Organic Grooves 28873 Items

Charles Tolliver / Music Inc & Orchestra

Release: 1980 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Re-mastering by: Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London

This little-known album by New Orleans-born drummer Idris Muhammad (1939-2014) was originally recorded for Theresa at Rudy Van Gelder's studio in New Jersey on September 12, 1980 with George Coleman & Pharoah Sanders on tenor saxophones & Ray Drummond on bass.

The six powerful tracks include originals from Muhammad & Drummond and an impressive version of Billy Eckstine's 'I Want To Talk About You' featuring Sanders.

'Kabsha', which is dedicated to Muhammad's youngest daughter, is recommended to anyone who appreciates inventive and passionate modern jazz.

Drummer Idris Muhammad's strongest jazz date as a leader. Muhammad, who had often been heard in funky or more commercial settings, really excels in this sparse setting, showing off what he learned from hearing bands in his native New Orleans. In addition, both the underrated Coleman and Sanders are heard in top form, stretching out on originals, basic pieces, and "I Want to Talk About You" (during which Sanders lets out a few trademark screams so everyone knows that he is not John Coltrane). Highly recommended. Scott Yanow/AMG

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Impact

LP | 1976 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

LP | 2020 | US | Original (Bastard Jazz)

Release: 1976 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Trumpeter/flügelhornist Charles Tolliver often straddled the line between the lyricism of hard bop and the adventurous nature of the avant-garde. Released in 1975, "Impact" contained a stimulating progressive edge within an energetic large band (14 horns, eight strings, and rhythm section) format. Tolliver's arrangements are consistently bright and build momentum, while the soloists are given sufficient room to manoeuvre through the multiple textures. Featured soloists in the remarkable reed section include Charles McPherson, James Spaulding, George Coleman, and Harold Vick.

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Kumail

Yasmin

Release: 2020 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 2015 | DE | Original (Private)

Black Devil

Disco Club

LP | 1971 | UK | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 2015 / DE – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves, Electronic & Dance

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Used Vinyl

Medium: Near Mint, Cover: VG+

Limited pressing on blue vinyl. 250 copies. Download code, insert and stickers included. Bent corner and small price tag on cover.

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Dr. John

Sun, Moon & Herbs

LP | 1972 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1971 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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"The Sun, Moon & Herbs" - Dr. John (voc, p, org, vib, perc); Tommy Ferrone, Eric Clapton (g); Bobby Keys (sax); Ed Hoerner, Jim Price (tp); Ken Terroade (fl); Walter Davis (p); Ronnie Barron (org); Jesse Boyce (b); John Boudreaux (dr); The Memphis Horns & backing vocals; a.o.
"The Sun, Moon & Herbs" was originally conceived as a triple album, but it was fragmented, stripped down and put together again to form the present single-disc LP. And although Dr. John never liked this version much, it is proof of the theory 'less is more'. None of the seven tracks are suitable for broadcasting on the radio and the spells that Dr. John and his companions weave are dark and swampy. "Black John The Conqueror" has its origins in ancient Cajun folklore, which the good Dr. modernised and gave a beat. The swampy "Craney Crow" is the younger sibling of his earlier "Walk On Guilded Splinters" and has a similar effect on the listener. "Pots On Fiyo (Filé Gumbo)" combines Latin-American rhythms with a wealth of Cajun chants and spells. The vocals are almost unfathomable and serve rather more as an additional musical instrument in the mix. "Zu Zu Zu Mamou" is so tightly knitted that one can almost cut through the music with a knife; the mood here takes on a quite different meaning. "The Sun, Moon & Herbs" is best heard on a hot sultry night where thunder rolls in the distance like jungle drums. Dr. John certainly had something specific in mind, but it is up to the listener to find out just what it was.

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Rahsaan Roland Kirk

Blacknuss

LP | 1968 | UK | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1972 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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As deep as a soul record can be and as hot as any jazz record has a right to call itself. deep

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Yusef Lateef

The Blue Yusef Lateef

LP | 1965 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1968 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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"The Blue Yusef Lateef" - Yusef Lateef (ts, fl, perc, voc); Sonny Red (as); Blue Mitchell (tp); Kenny Burrell (g); Hugh Lawson (p); Buddy Lucas (hca); Cecil McBee, Bob Cranshaw (b); Roy Brooks (dr); strings and vocal group

Yusuf Lateef was a leading representative of world music, long before world music was known as such in the jazz, pop and rock community. He integrated all kinds of oriental instruments in his jazz music, such as the koto, bamboo flute and tambura and also – as in this case – in his blues compositions. His saxophone playing is also flawless too and full of wonderful textures, hard and impulsive at one moment, cool and exotic at the next.
On this album Lateef explores, in a painterly way, the border areas of the blues, in all their various guises and addresses both eastern and western cultures. "Juba Juba" begins with a drumbeat on a slave ship, the tempo builds up slowly and agonizingly, and is only penetrated by Lateef’s plaintive flute and background voices singing »freedom, freedom, freedom«. After such a gloomy beginning the classical blues number "Like It Is" comes over like a breath of fresh air, with its superb string quartet as the foundation. The R&B contributions on the other tracks testify to Lateef’s skilled excursions into the realm of the blues, while the truly adventurous tracks such as "Back Home" and the mystic, Chinese odyssey "Moon Cup" weave a magical net of sheer pleasure. "The Blue Yusef Lateef" is in every possible way absolutely breathtaking. It is a milestone as a jazz album. As a blues album it is quite unique. But as a musical work of art it is a glorious and genial masterpiece.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. More information under www.pure-analogue.com.
All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

Recording: April 1968 in RCA Studios, New York City by Ray Hall
Production: Joel Dorn

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Eddie Harris

The In Sound

These Are My Roots - Clifford Jordan Plays Leadbelly

Release: 1965 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Re-mastering by: Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London

This is one of Eddie Harris' great records. The playing is inspired! What a band! Cedar Walton (piano) and Billy Higgins (drums), Lee Morgan's favourite rhythm section. The underrated but popular tenor saxophonist introduces his "Freedom Jazz Dance," which would become a jazz standard after featuring on Miles Davis' album Miles Smiles. Plays one of the earlier versions of "The Shadow of Your Smile," romps on "Love for Sale" and "'S Wonderful," and also performs "Born to Be Blue" and his own "Cryin' Blues." Harris is heard in prime form in a quartet/quintet with pianist Cedar Walton, bassist Ron Carter, drummer Billy Higgins, and part-time trumpeter Ray Codrington. A gem. - Scott Yanow/AMG

Recorded 1965
Engineer – Tom Dowd

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Clifford Jordan

LP | 1965 | EU | Reissue (Atlantic)

Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes

Release: 1965 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Re-mastering by: Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London

Clifford Jordan hailed from Chicago, hometown of hard-driving, so-called ‘tough tenorists’ like Gene Ammons and Eddie ‘Lockjaw’ Davis. While Jordan shared their unnerving bravado, his tone is different, an alluring tone, simultaneously rough around the edges and ephemeral. A sought-after sideman, Jordan recorded with stalwarts as Lee Morgan and Max Roach in the late fifties and early sixties, as well as a series of high standard solo albums. Like age matures wine, Jordan’s style ripened in the early seventies, his lines becoming fluent like ripples of lake water. Jordan kept recording and performing steadily until his death in 1993.

Maybe this album, filled with interpretations of such classic tunes as Take This Hammer and Goodnight Irene, is not such a surprise act after all. The preceding year, Jordan had been part of Charles Mingus’ outfit (appearing on the hi-voltage live album Right Now: Live At The Jazz Workshop) Musical gobbler Mingus’ unfazed search for new vistas while retaining an all-embracing sense of the past’s relevance and blend of harmonic finesse with unbridled juke joint tumult surely rubbed off on Jordan.

Da Gray Goose is one of the cases in point. Tasteful harmony over the stop-time theme kicks it into action, strongly plucked bass and fiery drums inspire the soloists, creating an atmosphere of abandon. Lusty shout choruses stoke up the fire as the tune progresses. There are also some, yes, virtuoso banjo parts.

The gloomy folk blues music of Huddie ‘Leadbelly’ Ledbetter, whose life story reads like a combined effort of Shakespeare and James Baldwin, including oppression, hardship, addiction, treachery, murder and prison life, is excellently cast in a jazz frame. But not too jazzy, often the sound of Jordan’s top-notch group is as tough-as-nails as the sound of any one group that enlivened the back alley bars way back when. Jordan’s unpredictable phrasing overcomes the restrictions of the rigid folk blues form.

Craftily uncrafted, These Are My Roots is a spirited album of earnest, raw and ebullient swing.

