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Hank Mobley - Dippin' RVG


Soulstation1

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Hopefully an interesting side note: This was in the first Liberty distributed release from BN. Still BN pressings and covers. I remember the salesman visiting the JRM and giving me a promo. Can't be too many "real" BN copies out there.

Just checked my LP and it looks early Liberty with 'Van Gelder' and no ear, mono copy. 1966 inner sleeve so seems to line up with the above.

In fact "real" BN copies of this title - meaning being manufactured at the Plastylite pressing plant - do not (seem to) exist; the first copies date from the "Liberty-era". What might be confusing though, is that these first pressings still have Blue Note USA - and not Liberty - labels (but no ear). This is not unique for this title, as Blue Note kept using older labels - sometimes even w/Lexington address - during the Liberty era.

Anyway, Liberty or not, the vinyl edition of Dippin' does sound great!

This thread inspired me to transfer mine to cdr.

Mine is a Blue Note - Stereo - 43 West 61st Street.

"The Break Through" is great as well is the ballad "I See Your Face Before Me"

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Had the RVG for a while, only listening to it tonight for the first time.

Gotta love "The Dip" which sounds like it wants to be another Sidewinder-type but then it has that kick in the seventh bar wher it just kinda dangles, except for Higgins & Mabern just dancin' all around it.

Can't wait to listen to the rest of this album!

Agree above with Lee/Hank and/or Lee/Jackie (and of course, the heavenly Lee/Hank/Jackie on Cornbread!). Love it all!

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Had the RVG for a while, only listening to it tonight for the first time.

Gotta love "The Dip" which sounds like it wants to be another Sidewinder-type but then it has that kick in the seventh bar wher it just kinda dangles, except for Higgins & Mabern just dancin' all around it.

Can't wait to listen to the rest of this album!

Agree above with Lee/Hank and/or Lee/Jackie (and of course, the heavenly Lee/Hank/Jackie on Cornbread!). Love it all!

"Recado Bossa Nova" is THE track. You won't find a more swinging Hank anywhere else. A favorite of mine for many a year.

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Yeah, Dippin' is great no doubt. But I wonder what makes it Jim's favorite Mobley album above all others. I enjoy it a lot, but I'm not sure it's even in my top 5.

How 'bout some musical insight Jim since you're a tenor player and this is your fav. Hank LP. Shine some light on it for the rest of us.

None to offer, I'm afraid. It just hits that spot in me.

Although, I guess I could say that to me, it's the perfect "transition" album between the mid-period Mobley & the late. You got that compressed sense of about-to-burst energy pared down to the essence, but with just enough of the earlier lyricism to distinguish it from the later, stubborn paring down to a relatively few phrases in the vocabulary (I exxagerate, but only to make the point). Very tense (in a good way), taut playing from Hank, and totally gripping where and what I like to be gripped.

It's also one of Billy Higgins' most interactive performances of a career that was all about interactivity. And Lee & Hank were, afaic, his truest "soulmates" in the BN stable, so you're talking high level stacked upon high level. Not coincidentally, I think it's also one of his best recorded BN dates. But then again, I've been unknowingly listening to it in mono for almost 30 years, so what do I know? :g:g:g

Bottom line though - it just hits that spot. Nothing else like it for this style of BN jazz, except for "Our Man Higgins" from Cornbread. That shit just hits me where I live.

Interesting. I'm going to be playing Dippin' some more real soon.

What's your favorite "late" Mobley album? Mine is High Voltage.

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Wait a minute...I do have that after all! (Dug around and found it last night.) Have to say that I like Hi Voltage more. But I'm glad I have Breakthrough. I just wish Hank's health had been better at that point.

Edited by BruceH
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I got the RVG of Dippin' this past weekend, to see if maybe it would strike me differently than in the past. I'm a Hank Mobley fanatic...but this album has never even been close to the top of my list. Anyway, I did enjoy it more than I remembered...however...the 2 things that irritated me the most about this album are still there. The heads of "The Dip" and "Ballin'" just sound cheesy as hell to me. Of course once you get into the tunes it's fine...but for some reason having the album bookended by two tracks that annoy me drops it down the list a ways.

If they had let me choose the reissue, I would've released A Caddy For Daddy instead.

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  • 7 years later...
  • 4 years later...
  • 4 months later...
On 3/6/2006 at 8:23 PM, JSngry said:

This is my favorite Hank album bar none. If I was forced at gunpoint to go through life with only one Mobley recorded appearance, this would be it. Period. Five like-minded souls living and breathing as one w/o a hint of "recording" going on.

 

Favorite song? "The Breakthrough". That's about as perfect as this shit gets, including the ending, how the last note is just a hard little "bop" that cuts off immediately with just a touch of reverb to carry it over. My hunch is that there might have been something that happened after that note that necessitated such an abrupt cutoff, but who knows?

 

Don't have the RVG, don't want the RVG, I don't think. Managed to get a pre-Liberty LP new back in the 70s and have treated it with TLC ever since. Got the McMaster for portability purposes a while back, and it's served well in that capacity. Don't want to hear this one any differently than I have been hearing it all these years. Thanks, but.....no.

 

Dippin' is the real deal.

Yup. And I'm a Mobley nut for many reasons but this record signifies why Hanks' the best: this right here.

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