Good Friday, cyberspace travelers. I hope you are feeling well. In fact, I hope you are feeling so well that you wouldn’t hesitate to say you’re feeling downright jazzy. If this is indeed the case, you’ve definitely pointed your web browser to the correct page, because in today’s installment of “Treasures From The Collector’s Slum” we’re going to be listening to some fantastic, sadly out-of-print jazz LPs. I should mention before I begin that I have absolutely zero jazz vocabulary, so I’m relying heavily on information from outside sources. Hopefully I’ve cited them all directly. As Mark Prindle once wrote, “I don’t understand jazz really at all.”
Anthony Braxton is often called “jazz’s last bona fide genius” (AllMusic). He managed to create music that many compared not to jazz but to 20th century classical music. This led to his being ostracized by jazz musicians who could not fully grasp his experimental tendencies. Rather than align his style with innovative composers like Eric Dolphy, Braxton was a Cage-ian figure, who the jazz world never truly accepted as one of their own.
Creative Orchestra Music is one of his most noteworthy recordings. The groups he composed for ranged from fifteen to twenty pieces. It is truly an ambitious album. It manages to combine the swinging, big-band-style of Count Basie or Duke Ellington with true free jazz movements. What’s great about this album is how it hints at what must have been a marvelous sense of humor. “Piece Three” sounds like a county fair, complete with a parade march and carousels. Without so much as a flinch, things take a turn for the abstract. This atmosphere is present throughout the album, making it both a challenging and fun listening experience.
Anthony Braxton
Creative Orchestra Music 1976
MediaFire Download Link
Track Listing:
01) Piece One
02) Piece Two
03) Piece Three
04) Piece Four
05) Piece Five
06) Piece Six
Julius Hemphill worked with both big bands and duos during his illustrious career, and though his primary instrument was an alto saxophone, it emitted such a brutally harsh tone that it could sound like a battered lead pipe. During his 30s, he moved from St. Louis to New York and recorded with both Lester Bowie and Anthony Braxton, and found lasting success during the last 70s and 80s. But it was his recorded output during the early seventies, specifically his first two releases Dogon A.D. and Coon Bid’ness that best exemplified his avant-garde tendencies.
On the topic of Dogon A.D., Free Jazz blog writes, “From the very first notes of this album, you know that something special is taking place. The cello of Abdul Wadud brings a repetitive theme, supported by some energetic drumming by Philip Wilson, with Hemphill and Baikida Carroll on sax and trumpet playing the main theme. After a minute or so Carroll drops away and Hemphill starts with a magical sax solo. Wadud and Wilson relentlessly continue with their hypnotic basis, sometimes only playing parts of it, yet keeping it implicitly present at all times. After about 13 minutes the piece changes and the contrapuntal interplay between the cello on the one hand and the sax and trumpet on the other hand leads to a climactic finale. Dogon A.D. is phenomenal in the simplicity of its form and the power and creativity of its performance. “Rites”, the second number, starts with strong interplay of the four band members, who quickly pursue their own lines without loosing focus of the whole. “Painter” brings Hemphill on flute. This is an absolute must for all jazz fans. It is unfortunately impossible to get in stores anymore, and it is very hard to understand that it was never brought out on CD.”
Julius Hemphill
Dogon A.D.
MediaFire Download Link
Track Listing:
01) Dogon A.D.
02) Rites
03) The Painter
As for ‘Coon Bid’ness, Metropolis Blog says, “Side one works as a single composition. The opening piece, “Reflections,” begins with a slow lament, the three horns and cello creating dark, rich harmonies and utilizing a subtle vibrato to underline the music’s pathos. “Lyric” continues in this vein; then the space begins to open up. Hemphill, it seems, likes to work with several layers of sound, to slowly take them apart – to the point of near dissolution – then to put them back together again (though not neccessarily the same as they were before). This is what happens during “Lyric” and also during “Skin 1.” The latter piece especially works its way into some very free space. Then “Skin 2” offers alternate choices as to the side’s resolution; yet there is no real resolution, only lingering afterthoughts.
“Hard Blues” (side two) is an unreleased track from the sessions that produced Dogon A.D., originally released on Hemphill’s label, Mbari, and now re-released by Arista. It’s a funky but somewhat rambling piece, with good solos by Hemphill and Carroll. But, by and large, the music on Dogon is better.”
Julius Hemphill
‘Coon Bid’ness
MediaFire Download Link
Track Listing:
01) Reflections
02) Lyric
03) Skin 1
04) Skin 2
05) Hard Blues
– Last but certainly not least, a link from an Entertainment Weekly LOST article leads to this intriguing Time/Loop theory. Apparently the page receives over 10,000 hits per day, so I imagine the creators of LOST are hip to it and will do everything in their power to disprove its theories over the course of the final episodes. At least, that’s what I’m hoping. Once I finished reading it I started to feel like the rest of the show had been spoiled for me.