Recorded on February 1 & 17, 1965 in NYC

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Visions Of A New World Remastered Edition

LP | 1975 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Kimiko Kasai with Herbie Hancock

Release: 1975 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Re-mastering by: Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London

Pianist Lonnie Liston Smith began his true professional career with Pharoah Sanders and then moved on to the very electric Miles Davis band before embarking on his own journey -- one that took him deep into the waters of pop music and disco by the late '70s. On Visions of a New World, Smith, accompanied by his working unit the Cosmic Echoes, digs deeper into the soul-jazz vein that he had begun exploring on Expansions and Funk Extraction in 1973 and 1974, respectively. In 1975, Smith was looking for a smoother, more soulful groove than he had displayed previously. Elements of the earlier band are in evidence: Vocalist Donald Smith is still on board, as are Dave Hubbard and Cecil Bridgewater on horns. Reggie Lucas even helps out on guitar in one or two places, and Ray Armando helps the percussion section. Despite these fiery players, the music here is strictly a late-night seduction/meditation groove. Tracks like the opener, "A Chance for Peace," keep the funk in mid-tempo while rounding off the edges, but "Love Beams" sounds exactly like its name. "Colours of the Rainbow" is a duet between Donald and Lonnie on keyboard and vocals, and "Devika" is the first place where the groove exceeds the mood. Latin rhythms, loosely woven horn lines, funky backbeats, and a slinky melody bring the whole thing up a couple of notches. The only other place the album heats up is on the final two tracks: the second part of the title suite -- when Donald Smith stops singing -- and "Summer Nights," when the concentration is on pure movement and sweaty, shimmering late-night funk. - ThomJurek/AMG

Recorded in 1975 at Electric Lady Studios

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Butterfly

LP | 1979 | EU | Reissue (Be With)

Louis Armstrong & His All-Stars

Release: 1979 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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This is the 2020 repress. Due to its super-rare status as a Japan-only release, this exquisite collection of covers never got the recognition it deserved at the time, despite incredibly inspired performances from Kimiko, Herbie and the supremely talented musicians assembled for the project. From heavenly drummer Alphonse Mouzon and renowned organist Webster Lewis to bassist Paul Jackson, reedman Bennie Maupin and the master percussionist Bill Summers, the legendary performers crafted amazingly good vocal versions of Herbie / Headhunters jazz-funk.

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Live In 1956 (Allentown, Pa) Black Friday Record Store Day 2019 Edition

LP | 2019 | US | Original (Atlantic)

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Limitation: 1000. RSD Limited Run. Unearthed for the first time after the discovery of a “mystery" tape reel, Louis Armstrong's performance in Allentown, PA on November 24, 1956 is one for the history books. Armstrong is joined by his All-Stars, including Trummy Young, Edmund Hall, Billy Kyle, and Velma Middleton. Available for the first time in any format, the historic concert audio has been mastered from the original analog tape and pressed on color vinyl for this limited edition release, exclusively for RSD Black Friday.

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Linda Hill

Lullaby For Linda

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Featuring members of the Arkesta
Re-mastering by Kevin Gray
Produced by Tom Albach
Recorded & mixed by Dennis Moody in 1981
Linda Hill recorded this LP for Nimbus West in 1981 with fellow Arkestra members, including flautist Adele Sebastian. And it’s Sebastian’s vocal duet with Hill on the spiritual jazz epic “Leland’s Song” that opens this stunning LP. Hill’s ensemble also included the serious horn player Sabir Matteen, as well as bassist Roberto Miranda and drummer Everett Brown Jr., who would all go on to record LPs for Nimbus.

The Arkestra first started rehearsing at pianist Linda Hill’s house in the early ‘60s. “In a few months, we’d built up from seven or eight to about 18 cats, musicians started living there,” Tapscott wrote in his autobiography. “People got involved with the Arkestra like it was their life’s work.” Hill took the role seriously, earning her the name of “the Ark’s matriarch” by Tapscott.

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Gary Bias

East 101

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Recorded at City Recorders, 1981
Produced by Tom Albach & Co-produced by Gary Bias
Engineer – Dennis Moody
A beautiful, dreamlike expression of spiritual jazz recorded at a time when the idiom was completely out of vogue, Gary Bias' East 101 remains little known even by cult-classic standards, but its free-flowing approach demands attention from listeners who believe this kind of LP ceased to exist somewhere around the late 1970s. Recorded with a stellar supporting cast including vibist Rickey Kelly, bassist Roberto Miranda, and pianist David Tillman, Bias unspools a suite of deeply soulful and profoundly far-reaching original compositions that vividly evoke the blue skies of the record's Los Angeles origins. His flute and soprano saxophone somehow divine gravitas from weightlessness, creating music that challenges as much as it comforts.

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Horace Tapscott

Live At Lobero Volume 1

Mogadisco - Dancing In Mogadishu (Somalia '72-91)

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Re-mastering by Kevin Gray
Produced by Tom Albach
Recorded & mixed by Dennis Moody Nov. 12,

1981 in the Lobero Theater, Santa Barbara, California

This is a reissue of a now out-of-print album from live trio date by the legendary LA-based pianist, composer and multi-bandleader, Horace Tapscott. Pianist Horace Tapscott is always at his best when he is leading a trio. 'Sketches of Drunken Mary' features some sparkling piano revolving around a most lyrical bass part that is absolutely touching. The piece ends with a long, monstrous drum solo has to be heard to be believed. I recall hearing/seeing the mighty Sonship with John McLaughlin's One Truth band live at Central Park way back in 1979 and being knocked out by his drumming. 'Raisha's New Hip Dance' is a lovely piece that starts with some amazingly powerful and somewhat dark solo piano, with some strong two handed playing going in different directions and then winding down to somber conclusion, then building back up once again. The final piece is called 'Dark Tree' which is a great work that features a colossal, McCoy-like repeating line that is most hypnotic. The trio explodes in waves together, an immensely propulsive circular current at the center of the storm. Roberto Miranda takes an astonishing, fleet-fingered contrabass solo and then Sonship again provides a cosmic gong, cymbals and drum solo. This is a momentous offering from start to finish. It doesn't get any better than this.

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V.A.

2LP | 2019 | EU | Original (Analog Africa)

Free At Last Extended Edition

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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After being blown away by a few tunes – probably just as you will be after listening to this – Samy Ben Redjeb travelled to the infamous capital city of Somalia in November of 2016, making Analog Africa the frst music label to set foot in Mogadishu. On his arrival in Somalia Samy questioned the need for a vehicle full of armed chaperones casually toting Kalashnikovs, deemed necessary to accompany him to the radio station archive every morning, but then began ri?ing through piles of cassettes and listening to reel-to-reel tapes in the dusty archives of Radio Mogadishu, looking for music that ‘swam against the current’. The stars were aligned: an uncovered and unmarked pile of discarded recordings was discovered in a cluttered corner of the building. Colonel Abshir - the senior employee and protector of Radio Mogadishu’s archives - clarifed that the pile consisted mostly of music nobody had manage to identify, or music he described as being ‘mainly instrumental and strange music’. At the words ‘strange music’ Samy was hooked, the return ?ight to Tunisia was cancelled. The pile turned out to be a cornucopia of different sounds: radio jingles, background music and interludes for radio programmes, television shows and theatre plays. There were also a good number of disco tunes, some had been stripped of their lyrics, the interesting parts had been recorded multiple times then cut, taped together and spliced into a long groovy instrumental loop. Over the next three weeks, often in watermelon-, grapefruit-juice and shisha-fuelled night-time sessions behind the fortifed walls of Radio Mogadishu, Samy and the archive staff put together Mogadisco: Dancing Mogadishu - Somalia 1972–1991. Like everywhere in Africa during the 1970s, both men and women sported huge afros, bell-bottom trousers and platform shoes. James Brown, Stevie Wonder, Marvin Gaye and The Temptations’ funk were the talk of the town.In 1977, Iftin Band were invited to perform at the Festac festival in Lagos where they represented Somalia at the Second World Black and African Festival of Arts and Culture. Not only did they come back with an award, but they also returned with Afrobeat. While Fela Kuti’s ‘Shakara’ had taken over the continent and was spreading like wildfre throughout Latin America, it was the track ‘Lady’ that would become the hit in Mogadishu. At the same time Bob Marley was busy kick-starting reggae-mania in Somalia, which became such a phenomenon that even the police and military bands began playing it. Some say that it was adopted so quickly because of the strong similarities with the traditional beat from the western region of Somalia, called Dhaanto. But then suddenly the trousers got tighter as the disco tsunami hit the country. Michael Jackson appeared with a new sound that would revolutionise Somalia’s live music scene. You couldn’t walk the streets of Mogadishu without seeing kids trying to moonwalk. ‘Somalia had several nightclubs and although most use DJs to play records, some hotels like Jubba, Al-Uruba and Al Jazeera showcased live bands such as Iftin and Shareero’ – so ran a quote from a 1981 article about the explosion of Mogadishu’s live music scene. The venues mentioned in that article were the luxury hotels that had been built to cover the growing demands of the tourist industry. The state-of-the-art hotel Al-Uruba, with its oriental ornaments and white plastered walls, was a wonder of modern architecture. All of Mogadishu’s top bands performed there at some point or another, and many of the songs presented in this compilation were created in such venues. Mogadisco was not Analog Africa’s easiest project. Tracking down the musicians – often in exile in the diaspora – to interview them and gather anecdotes of golden-era Mogadishu has been an undertaking that took three years. Tales of Dur-Dur Band’s kidnapping, movie soundtracks recorded in the basements of hotels, musicians getting electrocuted on stage, others jumping from one band to another under dramatic circumstances, and soul singers competing against each other, are all stories included in the massive booklet that accompanies the compilation - adorned with no less then 50 pictures from the `70s and ‚80s. As Colonel Abshir Hashi Ali, chief don at the Radio Mogadishu archive – someone who once wrestled a bomber wielding an unpinned hand-grenade to the ?oor – put it: ‘I have dedicated my life to this place. I’m doing this so it can get to the next generation; so that the culture, the heritage and the songs of Somalia don’t disappear.’

