Jump to content

Major Label Jazz in the 1990s


colinmce

Recommended Posts

As a spin-off from the Verve thread, let's use this space to list some of the great jazz records released by major labels in the 1990s (and late 80s I suppose). Like I said over there, labels like Verve, Blue Note, RCA, A&M, Ryko, Columbia and others had thriving jazz lines. It's sad to see all of these programs crater in the last 10-15 years and to see all of this music go OOP (though it is available very cheaply secondhand in most cases). Hopefully a few new-to-some titles will turn up in the discussion.

Some I enjoy:

Sun Ra, Don Cherry, and Cecil Taylor on A&M

Steve Lacy on RCA/Novus

Steve Lacy, Cecil Taylor, Archie Shepp/Roswell Rudd on Verve

Randy Weston, Charlie Haden & Jackie McLean on Verve/Gitanes

Abby Lincoln on Verve

Don Pullen, Andrew Hill, Jason Moran, Stefon Harris, Ralph Peterson Fo'tet and Geri Allen on Blue Note

Dave Douglas on RCA

Myra Melford, John Carter, and Clusone 3 on Ryko/Grammavision

Don Byron on Nonesuch and Blue Note

Alvin Batiste's Late on Columbia

DIW reissues via Columbia by David Murray, David S Ware, et al

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Replies 52
  • Created
  • Last Reply

Top Posters In This Topic

Steve Coleman on Novus

This. Also The Jazz Futures: fun to hear where those guys were at at thee time, as well Roy Hargrove on Novus, Joshua Redman Spirit of the Moment, Wish, Kenny Garrett, "Pursuance" and "Songbook". Branford's "Dark Keys", Tain's "Citizen Tain", Joe Lovano "From the Soul", the Mehldau Art of the Trio 4 and 5, all things I dig. At the time I was pretty nonchalant when a lot of that stuff came out because I was still in 1950's, 60's hard bop mode. JMT was an indie distributed by Verve, but Gary Thomas "Till We Have Faces" I'd enter in the conversation for serious discussion. Brecker's "Tales from the Hudson" and "Two Blocks From the Edge", "Time is Of the Essence". John McLaughlin "After The Rain", There's a bunch of Larry Goldings albums from that decade I still haven't heard,

Edited by CJ Shearn
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Shirley Horn and Betty Carter each had notable albums released on Verve in that era.

I know he is not every one's cuppa tea, but Kurt Elling had some good albums on Blue Note.

I really enjoyed the Nicholas Payton & Doc Cheatham CD that was also a Verve project. Payton had other projects on that label as well.

Terence Blanchard was recording for Columbia during that time although I tend to like his releases after 2000 a little more.

Warner Bros. Records gave us releases by Brad Mehldau and Joshua Redman.

Cyrus Chestnut had some good CDs on Atlantic.

Carmen McRae's last 2 (excellent) CDs were on some corporate combination of RCA/Novus/Bluebird

Edited by duaneiac
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Joe Lovano: From the Soul & Trio Fascination on blue note

Joe Maneri on ECM

Art Ensemble on ECM

Bley-Peacock-Motian: Not Two, Not One ECM

(Not sure if ECM qualifies)

It should because it was distributed by BMG in the 90's, I don't remember when Warner stopped distributing ECM.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

CJ, I think that Warner's relationship with ECM ended ca. 1982. It was about then that ECM cassettes were being dumped, sold for a dollar each.

Cassettes, hell, LPs! WHOLE LPs, both sides with music, not the bargain jobs like they'd import from god knows where that only had half-grooves on one side, or all the grooves on the other. No sir, REAL records!

I think it was between 1984-86 when the big ECM LP dump hit the stores here, definitely before our son was born, but after we had moved back to Dallas. I know I had the free time to drive around all day looking in the cutout bins at all 492.091 record stores in the greater DFW area armed only with a tank of gas and about $30 cash, and it usually being enough.That would have been in that window.

Hell, even the sorryass "Record Town" mall stores in the mall, you know, the ones that were about as wide as an Italian alley and had ALL (i.e. JUST) the hits, they'd have a dinky little half-din cutout rack full of ECM LPs. It was one of those rare unambiguous Carpe-Diem moments in record buying history. I was buying shit I didn't even want to hear just because it was so cheap, you know, well, I MIGHT like it after all...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Joe Lovano: From the Soul & Trio Fascination on blue note

Joe Maneri on ECM

Art Ensemble on ECM

Bley-Peacock-Motian: Not Two, Not One ECM

(Not sure if ECM qualifies)

It should because it was distributed by BMG in the 90's, I don't remember when Warner stopped distributing ECM.

In Europe, ECM CDs are manufactured at the Universal plant.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.

×
×
  • Create New...