Soul Stream

The God who created the Hammond Organ. Happy Birthday Jimmy (I'll never forget you chewing my ass out )

The album with Sonny is a live club gig with Sonny "singing" if you can call it that . But really, really GREAT in the most South Dallas kind of way. They do a killer version of Dyke and The Blazers "Ugg". Definately one for Jim's collection of ghetto classics. ...and that 45 is killer. Especially the flip which is Rescue Me

Winter? What's that? 70's here on Thanksgiving....

Included in that list are some of my favorite recordings of all time. Thanks Ozzie!

Still lots of unissued stuff in the vaults. I run across sessions all the time I'd love hear. A Freddie Roach unissued I was just looking at. Also, some John Patton I'd like to see...

I always return to the earthy simplicity of his early Prestige sides and the few LPs he did with Lou Donaldson. Black Talk is just about a perfect recording. His playing on that, his breakout masterpiece, is a marvel of swinging, lean simplicity. Simplicity, NOT simplistic. There's a huge difference that gets lost. I also dig his early 45s and pre-Prestige albums such as Black Power. Black Talk just blows my mind EVERY time. The horns, Idris, Melvin and the Mighty Burner welding it all together like he's at a shipyard. More Today Than Yesterday deservedly gets all the attention from that album, but my personal favorite has always been The Age Of Aquarius.

I know there are a few Earland threads floating around. That said, it would be nice to see a general thread on the man himself. Over the years I've come back over and over again to albums like Black Talk, Live at the Key Club as well as some of his earlier singles. He needs to be rethought, reaccessed, re-everythinged! Charlie was a true master of the B3. Man, his lines were SO in the pocket. His concept was SO his own. He had about a dozen licks that he loved to play, but the way and WHERE his played them... were so right on. He had a STYLE. Yes, a STYLE all of his own. THAT ain't easy. I love Charlie and I'm not afraid to say I get as much enjoyment from Black Talk as I do Unity by LY. It's no joke. Earland was as good, great as any. Always I guy I come back to and love to hear over and over again. The human freight train.

Just wondered? Got my subscription copy of the new Downbeat and Organissimo is given a prominent review which is damn good and 3 stars!

Maybe so...didn't know that's how iTunes did it. Still, pretty funny.

So I get my Dustygroove CD reissue they did of Brother Jack McDuff's "Gin & Orange". I pop it into my Mac and load it into iTunes. When iTunes finds the album, it loads up all the song titles...this is how the song titles came up.... 1 Mac-Duffin 3:04 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 2 Dusty Groove Is Lame 5:02 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 3 On The Case 3:00 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 4 Channel One 5:57 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 5 Get It Up 3:02 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 6 Gin And Ornage 4:19 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 7 Beep-Bo-Boo 7:23 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz 8 D-G-D-R (Dusty Groove Doesn't Remaster) 6:46 Brother Jack McDuff Gin And Orange Jazz

Although they never recorded. I heard an interview with Sam Rivers yesterday where he talked about playing gigs with Big John Patton. THAT would have been a killer gig to hear!

I know Lee Morgan recorded quite a bit with organists, from early Jimmy Smith to his final recording with Charles Earland. That said, I don't think of him obviously as a typical organ sideman. But his contributions are always beautiful with the B3....especially love Flamingo with JOS and his work with Lonnie Smith. Love Bug is damn close, even though he didn't seem to be in great shape on that session he had a lot of soul that makes that album.

James Anderson (was this the guy for whom Patton names is album "This one's for JA"?). Don't know, but I bet it was as Patton and Roach were real tight, and Thelma Patton described Jimmy Anderson as a local guy who didn't record much. Roach often used local guys to record such as Conrad Lester and Eddie Wright who didn't have much of a history until Roach used them. Good call!

Not sure if these have been mentioned yet... George Coleman on Patton's "Memphis NY Spirit" and the extra cuts on the CD of "Accent on the Blues" (all from the same session) (he also did that Joey live CD recently) Tommy Turrentine's stint with Lou Donaldson produced some nice sessions like The Natural Soul and Patton's Blue John Trumpeter Irvin Stokes on Lou's "A Man With A Horn" LeRoy Williams was Patton's drummer for a long time, and I think John was the only organist he recorded/played with to my knowledge. Outside of those Patterson Prestige dates, I don't think of Booker Ervin as an organist's tenor.

My comments about John "dragging them along" was probably a bit of an over exagerration. These all seem like good players who keep good time and try and serve the music. John isn't doing it all by himself, but I think Eddie Gladden would have made a big difference here. Anyway, GREAT to see John playing again!

My thoughts exactly Jim. That drummer was diggin' coal the whole time. Horns were fine in a do-no-harm kind of way, but the rhythm section...yeah, John drug them along. John was so dead-on that none of it mattered. That whole cliche'-tired-of-hearing-it "saying a lot with a few notes"...well, Big John just showed you what that REALLY means. You gotta know that was a thrown together band of workman-like players (nothing wrong with that) that John just made sound like a million bucks (that's when you know who the real STAR of the show is : )

Glad everyone's digging the video! To answer a couple of questions....yeah, I was disappointed in that it wasn't a whole concert, just this one song. Guess he just did one song on some TV show over there. I don't know who the band is. I'm sure just musicians that were provided to him for the gigs he played there. I'm in contact with the guy from London who sent me this, I'll ask him if he knows anything else. Anyway, what a great find this was/is/will be. To see John finally represented on YouTube alongside Jimmy Smith, McGriff, Lonnie, ect... is wonderful. P.S.-John never said much about the "Big" title except that anything that helped you get over in the music business was good. I think that's how he looked at it... advertising.

I've just received a DVD that I've since posted on YouTube. It's, to my knowledge, the only taped live broadcast of John Patton performing. It's from the BBC 2 in the 1990's....John's playing Funky Mama. John Patton Lives!

The show I did with him was him mostly singing and doing some of his most famous bits.... He was THE king of merchandising, I think he bought some cheap clocks...cut out some pictures of himself and put them in the clocks...then sold them for 20 or 30 bucks! Rudy lives....

I backed up Rudy a couple of years ago here in Austin, then in Houston. Sad to hear he's gone. It was a real thrill working with him....

Awesome! DG's killin' on their reissue program.

I'll ask him those things. I do know he, John and LeRoy Williams were together as a band for something like 5 or 6 years more or less. So they did travel and play live shows constantly. I did ask Marvin if he had any live recordings of that band, and he regretted to say he didn't.

Anybody got a CD issue of Frederick Roach's "All That's Good?" I had one, but I can't find anywhere. One of my favorites.... Also, would love to have an LP copy....

Hey everybody.... I'm going to talk to Marvin again soon. I've been writing down questions I want to ask, and now am just waiting for a good time for me to call. I'll let you know what he has to say, and I'll tell him how much support he has on the board!

Just thinking how my one regret was not seeing Sonny when I had the chance up in Boston. Looks like it might happen now...thanks!!!!