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Mal Waldron Trio

2LP | 2019 | EU | Original (ECM)

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 2019 | EU | Original (ECM)

Keith Jarrett

Munich 2016

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1978 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Ry Cooder

Jazz

Victim Of The Joke: An Opera

Release: 1978 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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When someone such as Ry Cooder, who delved deeply into traditional sources, just names his LP "Jazz", it is unlikely that one will hear avant-garde music. Actually, in the numbers gathered together here the investigative guitar man dedicated himself more or less to almost forgotten music. Historically informed, yet not adhering to the original instrumental ensemble, this ostensibly antiquated music enjoys a brilliant renaissance. Just like in an album of charming black and white photographs, the old-fashioned style shines out brightly, such as in "Big Band Bill", which (hardly by accident) is modelled on the jaunty swing of Django Reinhard, but does not imitate him. Cooder’s slightly acidic-sounding guitar mixes homogeneously with the delightfully rustic sound of the tuba and a bluegrass mandolin ("Face To Face…"). The typical Caribbean rattle of the marimba enters into a pleasant dialogue with the warped sound of the slide guitar. Folksy bliss in three-four time ("Happy Meeting In Glory") stands confidently on a par with the merry, self-willed saxophone ("In A Mist") and with the poetic, dreamy and meditative guitar ("Flashes"). And just listen to how the classic number "Davenport Blues" – with its emphasis on the woodwinds – grooves along with the vibraphone and tingly inner parts. This sound is both filled with the spirit of Bix Beiderbecke and, based loosely on Mingus, will sooth the Jelly Roll Morton-soul of its fans.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. More information under www.pure-analogue.com.
All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

Recording: 1977 at Amigo Studios, North Hollywood, by Lee Herschberg & Douglas Decker
Production: Ry Cooder & Joseph Byrd

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David Porter

LP | 1971 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Release: 1971 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1970 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Booker T & The MG's

Melting Pot

Release: 1970 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1969 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Bar-Kays

Gotta Groove

Release: 1969 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1967 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Elvin Jones

Midnight Walk

Release: 1967 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1970 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Tito Puente & Celia Cruz

Alma Con Alma

LP | 1968 | EU | Reissue (Craft)

Release: 1970 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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THIS ALBUM SYMBOLIZES THE VERY ESSENCE OF TWO GREAT ARTISTS AT THEIR VERY BEST. THE 'CUBAN EDITH PIAF', CELIA CRUZ AND THE UNPARALLELED TITO PUENTE GIVE THIS ALBUM EVERYTHING IN SPADES: FEELING, STYLE, RHYTHM AND CLASS!

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Willie Colón

Hustler

LP | 2015 | UK | Original (Intimate Friends)

Release: 1968 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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HIS CLASSIC SECOND ALBUM WITH HECTOR LAVOE AS LEAD VOCALIST AND IT SET THE PATH FOR BOTH MEN AS ONE OF THE GREATEST SALSA DUOS IN HISTORY.

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Reginald Omas Mamode IV

All Together

LP | 1965 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 2015 / UK – Original

Genre: Hip Hop, Organic Grooves, Electronic & Dance

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Used Vinyl

Medium: VG+, Cover: Near Mint

Vinyl with a couple of light scuffs

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Sarah Vaughan

Sarah +2

Release: 1965 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1978 | EU | Reissue (Wewantsounds)

Yukihiro Takahashi

Saravah!

Release: 1978 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1971 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Stanley Turrentine

Sugar

Charles Lloyd / John Abercrombie / Dave Holland / Billy Higgins

Release: 1971 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Recorded: November 1970 in Rudy Van Gelder Studios, Englewood Cliffs, NJ, USA

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Voice In The Night

2LP | 2019 | EU | Original (ECM)

2LP | 2019 | EU | Original (ECM)

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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For the first time on vinyl, his album from 1999.

Charles Lloyd's sixth ECM album is both a departure and a homecoming for the Memphis-born and California-based tenorist, introducing new music and revisiting archive favourites (including the epic "Forest Flower"), and featuring an all-star line-up. With his "Scandinavian" band currently on hold, this is Lloyd's first all-American album in a long while - Dave Holland qualifies as an honorary American by now - with all the differences of cultural emphasis that this implies. ECM veteran John Abercrombie and legendary drummer Billy Higgins are in great form throughout as they lock in with Lloyd to tackle material ranging from Billy Strayhorn's "A Flower Is A Lovesome Thing" to the Elvis Costello / Burt Bacharach-penned "God Give Me Strength" or dig deep into the roots music of the "Island Blues Suite".

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Anouar Brahem

Le Pas Du Chat Noir

2LP | 2019 | EU | Original (Warner Bros.)

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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For the first time on vinyl! The album from 2002.

Hypnotic, magnetic new album by Anouar Brahem which adds a new dimension to our knowledge of this exceptional Tunisian musician. "Le pas du chat noir" gives the clearest indication yet of the work of Brahem as composer and features a spacious "chamber music" that resonates with the freshness of improvisation. The instrumentation is unique: oud, piano, accordion. Brahem's writing for this combination is highly evocative, meticulously controlled and sparse. Half of the magic, as he notes, resides in the not-played, in the marvellous mingling of overtones, sounds that rise from the piano to blend with the warm tones of the oud and the breath of the accordion's bellows.

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Prince

Originals

Release: 2019 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Simon & Garfunkel, Dave Grusin

OST The Graduate: The Original Sound Track Recording Limited 180g Audiophile Edition

LP | 1968 | US | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1968 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1956 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Mit Jackson

Ballads & Blues

The Max Roach Trio Feat. The Legendary Hasaan

Release: 1956 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Whenever Milt Jackson could free himself from the 'bondage' of the Modern Jazz Quartet and its assertive leader John Lewis, he dedicated himself to his two great passions: ballads and the blues. That was precisely the case when he entered the famous Rudy van Gelder Studio in Hackensack, New Jersey, USA in 1956. He was free to choose his sidemen, and money was no object, which is why various formations gathered in the studio for the three recording sessions. With Lucky Thompson on the tenor sax (unfortunately for only three numbers), Barry Galbraith, Barney Kessel or Skeeter Best on the guitar, Oscar Pettiford or Percy Heath on the bass, together with Kenny Clarke or Lawrence Marable on the drums, he set off on a journey through the history of jazz. John Lewis stayed unobtrusively in the background and offered 'Bags' (as Milt was known) plenty of opportunities to glory in soloistic freedom.
The themes were soon found: the musical composers Cole Porter, Irving Berlin and Jerome Kern, as well as a work from The Duke Ellington Songbook, formed a basis upon which all the musicians could perform with confidence. Three compositions by Milt Jackson himself proved that he too was full of imagination.
If you don’t possess this LP – or maybe none by Milt Jackson – here is an opportunity to remedy this shortcoming. The present author would award this recording 5 out of 5 possible stars!

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. More information under www.pure-analogue.com.
All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

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The Max Roach Trio

LP | 1965 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

2LP | 1972 | US | Original (ATCO)

Release: 1965 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Hardly any other musician has released so little as Hasaan Ibn Ali, born William Henry Langford Jr., in 1931, who died in 1980. Just seven titles in all are his complete output, all of which he composed himself, all of them on the present Atlantic LP, and all recorded in December 1964. The saxophonist Odean Pope, who often practised with him, talks of a second recording session in 1965 for Atlantic, but the recordings were never released because Hasaan was sent to jail shortly afterwards; rumour has it that the tapes were destroyed in a fire – and it might well be that recordings with John Coltrane still exist somewhere or other.
Until then, one should enjoy the Max Roach Trio with Art Davis on the bass to the full. We have here a recording that will astound and fascinate your ears with its originality. A first impression conjures up reminiscences of Cecil Taylor and Herbie Nichols, while Hasaan himself talks of the pianist Elmo Hope as the man who brought him closer to the 'mystery of music'. When asked how the recording session with maestro Max Roach went, Hasaan said: »They scared me to death.«
According to Odean Pope, Hasaan was not an easy person to get on with, and he was convinced of his talent to the point of arrogance. But despite this – or perhaps because of this – one listens spellbound to the 40 minutes on this LP, a legacy and never-fulfilled promise of an extremely talented man. We are indebted to Max Roach, who persuaded the bosses of Atlantic Records to make these recordings. For many, many years they had vanished from the record market, but fortunately they are now available as an audiophile re-release to be listened to and admired.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. More information under www.pure-analogue.com.
All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

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Otis Redding

The Best Of Otis Redding

Release: 1972 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Used Vinyl

Medium: VG+, Cover: VG

Gatefold cover has light wear, top and bottom spines have tears. Original US PR Preswell pressing.

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Dadisi Komolahe

Hassan's Walk

LP | 1981 | US | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Don’t let the date fool you, released back in 1983 this modal to slightly free jazz outfit from California takes you on a journey back to the late 60s and very early 70s, into the spiritual realms of greats like John Coltrane, Pharoah Sanders, John McLaughlin and Miles Davis among others. A soul jazz treasure from the LA scene of the early 80s – a fantastic record that I rank with the best Strata East sides of the time! The group's led by alto saxophonist Dadisi Komolafe, and features vibes by Ricky Kelly, piano by Eric Tillman, bass by Roberto Miranda, and drums by Sunship Theus – all working together in a style that's infused with soulful, post-Coltrane exploratory energy, never going too far outside, and always staying true to the rhythmic pulse at its core. Kelly's vibes are really great – sparkling underneath solos by Komolafe that remind me a lot of Gary Bartz's earliest work.

