginner and collecting Sonny Rollins albums, Saxophone Colossus and Way Out West are essential, but you can do without the others since you will buy the albums by Miles Davis and Thelonious Monk with Rollins anyway.
The album that started it all for me, heard it in '72 or so and it started me out on my Miles and then jazz journey.
Denny Zeitlin - Cathexis Had a massive ‘this is the best thing ever’ burst of enthusiasm for Zeitlin when i discovered him a few years ago, but it kind of faded and he never really entered my regular rotation. I’ve found it hard to find my way back in, almost always take his albums off after listening to a couple of songs. Tonight, however, this is hitting the spot big time. Back in the mood i guess.
Boy, what a beating I took for that 80s jazz post. Learned a lot from your answers, and I'll check some of those examples you gave (@chervokas and others). That's what I love about this thread - the discussion/conversation factor. Not agreeing on every subject and not having the same tastes enriches the thread (IMO). As a consequence I'm playing this one today - my favorite 80s jazz album (actually one of my all time favorites): Got that one as part of the ECM touchstones series. Good price, but awful packaging - and I'm not even one of those guys that hate digipacks. Sound is exceptional, as for most of ECM CDs. As for the playing... I guess Dave followed Miles example on this one. Once the top was reached he moved on to something else despite the success. To bad that it just took one album to reach the top. Dave Holland proves that he's a hell of a composition writer. And I was amazed with the technics the other guys displayed on their playing. Check the complexity and beauty of the track "The Oracle" to see what I'm talking about.
I love that "Old Cowhand," in fact I love the whole albums. It's quintessential Sonny Rollins -- bristling with imagination, out of the box song selection. But I think the album wound up a favorite among audiophiles not so much for the music but because it's an early true stereo recording with the most minimalist of setup by Roy Dunann with condenser mics directly feeding the tape machine. It has maybe the best bass sound of any jazz bass recorded in the decade. It has all that non-musical detail that audiophiles love -- Sonny spinning off mic routinely, etc., you can kinds of tell by how resolving your system is by how much center fill room space you can hear, on and on. I don't know that's outside of audiophile circles it's more celebrated than Tenor Madness or Saxophone Colossus or Sonny Boy or A Night at the Village Vanguard.
We probably have very different tastes, musically and soncially -- for example, while I love Dave Holland, he's one of my favorite bass players ever and I love his compositions, I've never loved his '80s and following quintet, and I hate the sound of ECM records -- not just his, all of 'em -- post 1980s, I think they're dark and murky and clouded sounding, I really struggle to listen to them, they make all the music sound the same and they sap the music of all its energy, when an album is on ECM I think twice about whether I want to buy it because I know I'm going to have to struggle to listen through the sound to the music. Some of the early ECMs, by contrast, are great sounding to me. So, take my recommendations for what they are -- albums I really love from the '80s (that was the era when I first really went down the jazz rabbit hole so most of this was stuff I was listening to as it was coming out), but which you might not considering our different tastes Off the top of my head: Billy Bang - Changing Seasons Julius Hemphil - Flat Out Jump Suit David Murray - Ming Joanne Brackeen - Ancient Dynasty Muhal Richard Abrams - Mama and Dady WSQ - Revue Art Ensemble - Urban Bushmen Muhal Richard Abrams - Blues Forever Paul Motian - Psalm David Murray - Home David Murray - Murray's Steps Blood Ulmer - Odyessy Don Pullen - Evidence of Things Unseen Paul Motian: The Story Of Maryam Ornette Coleman/Pat Methany - Song X Henry Threadgill - Just the Facts and Pass the Bucket Wynton Marsalis -Black Codes (I'm not much a Marsalis fan, but so much of this material became almost standard that it's important) Don Pullen - Sixth Sense Henry Threadgill - Slip Easily Into Another World Ornette Coleman -In All Languages Phalanx - Original Phalanx Muhal Richard Abrams - Hearinga Suite
One of the Sonny Rollins’ best audiophile recordings is Our Man In Jazz on RCA. It’s a GREAT audiophile disc. Every nuance of details is eerily palpable.