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Adele Sebastian

Desert Fairy Princess

2LP | 2018 | DE | Original (ECM)

Release: 1981 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Adele Sebastian was an Afro American jazz flutist and singer, active from the early 70s (when she was still a teenager) until her untimely death at the age of 27 (!) in 1983 from a kidney failure. In fact she had been depending on monthly dialysis to stay alive for years. She lived through and for the music and you can hear it on her only solo album “Desert Fairy Princess” which was first issued in 1981. The mostly acoustic instrumentation brings a very natural and therefore rather retrospective sound considering the year the album was recorded. Adele and her band pull it off right from the start as if it had been 1966 and it was time for a revolution to shake the dust from the old time jazz. In a perfect way she mixes classic American vocal jazz elements with playful and more free passages, Latin music and tribal African sounds in the lengthy and quite rhythm oriented “Man From Tanganyika” and makes the title track start with a mystical “Allahu akbar“ chant while it turns more and more into a dark and gloomy song with something like a psychedelic edge reminiscent of Pharoah Sanders on his early works. Wild rhythms from drums, percussions with tons of bells and chimes weave a thick groove carpet and conjure a magical atmosphere. Those jazz aficionados who love the mid 60s John Coltrane, his sidekick Pharoah Sanders and Alice Coltrane will go crazy for this album.

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Nik Bärtsch's Ronin

Awase

Release: 2018 / DE – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Horace Tapscott with The Pan-Afrikan Peoples Arkestra

Horace Tapscott with The Pan-Afrikan Peoples Arkestra Live At I.U.C.C

3LP | 2019 | UK | Original (Outernational Sounds)

Release: 2019 / UK – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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“I love Horace Tapscott! I love his music, his philosophies, and everything he did for the community that I grew up in” Kamasi Washington
Soul Jazz Records are proud to release the first in a series of albums by the legendary Los Angeles radical jazz artist, Horace Tapscott and The Pan-Afrikan Peoples Arkestra. Horace Tapscott is the key figure in the Los Angeles political and underground jazz scene of the late 20th century – his stridently independent and radical music, as far-reaching, cosmic and spiritual in scope as it was rooted in the Watts community of Los Angeles where he lived.
This superb rare, deep and spiritual jazz opus album was recorded at the Immanuel United Church of Christ, Los Angeles, in 1979, and has been unavailable on vinyl for over 40 years. ‘I had a vision of the inside of this church, and I went there, and it was just like I had dreamed it.’ This location remained the residence of the musical collective for most of the 1970s.
The music of Horace Tapscott and The Pan-Afrikan Peoples Arkestra is part Sun Ra Arkestra, part John Coltrane, part Art Ensemble of Chicago. This ground-breaking and monumental album (released here for the first time ever on expanded triple vinyl and double CD) explores the multi-faceted deep and spiritual jazz of Tapscott – Afro-centric rhythms, hypnotic bass lines, Tapscott’s stabbing modal piano playing and stunning flute and horn arrangements. ‘The Pan-Afrikan Peoples Arkestra – Live at I.U.C.C.’ is a true high point in the cannon of great independent underground jazz music recorded during this era.

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Charles Tolliver

All Stars

LP | 1956 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 2019 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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* Re-mastering by: Ray Staff at Air Mastering, Lyndhurst Hall, London / This was Charles Tolliver’s first album as a leader. The setting is unique only because his second Freedom-Black Lion album “The Ringer” and all of his subsequent albums on Strata-East featured his quartet Music Inc. with pianist Stanley Cowell. Here he is surrounded in quartet and quintet formats with a truly stellar cast of the leading players on the New York jazz scene.

Charles plays the role of leader, composer and trumpeter. But it is surely that last role that deserves the most attention. The trumpet is a brass instrument that leans toward a hard sound and staccato phrasing. Yet Tolliver is the quintessence of fluidity. While it may be undeniable that he has learned from his musical heritage and past trumpet masters, a trumpeter of such flow, tone, control, lyricism and creativity is, by definition, a major musician.

Charles Tolliver first came to the professional jazz scene in the mid-sixties, when he first met Jackie McLean. Under McLean’s leadership, he played on a number of Blue Note record sessions, some of which have yet to be released. He contributed original tunes to many of those sessions.

Within a couple of years, Tolliver was a well known figure in New York circles, playing and/or recording with Booker Ervin, Archie Shepp, Andrew Hill, Roy Ayers, Art Blakey, Sonny Rollins, Willie Bobo, Gerald Wilson, McCoy Tyner, Hank Mobley, and many others. His compositions were getting recorded by many artists. He gained his greatest recognition during a two year stint with the Max Roach quintet that also included Gary Bartz and Stanley Cowell.

There is also a previously unreleased bonus track of the song, "Repetition", recorded by Charles for this LP which will be included on this new release of the album. This song was originally made famous by Charlie Parker's LP With Strings.

This album is certainly an important and lasting document in light of the musicians involved and in light of its unique context for Charles Tolliver. But basically, it is just a great album to listen to.

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Cab Calloway

LP | 1973 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1956 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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From 1932 to the late 1940’s the period covered by this set, Cab had an orchestra that was about as swinging a band of solid senders as you’d find on the big-band circuit.
Cab projects, in his singing on records, something of the vital magic of his stage presence, a boundless exuberance and enthusiasm. His orchestral backing during the Thirties and Forties included many well-known names in jazz. At various times, Milt Hinton, Danny Barker and Cozy Cole were in his rhythm section.The reeds included the late, great Chu Berry as well as Ben Webster. Dizzy Gillespie was in the band, some members of which, at odd moments, served as a laboratory for the style to be called Bop. »This whole new chord structure idea was interesting to me,« Milt Hinton recalled, »and I would walk the new chords behind his playing.« Cab wasn’t the least enthusiastic. Danny Barker quoted him as saying, »I don’t want you playing that Chinese music in my band.«
The main attraction, however, was always Cab—showman, singer, entertainer. Most audiences didn’t even know that some of his sidemen were candidates for the jazz hall of fame. And that was as it should be. The musicians’ first function was to provide musical backing and a musical setting for the man who was being called 'King of the Hipsters', and this they did, wonderfully well. It was as Barry Ulanov noted in Metronome (January, 1943) a band extraordinary in every respect, hailed for its »clean musicianship, its jazz kicks, its brilliant showmanship«.

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Charles Brackeen

Rhythm X

LP | 1980 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1973 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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On this record, the little-known Charles Brackeen brings his saxophone to a party with most of Ornette Coleman's band. As might be expected, while Brackeen certainly holds his own, it's Ornette's boys who bring the thunder, playing around Brackeen's muscular alto as if they were a gang jumping on a new member. Haden's bass playing provides the frantic pulse, here and there ceding the stage to Blackwell's flexible drumming and dropping out to provide rolling sheets of sound by bowing his instrument. Brackeen and Cherry wrestle across this solid bedrock, with results that are often surprising and never short of beautiful.

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John Hicks

Hells Bells

LP | 1962 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1980 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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John Hicks (1941-2006) gave much to jazz over several decades but never really received the appreciation he so richly deserved. As a pianist, he proved himself in the Art Blakey and Betty Carter universities. He was also the prototypical musician's musician, a first-call pianist for many jazz greats and a magnificent accompanist to the art's best saxists, including Pharoah Sanders, Arthur Blythe, Chico Freeman, Archie Shepp, and David Murray.
He was often accused of hovering in McCoy Tyner's shadow, which is unfair and untrue. But he evinced a great fondness for Coltrane's music and was often heard on many a Coltrane tribute, showing affection for the saxophonist and his appreciation for Tyner's contribution to Coltrane's finest music.
Another facet of John Hicks' career, which gets even less attention than his wondrous playing, is his ability to craft identifiable compositions that are wandering and melodic, suggestive and malleable yet memorable all at once.
It would be difficult to conceive the ideal tribute to John Hicks. As a jazz contributor, he wasn't easily pigeon-holed. While he was always a (straight) jazz player, he skirted the edges of free jazz and pure romanticism that neither side ever appreciates in the other. But both camps could find moments of joyous life in all the ways Hicks chose to express himself. He was an unmistakably perfect accompanist in any mode.

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Herbie Mann

At The Village Gate

Lee Konitz With Warne Marsh

Release: 1962 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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"Comin’ Home Baby" – that’s how the LP begins and that’s what catapulted it right into the charts. Not to one of the top places, but from this time on Herbie Mann was one of the superstars in Atlantic’s collection of jazz musicians. He was known as 'our man with the flute', and the critics in the early Sixties were full of praise for him. He became even more famous, and probably richer, through soundtracks and later on sometimes rather commercialised productions. Well, good for him. 'The Man' serves up jazz pure on this recording, made live at the legendary Village Gate club, which is no wonder considering the rhythm group that includes Ahmad Abdul-Malik and Rudy Collins. The composer of "Comin’ Home Baby", Ben Tucker, also makes an appearance as a guest soloist before the two Gershwin numbers from "Porgy And Bess" offer a wealth of rhythm pure. On the cover text of the LP, Willis Conover, who hosted the Newport Jazz Festival as a sideline (older jazz fans will know his baritone voice from AFN broadcasts), describes in detail the ethnic background of the musicians who come from all over the world – from Romania to Puerto Rico. The three numbers are by no means commonplace. Perhaps a tasty flute cocktail would be a good description. This true rarity from Atlantic’s treasure trove in the early Sixties has long been marked down on the wish list of many fans and at long last it’s available again.

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LP | 1955 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

An Evening With The Devil

Release: 1955 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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What a great rhythm group! A dream comes true: Oscar Pettiford and Kenny Clarke – and then Billy Bauer on the guitar and alternately Ronnie Ball (UK) or Sal Mosca (USA) on the piano. No wonder that things really take off when these masters of improvisation from the Lennie Tristano school get going.
In June 1955, in the Atlantic studio, standards provided the starting base for the long and wonderfully sophisticated improvisations by Lee Konitz and Wayne Marsh, who were at that time pupils of the great Chicago maestro. Although the numbers are declared as own compositions, such as "Background Music" and "Ronnie’s Line", they are actually none other than adaptations of "All Of Me" or "That Old Feeling" – but at the very highest level. Lee Konitz always called this 'The Twelfth Step'. The repertoire is enriched by seldom-heard compositions by the great Oscar Pettiford. 'Time-keeping' – a neologism of prime importance for jazz musicians – is the most important element in "Donna Lee" and "There Will Never Be Another You" – and there is no better drummer for this music than Kenny 'Klook' Clarke, who lived in those days in the USA before moving to Paris in 1956 where there was no racial discrimination.
Of course, you can buy these recordings on various digital discs. But that can’t be compared to a superb black disc and a cover with lines notes by the famous Barry Ulanov.

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Wendell Harrison

LP | 1972 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

LP | 1976 | EU | Reissue (Wewantsounds)

Release: 1972 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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»The compositions we play are reflective of the music of our times whereby we play Jazz, Rock, and African music with its poly or many rhythms. I wrote all the tunes on this particular LP and it is written as a suite in 5 movements which means that the music can be performed along with poetry and dancers. On our last LP called “Message From The Tribe” we featured the compositions of our very talented composer, arranger, and trombonist Phil Ranelin. On one side he wrote all the compositions and on the flip side I wrote all the tunes. This album was produced by us on the Tribe record label. As far as the music on “Evening With The Devil” is concerned it really speaks for itself. In addition to the music it features some relevant poetry by two very talented young poets named Oba and Vajava who are also members of a very excellent theatre group in Detroit called The Black Messengers.«
Extract from the sleeve notes of this album by Wendell Harrison.

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Jaye P. Morgan

Release: 1976 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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The Love You Save American Soul Music 1955 1972

V.A.

2LP | 2018 | US | Original (Cairo)

Release: 2018 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1968 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Dr. John

Gris Gris

LP | 1971 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1968 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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His grandmother is purported to have transported objects using her spiritual powers and it is said that she sometimes floated through the room. Her grandson Malcolm Rebenneck was fully aware of his unique features when he appeared under the name of Dr. John, a voodoo healer in the 19th century, and was the first person to transcend from pitch-black spheres to psychedelic music as its high priest, so to speak.
In the seven magical musical numbers of "Gris-gris", the root doctor conjures up a potent mixture of creole melodies, primeval heathen sounds, a pinch of mardi-gras and New Orleans jazz and even undreamt-of sounds. "Gumbo Ya Ya", a dragging procession with archaic sing-song, shows that suggestive Afro sounds are what rule in this album. And to play with them, to soften them here and there, or to enhance them with dance-like expression and voices from afar ("Danse Fambeaux") is all part of the programme in this collection of artistic treasures. In between raspy sounds there are flattering, intimate tones such as the springy, gentle and forward-looking "Croker Courtbullion".
The equation Witchcraft = Masterwork certainly applies to this unrivalled album, which is listed at No. 143 in the 500 Greatest Albums of all Time by the magazine Rolling Stone.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. More information under www.pure-analogue.com.
All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

Recording: 1967 at Gold Star Studios, Los Angeles
Production: Harold Battiste

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Music Inc.

The Charles Lloyd Quartet

Release: 1971 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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The remarkable Music, Inc. Big Band remains the apotheosis of trumpeter Charles Tolliver's singular creative vision. Rarely if ever has a big band exhibited so much freedom or finesse, while at the same time never overwhelming the virtuoso soloists on whom the performances pivot. Built around the core of Tolliver, pianist Stanley Cowell, bassist Cecil McBee, and drummer Jimmy Hopps, the music boasts the kind of give-and-take born equally of talent and telepathy -- each player seems to communicate with his colleagues on a higher plane, delivering performances to rival any in their careers. Tolliver in particular plays like a man possessed, summoning an energy and clarity that slice through the big, bold arrangements like the proverbial hot knife through butter.

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Love-In

LP | 1967 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

LP | 1976 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1967 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Four-and-a-half decades after the event, saxophonist Charles Lloyd's "Love-In", recorded live at San Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium in 1967, the counterculture's West Coast music hub, endures as much as an archaeological artifact as a musical document. From sleeve designer Stanislaw Zagorski's treatment of Rolling Stone photographer Jim Marshall's cover shot, through the album title and some of the track titles ("Tribal Dance", "Temple Bells"), and the inclusion of John Lennon and Paul McCartney's "Here There And Everywhere", "Love-In's" semiology reeks of the acid-drenched zeitgeist of the mid 1960s, a time when creative music flourished, and rock fans were prepared to embrace jazz, provided the musicians did not come on like their parents: juicers dressed in sharp suits exuding cynicism.
It is likely that more joints were rolled on "Love-In's" cover than that of any other jazz LP of the era, with the possible exception of saxophonists John Coltrane's "A Love Supreme" (Impulse!, 1965) and Pharoah Sanders's "Tauhid" (Impulse!, 1967). Chet Helms, a key mover and shaker in the West Coast counterculture, spoke for many when he hailed the Lloyd quartet as »the first psychedelic jazz group«.
It is to Lloyd's credit that, at least in the early stages of his adoption by the counterculture, he resisted dumbing down his music. The adoption stemmed from Lloyd's espoused attitude to society, his media savvy, his sartorial style and his sheer nerve in playing jazz in the temples of rock culture. He took the quartet into the Fillmore West three years before trumpeter Miles Davis took his into the Fillmore East.
So "Love-In" comes with a load of baggage, some of it less than fragrant. But as 45 minutes of music, it still has legs. Lloyd's vocalized tenor (and flute on two tracks) has Coltrane-derived muscle; the young Jarrett's lyrical and funky solos, particularly on his 07:55 showcase, the gospel-ish "Sunday Morning", his two featured originals ("Sunday Morning" and the soul jazz-ish "Is It Really the Same?"), and his playing the strings of the piano directly with his hands, all remain compelling; McClure and DeJohnette are solid and inventive.

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John Gordon

Step By Step

LP | 1971 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1976 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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John Gordon, a trombone master, brings us another gem from that most renowned of 70’s record labels, Strata-East. The trombone is a difficult instrument. In the hands of an artist like John Gordon, however, it can create vivid images and conjure up beautiful music. And when the cohort of other players includes the likes of Charles Tolliver & Stanley Cowell, you know you’re in for an extra treat.

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Phil Ranelin

Vibes From The Tribe

Atlantic Singles Collection 1967-1970

Release: 1971 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Phil Ranelin was a session trombonist recording with the likes of Steve Wonder before setting up the Tribe label with Wendell Harrison in Detroit.
Like other contemporary artist run labels like Strata East and Black Jazz, Tribe releases were characterised by a heady mix of post Coltrane free jazz, soul and funk, all informed by a strong political conscience.
"Vibes From the Tribe" is a fine record. The title track is lusciously, greasily funky and stands in pretty stark contrast to the kind of airbrushed fusion that was in vogue at the time. "Sounds From The Village" is even better (and dirtier), showcasing Ranelin's oily trombone gymnastics and a viciously fuzzed guitar solo. "Wife" features Phil's singing and is oddly reminiscent of Frank Zappa's writing on "Sleep Dirt"; an affecting, snaking melody topped off with a beautiful solo from the leader, whose playing here has the grace of Bob Brookmeyer coupled with the agility of George Lewis.
"He The One We All Knew" is the obligatory Coltrane tribute and is a trip into the kind of groove based free playing typical of Pharoah Sanders, though only really picks up when the band launch into post bop swing mode in the last six minutes or so, provoking another fine Ranelin solo. Bassist Ralph Armstrong is particularly strong here; his brief solo passages are a wonder of agility and tough lyricism that make me wonder why he's not better known. Other highlights come from the mellifluous flute of Wendell Harrison. Beautiful stuff, and it's good to know that Ranelin is still at work even now. Essential.

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Aretha Franklin

2LP | 2018 | EU | Original (Atlantic)

Release: 2018 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1982 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Ted Hawkins

Watch Your Step

Release: 1982 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1964 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Modern Jazz Quartet

The Sheriff

Release: 1964 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1959 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Ruth Brown

Miss Rhythm

Release: 1959 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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2xLP | 2018 | US | Original (Smoke Sessions)

Buster Williams

Audacity

Release: 2018 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1956 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Charles Mingus

Pithecanthropus Erectus

Release: 1956 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1973 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Billy Harper

Capra Black

Release: 1973 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Shamek Farrah

First Impressions

Release: 1974 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Tito Rodriguez And His Orchestra

Three Loves Have I

LP | 1958 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1958 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Harold Vick

Don't Look Back

Release: 1974 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Norman Connors

Love From The Sun

Release: 1974 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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2LP | 2017 | EU | Original (ECM)

Anouar Brahem

Blue Maqams

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1973 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Cecil Payne

Zodiac

LP | 1976 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1973 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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It's impossible to talk about this album without acknowledging the spectre of death that hangs over it - not only is it the third entry in Strata-East Records' Dolphy Series, a collection of archival recordings from some of the label's close associates honoring the recently deceased multi-instrumentalist, but it is actually dedicated to two members of the band, Wynton Kelly and Kenny Dorham, who died in between the recording sessions and its release. The point is driven home even further by the fact that the album begins with a tribute from Payne to the fallen Martin Luther King, Jr., a piece that acts as a de facto solo for Dorham - his playing all rosy elegance and regal warmth - before shifting into the lighter (though equally coolly-paced) "I Know Love," a showcase for Payne's sax. While not the most somber jazz track ever recorded, this opening suite is a low-key and mournful way to open the affair, but thankfully the album really picks off and shows these musicians more in their element the rest of the way.