It's a workmanlike display of the trio's chops, heavy and sweating. For the Rollins' trio in full flight live I turn to their European '59 tour recordings. The 3CD euroboot "Live in Europe" is superb.
I meant to put Live at BAM on my list, that's my favorite WSQ album actually. Also, to me, that's one of the greatest sounding live jazz albums ever.
And here are some more selections that are among my favourite live recordings from the decade (two per year): Art Pepper - Blues for the Fisherman '80 Phil Woods - European Tour Live '80 Peter Kowald, Wadada Leo Smith & Günter Sommer - Touch the Earth - Break the Shells '81 Sam Rivers - Crosscurrent: Live at Jazz Unité '81 Lester Bowie - Great Pretender: Live at Jazzbühne, Berlin '82 Pat Metheny - Travels '82 Graham Collier - Hoarded Dreams '83 Steve Lacy - Blinks... Zurich - Live '83 Joëlle Léandre - Les Douze Sons '83 Mike Westbrook - On Duke's Birthday '84 Norma Winstone - Live at Roccella Jonica '84 Joe Henderson - State of the Tenor: Live at the Village Vanguard '85 Vienna Art Orchestra - A Notion in Perpetual Motion '85 Billy Bang - Live at Carlos I '86 Mal Waldron - Seagulls of Kristiansund '86 Maarten Altena - Rif '87 Heiner Goebbels & Alfred Harth - Live at Victoriaville '87 Bobby Bradford & John Carter - Comin' On '88 Sergey Kuryokhin - Absolutely Great! '88 Charlie Haden - Montreal Tapes '89 Horace Tapscott - Dark Tree '89
I really enjoy Zeitland, especially those early Columbia recordings. I have a more recent cd of his dedicated to Waynes Shorter. It's interesting to hear some of those well known classics driven by piano instead of tenor sax.
I don't think you got beat up at all. It was a provocative statement that created conversation so cudos to you for posting it. It's easier to talk of 80s jazz when you lived it vs searching for it in today's world. So you just got responses of people who were there. I think that's easier than trying to search for 80s jazz albums today.
WP Anouar Brahem - Blue Maqams (ECM) NP Thad Jones - Detroit/New York Junction (Blue Note) Classic Records mono reissue One of my favorite Thad Jones albums.
Funny coincidence that you should be talking about this as I picked this up this weekend at my neighborhood Record store. I was contemplating picking up the new Concord Craft Recording version of this but this mastering on this version comes from the original master tape and is mastered by Doug Sax at TML circa 1992. They claim its an all tube signal chain from beginning to end and was pressed in limited numbers at RTI. This pressing is sequence number 0049. Its in very good shape except for some faint crackles and clicks here and there on side two. As for the audiophile attributes you alluded to, Sonny appears fully formed to the right of the left speaker and left of dead center with the bass on the right with Ray brown in front of Shelly Manne's drums. The bass playing is very well defined but what is most captivating is the crispness and vividness of the drums and cymbals during Shelly's solos at various points on the album. I agree with your sentiments about the creativity on this album and "the out of the box song selection", Rollins' make I'm An Old Cowhand sound like it was written as a jazz piece.
NP Rhasan Roland Kirk - I Talk To The Spirits (Limelight) Orig. lp. One of my favorites from RRK, a real tour de force of jazz flute.
I was a sporadic listener to jazz in the 8os and 90s. In general, I prefer jazz from the late 70s on than from the 50s and 60s.
Was a day with a lot of miles spent in the car taking Dad to a few appointments and to lunch and back to the country side again. In the car it was WCLV listener supported classical music station from Lorain. Now bact at home: Oscar Pettiford Orchestra "Deep Passion" Impulse Followed by Tommy Flanagan "Confirmation" Enja