"Girl, You Got a Home" is a funky piece, beginning very soulfully with some tight interplay among the rhythm section of Kelly, bassist Wilbur Ware and drummer Albert Heath. Ware is in especially fine form on this track, tying together the disparate passages of the piece by grounding the more ponderous moments in a deep funk, while Kelly's playing is especially ear catching in the way he stabs at his piano like it's an organ. After the first two tracks take up nearly twenty minutes, the four-minute "Slide Hampton" feels almost impossibly brief, a feeling that's enhanced by its quick, jittery, and infectious rhythm, driven by some really dexterous work from Kelly. The final track, "Flying Fish," may be the album's highlight, a Caribbean-inspired composition that casts the rhythm section as flighty ground for both Payne and Dorham to vamp on. The track is oddly danceable for something released on Strata-East, maybe the most fun moment ever for the label, and relentlessly uptempo. Though this release may be in part defined by the deaths that preceded it, it's clear that the recording process was actually a lot of fun for everybody, as their enthusiasm and energy jumps right out of the speakers. This is one of the first Strata East records I really got into and is still one of my favorites, a must-hear for any fans of the flightier moments of Dorham or Kelly's career, and a fitting tribute for both master musicians.

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Stanley Cowell

Regeneration

Billy Parker's Fourth World

Release: 1976 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Around the time of this recording, Stanley Cowell had achieved a degree of prominence as the pianist for the advanced bop quartet Music Inc., which he co-led with trumpeter Charles Tolliver, as well as for unusual projects like his Piano Choir. With Regeneration he chose another path, essentially trying to produce a jazz-infused pop album with strong African roots, perhaps owing a little bit to Stevie Wonder. He assembled an extremely strong cast of musicians for the venture, including Marion Brown, Billy Higgins, and Ed Blackwell, as well as several African string and percussion masters and, by and large, succeeded conceptually if not commercially. A few songs use vocals in a fairly standard pop framework, and, while they are performed capably enough, the lyrical content leaves something to be desired in typical mid-'70s fashion. But much of the rest of the music makes up for this with, among other things, a delightful fife and drum piece by Brown and strong bass work by Bill Lee (Spike's dad). Regeneration is an interesting, often enjoyable album which, aside from its own small pleasures, provides a snapshot of some of the cross-fertilization in genres occurring at the time.

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Freedom Of Speech

LP | 1975 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

2LP | 2017 | EU | Original (ECM)

Release: 1975 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Most of the musicians who gathered to record this fantastic spiritual jazz record for the Strata-East label on May 24th, 1974 had crossed each other's paths in various musical pairings over the preceding few years. Husband and wife team Dee Dee Bridgewater (vocals) and Cecil Bridgewater (trumpet) had been working together on albums like Frank Foster's "Loud Minority", and Roy Ayers' "Coffy" and "Virgo Red". Ten weeks before the "Freedom Of Speech" session, the couple had been joined in Tokyo by Cecil's brother Ronald Bridgewater (tenor saxaphone) to record Dee Dee's debut album, the beautiful "Afro Blue". Also in the studio on May 24th, 1974 was Donald Smith, (piano, vocals), fresh from recording on his older brother Lonnie Liston Smith's "Cosmic Funk" - on which Ronald Bridgewater had also played percussion. Cecil McBee (bass) was also there - just two weeks before, he'd completed his own Strata East date "Mutima", and in February he'd played on Mtume's "Rebirth Cycle" - with both albums also featuring Dee Dee Bridgewater on vocals. He'd also played on Lonnie Liston Smith's "Astral Travelling".
So 1974 was a huge year for all five of these people. Donald Smith and Cecil McBee were six months away from recording on Lonnie Liston Smith's massive "Expansions", with McBee fitting in a few Pharoah Sanders albums in between.
AND THEN, THE MYSTERY ... So with all this fervent activity, the question has to be asked ...Who was Billy Earl Parker Jr (drums), the leader of this session?
Billy Parker remains unlisted as a musician on all major jazz sites. His only other recording appears to be as a percussionist on Charles Tolliver's "Impact" in 1975.

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Vijay Iyer Sextet

Far From Over

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1964 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Miles Davis

Miles In Berlin

LP | 1956 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1964 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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It's 1964 and the first Berlin Jazz Festival is about to reach its absolute peak: the final concert on the night of Friday, 25th September by Miles Davis. And the European subsidiary of Columbia Records, CBS, couldn’t wait to release this legendary event on LP.
The new quintet, for the first time with Wayne Shorter on the tenor sax (and not yet as composer), thrilled and roused the audience in the Philharmonie from the first minute to the very end. The classics "Miles(tones)", "So What" and "Walkin’" were performed at an astonishingly fast pace, the ballads were tender and dreamy. Such a magical atmosphere was rarely evoked at later concerts, which was probably due to the excellent acoustics of the large concert hall. The audience were also seated behind the stage, so Miles couldn't turn his back provokingly on people; sometimes he just squatted on the stage. However, this didn’t prevent him from performing his solos lyrically and tenderly, most of them finely nuanced, soft and gentle, yet audible right into the furthest corner. The rhythmic structure created by the young drummer Anthony Williams provided the necessary excitement.
Miles at the top of his form, an enthusiastic audience, impressive acoustics and, to top it all, excellent recording technology and a fantastic pressing on virgin vinyl - what more does a jazz fan want? Now’s the time to dig out your credit card!

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

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The Modern Jazz Quartet

Fontessa

Descendants Of Mike And Phoebe, The

Release: 1956 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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The famous critic and jazz expert Ralph J. Gleason quite rightly mentioned two highly distinctive men in his liner notes – John Donne and Pablo Picasso. Almost four hundred years and a great deal of seawater separate the two exceptional artists from England and Spain. Nevertheless the four black US-Americans who make up the Modern Jazz Quartet bridge the gap between time and continents effortlessly.
And what’s more, blues is also to be heard – and bebop! And evergreens from the Broadway shows of the Thirties too!
In contrast to some of the other rather more dawdling and laid-back MJQ LPs, "Fontessa" offers diversified and intense music. Nothing is routine, perhaps because the drummer Connie Kay had replaced Kenny Clark just one year previously. But maybe too because Milt Jackson’s blues influence inspired John Lewis perceptibly to forget all about discipline. All seven numbers are true gems. But if you want a special hint, just listen to "Bluesology". Well, perhaps the present author is too much of a Milt Jackson fan. Be that as it may, the music magazine "Rolling Stone" gave this LP a five-star rating!

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

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A Spirit Speaks

Issue No. 1 - Benga Music (A Signature Genre From Kenya)

Release: 1974 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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One of the most unique albums on the Strata East label – and that's saying a heck of a lot, given the creative energies flowing through that legendary jazz outlet! "Descendents Of Mike & Phoebe" is a righteous little project put together by Spike Lee's father, Bill Lee, and his brothers and sisters (Cliff Lee, Grace Lee Mims, and Consuela Lee Moorhead) – working here in a group named after their slave ancestors, who are paid tribute in a beautifully flowing batch of tunes! Lee's round, warm bass tones are firmly at the head of the group on most numbers – recorded at a similar level to his excellent work with Clifford Jordan on Strata East during the same time – and other instrumentation includes piano from Consuela, flugelhorn from Cliff, and percussion from Sonny Brown and Billy Higgins – all used in a wonderfully evocative style that's even better than some of Lee's later soundtrack work. A few numbers feature vocals from Grace – singing wordlessly and with a really heavenly sort of quality – and together, the whole group have an undeniable sense of power and majesty, yet also one that's touched by a really personal sense of poetry too. Titles include a great version of Lee's "Coltrane", which was more famously recorded with Clifford Jordan.

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FLEE

LP | 2017 | EU | Original (FLEE)

Disco Music (BTO Spider 45 Edit) / I Wanna Be Near You

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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6 rare and almost forgotten benga tracks from Kenya including edits by Nik Weston, Jaakko Eino Kalevi and Africaine 808!

Inculding a 16 page printed silkscreen magazine!

FLEE is a collective of dedicated afro-diggers, driven by the enthusiasm to find and preserve semi-forgotten genres. For their first release they focused on an old Kenyan music genre called “Benga”. The record will be completed by a printed silkscreen magazine retracing the history of the genre, which will feature original archive pictures, great authors from the region, such as Emmanuel Mwenda, as well as the writer and singer of the eclectic Kenyan Band, Yellow Light Machine, Ondiso Madete. This vinyl compiles six rare and for some unreleased benga tracks, edited by contemporary artists (Nik Weston aka Mukat, Jaakko Eino Kalevi and Africaine 808), with the aim of approaching this genre with an innovative perspective, transcending simple nostalgia.

Only 200 copies of this first issue!

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Sir Ted Ford

7" | 2017 | EU | Original (Record Shack)

LP | 1963 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Limited whitelabel 7-inch deejay press of 50 copies only!

Rare UK only modern soul/boogie release recorded 1979 in Los Angeles with Fred Wesley providing the horn section perfectly de-guitarized by BTO Spider b/w in demand sensational smooth '77 modern/crossover groover!

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Thelonious Monk

Criss-Cross

Release: 1963 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1967 | US | Reissue (Craft)

Brenton Wood

Baby You Got It

Release: 1967 / US – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Duke Ellington & His Orchestra

Masterpieces

LP | 1951 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

LP | 1972 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1951 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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When Ellington went into the studio in 1950 to record the longer tracks on this LP, his orchestra was a bridge between its late-1940's configuration (the 5-man trumpet section) and its mid-1950's personnel. The sax section had settled into the form it would have for most of the ensuing two decades (old-timers Hodges and Carney and newcomers Procope, Hamilton and Gonsalves); the trombone section had long-timer Lawrence Brown as well as Tyree Glenn and newcomer Quentin Jackson; and the drummer was still Sonny Greer, who had anchored the rhythm section since the beginning.
The arrangements and orchestrations all bear the hallmarks of Ellington's collaboration with Billy Strayhorn in the late 1940's: they are lush, symphonic, impressionistic, and densely (and adventurously) harmonic. "Mood Indigo", in particular, is a 15-minute tone-poem with shifting colors and key relationships as Ellington and Strayhorn bring the melody through a wide variety of guises, from Glenn's wah-wah trombone solo to Shorty Baker's lyrical waltz to orchestral and piano passages which do homage to the influence which Ravel and Stravinsky had on both of them.
"The Tattooed Bride" is the only new piece from the original "Masterpieces by Ellington" LP, and it is a beauty. The others of the original tracks -- "Sophistocated Lady" and "Solitude" -- are not laid out as inventively in their harmonics or structure. Of the group, "Solitude" is perhaps the weakest, but this is a relative term. Ellington would go on to pen many more extended, symphonic works, but none would have quite the multicolored, impressionistic tone-pallate that these do. And Strayhorn's presence would not be as pronounced in those future works as it is here: the orchestration and harmonies in particular bear his mark. These are masterpieces indeed: great works of art by two of our greatest composers/orchestrators, and played by one of the greatest orchestras in Afro-American music. Andrew R. Weiss

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Herbie Hancock

Crossings

LP | 1967 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1972 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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In the 1970s, Herbie Hancock’s "Crossings" was to be found on every IKEA record shelf in the student pads of jazz-fusion fans. The cover, with its psychedelic touch, also contributed significantly to its popularity – although it was unclear where the crossing was going to take us …
Nevertheless, the excellent trumpeter Eddie Henderson – often underestimated as an improviser and composer, and Benny Maupin – who like Hancock had grown up under Miles Davis’s wing, present a wide range of sound-generating instruments – as was all the rage in those days. Synthesizer and Mellotron (a polyphonic tape replay keyboard and as such practically the prototype of the sampler) were permanent members of the group – and even produce here melodic arches of sound! Whether Bennie Maupin’s "Quasar" launches the group and us into extraterrestrial territory (as stated in one review) is a moot point.
This LP is a contemporary historical document, though it certainly doesn’t sound antiquated. That’s why younger listeners too will find pleasure in this experiment from the previous millennium.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

Recording: February 1972 at Pacific Recording Studios, San Mateo, CA., by Patrick Gleason
Production: David Rubinson

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Freddie Hubbard

Backlash

LP | 1966 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1967 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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After his great success as a new discovery through playing on tour and in the studio with Art Blakey’s creative and inspirational group, the Jazz Messengers, Freddie Hubbard made a dozen LPs over 16 years for Blue Note and Impulse under his own direction.
It was no wonder then that a big record company made him a lucrative offer in autumn 1966. All in all, Atlantic Records released six LPs and the very first, entitled "Backlash", is still until today the best of the bunch.
Three numbers by Freddie Hubbard, one by Bob Cunningham, and two by friends, provide the basis for a successful transition between hard bop and soul beat. Hubbard made high demands on his fellow musicians James Spaulding, Albert Dailey and especially the bass player Bob Cunningham and the drummer Ray Appleton because they had to cope with the ever-changing beat. Right from the very first note, it is obvious that Freddie Hubbard had Fats Navarro and Clifford Brown in his heart and fingers. All the titles are excellent. Of special note, however, is "Little Sunflower". The sound colouring of the flute harmonizes particularly well with Hubbard’s brass, and Ray Barretto’s contribution is more than mere decoration. You’re certainly on the right track with this LP, no matter whether it’s the beginning of a Freddie Hubbard collection or a further contribution to a large jazz collection.

This Speakers Corner LP was remastered using pure analogue components only, from the master tapes through to the cutting head. All royalties and mechanical rights have been paid.

Recording: 1967 by Tom Dowd, Phil Jehle and Adrian Barber
Production: Arif Mardin

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Charles Lloyd

Dream Weaver

The Invasive Dance Beat Of Cameroon 1976-1984

Release: 1966 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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The first studio date of the Charles Lloyd Quartet, with Keith Jarrett, Cecil McBee, and Jack DeJohnette, was recorded and released just a few days before the band took both the European and American festival circuits by storm. First came Europe, which was just getting the disc as the band was tearing up its stages. While the live dates are now the stuff of legend, it's easy to overlook the recordings, but to do so would be a mistake. "Dream Weaver" is a fully realized project by a band -- a real band -- in which each member has a unique part of the whole to contribute. Jarrett's unusual piano style fits musically with Lloyd's lyricism in a way that it shouldn't. Jarrett was even then an iconoclast, playing harmonic figures from the inside out and relying on counterpoint to create new spaces, not fill them in. (Just listen to "Autumn Sequence", where his solos and his backing harmonics are equally strident and inventive as Lloyd's Eastern explorations of mood and mode.) And then there's the rhythm section of McBee and DeJohnette, whose modal inventions on the intervals make the "Dream Weaver" suite an exercise in open time, allowing all players to wander around inside it and take what they want out. The set closes with a group party jam on "Sombrero Sam", with Lloyd and Jarrett trading eights on a Cuban variation on a fantasia. There were no records like this one by new groups in 1966.

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Pop Makossa

2LP | 2017 | EU | Original (Analog Africa)

2LP | 1972 | EU | Reissue (ECM)

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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An explosive
compilation highlighting the era when funk and disco sounds
began to infiltrate Cameroon's Makossa style. The beat that
holds everything together originate's from the Sawa people's
rhythms. When these rhythms collided with merengue, high-life,
Congolese rumba, and, later, funk and disco, modern Makossa was
born. Makossa, the beat that long before football, managed to
unify the whole of Cameroon. Some of the greatest Makossa hits
incorporated the electrifying guitars and tight grooves of
funk, while others were laced with cosmic synth flourishes.
However, most of this music's vibe came down to the bass, and
'Pop Makossa' demonstrates why many Cameroonian bass players
are among the most revered in the world.

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Circle

Paris Concert

3LP | 2017 | EU | Original (Strut)

Release: 1972 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Circle was a band on fire with creativity. Corea and Holland had just left Miles Davis' band, keen to explore all parameters of new music in an improvised context. Braxton, equally inspired by Stockhausen and Coltrane, brought in new directions from the AACM. Altschul's resume included extensive work with Paul Bley. Together they were, for a while, matchless.

The short-lived Chick Corea outfit outdoes itself in this 1971 live recording. A delicate piano intro primes us for an extended rendition of Wayne Shorter’s “Nefertitti” to start. Once Braxton throws himself on top of incoming bass and drums, however, what began as contemplative awakening quickly turns into a spastic jaunt into more upbeat territory. The gnarled unity of the quartet paints in bold strokes, all the while flirting with total breakdown. Braxton’s perpetual motion and uncompromising tone make a superb tune out of a great one. “Song For The Newborn” gives Holland a moment in the spotlight. Swaddled in all the innocence of its title and bound by a mature sense of structure, this is an engaging interlude to the Braxton/Corea duet that follows. Corea’s frenetic style in the latter works its way through a host of rhythmic options before settling into a row of block chords. Braxton’s heady phrasing tears a page from the book of Coltrane, while his solitary diversions crackle with the urgency of a broken mirror, as yet unframed by the bastion of mundanity. Altschul delights in “Lookout Farm,” in which he dives headfirst into his percussive arsenal. The tinkling of icicles and cowbells in an open field give way to an extended solo, thus providing ample segue into “73 degrees Kelvin,” a beautifully convoluted organism that could only come from the mind of Braxton. Below its cacophonous surface pulsates a vast network of instrumental veins, through which flows the passionate immediacy that is Circle’s lifeblood, and from which Holland’s rapture sings with detail and imagination. “Toy Room Q&A” (Holland) boasts Corea in notably fine form, leaving plenty of elbowroom for Braxton to flex his reeds. The freer aesthetic crashes in on itself by the end, leaving us craving a familiar foothold. This, we get in the standard “No Greater Love,” capping things off with notable turns from all.

Corea busts out with some of his most captivating fingerwork, proving himself finely attuned to the mechanisms of his caravan at every rest stop along the way; Braxton’s “Pharaonic” sound titillates the ear; and one could hardly ask for a tighter rhythm section at one’s side. As a collective unit, Circle doesn’t so much make music out of as inhabit its raw melodic materials. This recording is a lasting testament to a vibrant formative period for ECM. The audience’s enthusiastic reactions give the listener the feeling of being present in the making of history.

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Sun Ra

Singles Volume 2

2LP | 2016 | US | Original (Concord)

Release: 2017 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Following 2016’s definitive collection of singles released by Sun Ra from across his illustrious career, Strut present the second volume of the vinyl edition on 3LP format which focus on Ra’s later 1962-1991 period.
Released sporadically during the three decades and primarily on the Saturn label, the 45s offer one-off missives from Ra’s prolific cosmic journey, tracing the development of his forward-thinking “Space-Bop” and his unique take on jazz and blues traditions which remains unlike anything else from the period. As with the first volume vinyl editions, the collection is hugely varied, ranging from Ra’s spoken word recitations and some of his R&B recordings to alternative versions of Arkestra staples like ‘Love In Outer Space’, ‘Enlightenment’ and ‘Rocket No. 9’. The singles are also unpredictable vehicles for Ra’s music, combining different tracks from different sessions and occasionally making available music which was recorded many years beforehand.
As Francis Gooding describes them, “they are answers to questions that albums won’t answer, and questions that can’t be asked or answered elsewhere.”
As with Ra’s LPs, most 45s were only pressed in small runs and have since become extremely rare and sought after. On the volume 2 vinyl editions, we feature tracks that have only ever been seen via a small handful of copies including ‘Love In Outer Space’ b/w ‘Mayan Temple’ and ‘The Blue One’ b/w ‘Orbitration In Blue’; some were planned and pencilled but allegedly never made it to vinyl and some appeared as limited one-off magazine singles including Ra’s very last single release, the reflective ‘I Am The Instrument’.
Sleeve note writers Chris Trent and Paul Griffiths brilliantly illustrate the role of the single within Ra’s career and break down each release with detailed track by track notes. Working with Sun Ra LLC and Sun Ra archivist Michael D. Anderson, Strut has also assembled the best possible master sources for each track.
‘Singles’ Vol. 2 features fully remastered tracks, rare photos, original 45 artwork,
Chris Trent sleeve notes and detailed track by track and session notes by Paul Griffiths.

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The Marcus King Band

LP | 1957 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 2016 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Songwriter. Guitarist. Singer. Bandleader. At only 20 years of age, Marcus King’s dazzling musical ability is evident throughout The Marcus King Band, the young phenom’s 2nd full-length LP. Raised in Greenville, South Carolina, King was brought up on the blues, playing shows as a pre-teen sideman with his father—bluesman Marvin King, who himself was the son of a regionally-known guitarist—before striking out on his own. Operating within the fiery brand of American roots music that King calls "soul-influenced psychedelic southern rock," the album highlights King’s gorgeous, rough-hewn vocals, soaring guitar work and heartfelt songwriting all amidst a group of masterful musicians who, together, are quickly becoming one of the country’s most sought after live acts.

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Charles Mingus

The Clown

LP | 1974 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Release: 1957 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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Who hasn't got an ancient, worn-out copy of "The Clown" on his shelf, with a tatty cover and torn inner sleeve? Or maybe one of the rare re-releases made of cheap, thin vinyl with dreadful graphic art? And if you haven't heard this gem for a long time, despite the flood of Mingus LPs, CDs and downloads on the market, then you really should seize this opportunity to do so. "The Clown" was, and still is, an absolute must-have for every jazz collector. The small ensemble, only five musicians, came into the New York Atlantic Records studio in March 1957 to record music exclusively composed by the double bassist. Over the next 15 years, three of them were to be heard in numerous concerts with other ensembles. But the original recordings on this LP were the most deeply concentrated, the most versatile, and quite simply the best of all. The more so because the label attached great importance to optimal studio conditions and allowed the instrumentalists plenty of time to make the recordings.
In the present new release, "The Clown" can be enjoyed to the full from the very first note of "Haitian Fight Song" up until the words »William Morris Sends Regrets« in the title work.

Recording: Februay and March 1957 in New York City by Tom Dowd and Larry Hiller in mono
Production: Nesuhi Ertegün

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Ry Cooder

Paradise & Lunch

The Wonderful World Of Jazz

Release: 1974 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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A good 20 years have passed since a band with ancient musicians from Cuba – the Buena Vista Social Club – took the world by storm. Behind the project, in the wings yet right in the midst of this unheard-of music, was Ry Cooder, who regarded this encounter as the greatest musical event of his entire life. The bottleneck guitar hero had always been very interested in the music from the other Americas ever since the solo albums he made in his early years, in which he told the story of the American folk and blues in a multitude of styles. The LP "Paradise And Lunch" is no exception and begins with gospel-like grooves that smell of native soil. The faint smell of a wooden church from pioneering days wafts out of the processional antiphonal song "Jesus On The Mainline" and a healthy 12-bar blues paints a picture of what silent witnesses could tell if they could ("If Walls Could Talk"). Cooder and his sidemen felt themselves perfectly at home when adventuring further afield and this is testified to in the laid-back calypso rhythm of "It’s All Over Now" and the clip-clop of "Mexican Divorce".
This wonderful album is highly recommended for each and every number, but if you want a tip for a very special track, then just listen to the ragtime piano rolls in Bo Diddley’s "Ditty Wah Ditty".

Recording: 1974 at the Warner Brothers Studios in North Hollywood and Burbank (USA), by Lee Herschberg
Production: Lenny Waronker & Russ Titelman

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John Lewis

LP | 1960 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Singles Volume 1: Definite 45s Collection 1952-1961

Release: 1960 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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There is nothing hurried about this disc. That said, the music is focused and will stretch your mind. Lewis employed masterful melodic improvisers here: Paul Gonsalves, Eric Dolphy, Jim Hall among others. Listen to "Body And Soul" as it builds powerfully and the soloists explore every possible melodic theme, where the quiet power of these master musicians is almost too much to take. Listen to "I Remember Clifford" where the players are essentially the MJQ with Jim Hall replacing Milt Jackson. This set swings, but oh-so-elegantly. Just like Mr. Lewis.
S.C.Berry
Whether you're an old-time jazz afficionado or new to the genre, this album is essential. In my opinion, Lewis' lovely solo on "Body & Soul" makes his version virtually definitive - 15 minutes of bliss. The rest of the album, particularly "Afternoon In Paris", is at the same level. "Wonderful" is the perfect title for this record.
E Barrios

Recording: July and September 1960
Production: Nesuhi Ertegun & Tom Dowd

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Sun Ra

3LP | 2016 | EU | Original (Strut)

The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble

Release: 2016 / EU – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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The immense output of Sun Ra and his many backing bands, coupled with the limited production of many of his releases has long defied dedicated collectors. Parallel to a vast list of LP releases, Sun Ra released numerous 45 RPM singles; one-off meteorites from his prolific cosmic journey. Working closely with Sun Ra LLC and Art Yard Records, it is with great pride that Strut presents a definitive collection of the rare singles released by Sun Ra across his illustrious career, spanning 1952 to 1991.

Released prolifically during the 1950s and more sporadically thereafter, primarily on the Saturn label, the 45s trace the development of Sun Ra’s forward-thinking “Space-Bop” and his unique take on jazz and blues traditions which remains unlike anything else from the period. As with his LPs, most 45s were only pressed in small runs and have since become extremely rare and sought after. Some have only been discovered in physical form in recent years; some were planned and penciled but allegedly never made it to vinyl and some appeared as one-off magazine singles and posthumous releases.

‘Singles: The Definitive 45 Collection’ will be released in two volumes on vinyl across two release dates. All formats feature fully remastered tracks, rare photos, poster artwork, extensive sleeve notes by Francis Gooding, an interview with Saturn Records founder Alton Abraham by John Corbett and detailed track by track and session notes by Paul Griffiths.

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Out On The Coast Orange Vinyl Version

LP | 2016 | US | Original (Colemine)

LP | 1965 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 2016 / US – Original

Genre: Organic Grooves

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San Diego's own The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble is back with their sophomore LP “Out On The Coast”. Cinematic soul is the order of the day from this west coast group. Covering a lot of soulful territory here: deep funk, soul jazz, breakbeats, and more! The Sure Fire Soul Ensemble is a heavy, original, instrumental soul band based in San Diego. They draw influence from the masters of the style from the past and modern day, including: The Meters, Isaac Hayes, El Michels Affair, Mulatu Astatke, Budos Band, The Nite Liters, Menahan Street Band, Fela Kuti and The Poets of Rhythm. In June of 2015 they released their debut self titledalbum on Colemine Records. The band has shared the stage with Lee Fields and the Expressions, New Mastersounds, Monophonics, Kamasi Washington, and many other touring bands. They perform live regularly all over California and worldwide.

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Aretha Franklin

Yeah!

Release: 1965 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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LP | 1967 | EU | Reissue (Speakers Corner)

Charles Lloyd

Forest Flower

The Dave Brubeck Trio & Gerry Mulligan

Release: 1967 / EU – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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It was a clever move by George Avakian, producer at Atlantic Records, to record live the Charles Lloyd Quartet during their appearance in Monterey, and to release the LP under the title "Forest Flower". Although the hippy flower-power movement tended towards a rather different musical genre at the end of the Sixties, they were blown away by this music. The four artists attracted masses of people and ensured that every seat was taken and all standing room filled at jazz festivals such as Newport, Molde (Norway), Antibes (France) and the Fillmore East and West. The super group also appeared in Monterey, 120 Km south of San Francisco, the centre of the hippy movement, on 18 September 1966.
On the LP we have the almost 18-minute-long title piece and the standard work "East Of The Sun", which were recorded at the festival. The disc is complemented by a Keith Jarrett composition and one by Cecil McBee, both of which were recorded in the studio ten days before the festival.
Of particular note is the rich interplay, the energy that is palpable throughout, the perfect harmony in each and every change of mood, and the intensity. Even 50 years later, it is quite clear that Charles Lloyd managed to break down the barriers between pop and jazz.
Charles Lloyd is committed to this objective to this very day! All four musicians are still active, although they no longer appear together as a group. Such a special treat for the ears is offered by this newly mastered disc only.

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Blues Roots

LP | 1968 | UK | Reissue (Pure Pleasure)

Release: 1968 / UK – Reissue

Genre: Organic Grooves

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2LP | 2016 | EU | Original (Analog Africa)

V.A.

Space Echo