Soul Stream

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At the time, the working trio was Patton, Green and Otis Finch. They gigged heavily and regularly for a good period of time. I'd have to disagree with the drumming on this one. Finch is stirring the pot for sure. He doesn't have the chemistry with Green and Patton like Ben Dixon did, he who did!

The second track on Let 'Em Roll is Latona. It's a modal Latin groover using F#dorian. This is one of the most incredible examples of John's ability to juggle a difficult polyrhythmic bassline. The bassline itself seems like a simple 3 note figure, but when used against the rhythm...it is a bitch. Also, love how the melody is constructed around the scale but it doesn't sound especially driven that way, very subtle and beautiful. Especially the two note phrases before they punch the chords. Super hip. John's solo is so, so, so...JOHN. He's really finding his voice on this album. We'll hear a LOT more of Patton soloing in this sort of modal groover much more once he gets to That Certain Feeling. But if I had to choose one cut that would represent the dividing line for John, both compositionally and conceptually, this would be it. After Latona, there's no turning back for him. Also, his full organ tag on the end is beautiful.

Here's a little more I'd like to say about "Let 'Em Roll." Firstly, I can't express how much I love this album and how many, many, many hours of enjoyment I've gotten from it over the years. If there is such a thing as a "perfect" LP, this might be it for me. To begin with, the six songs included construct such a perfect set of listening that from start to finish this is a wonderfully sequenced LP... The title cut Let 'Em Roll leads it off. It's a great example of John's compositional style. Deceptively simple, but very open ended. This is an 8 bar blues in G, but has modal aspects to it when you get to the IV chord, much like "All Blues." You can really hear it exagerrated on the head with the D,G,C,F note walkup. Plus, this has got some great rhythmic angles to it.... although Candy Finch just shuffles the shit out of the whole thing. The turnback from bars 5 on, especially pronounced on the head, is just something only Big John would come up with. It's trademark stuff. You listen to it and it sounds relatively simple. But try and PLAY what those guys are doing, and you realize you're in Patton's world now and you are screwed. Rhythmic and harmonic subtlety are the name of the game here and lesser men would make a complete mess of this thing. Another thing I love is that John keeps the bass in 2 against 4 the whole time. A lot of organists would have started walking the bass at some point. This was something John liked to to quite a bit because it frees the drummer up a bit more. That's why drummers loved playing with John too, he gave them plenty of room. Grant and John keep their solos bluesy and, surprisingly, so does Bobby Hutcherson. At 3:32 Big John hits a lick that foreshadows the complete Got A Good Thing Goin' LP. Also, when Bobby solos...listen to what the fuck John and Grant start doing behind him! Those interlocking figures keep that rhythm moving and are locking in so tight with Candy Finch...it's unheralded stuff, but those are the things that seperate good from great rhythm sections....

And the cover ain't bad either.

O.K. So this is the album most consider Big John's finest. I'm not going to argue, since I couldn't argue there's a BETTER one (a few equals I'd say however). But no doubt Big John and company are at their peak here. John Patton himself told me he was very nervous at this session due to the presence of Bobby Hutcherson. You'd never know from John's playing however. One thing I love so much about Patton's work, no matter what the album, is that it's so focused. Clean lines, it's like he's got it all mapped out in his head before hand. And this band@! Bobby does add that extra ingredient that maybe sends this session from being merely a great one to a legendary one. I'm going to go into a more blow by blow rundown of the LP later today or tommorrow, but wanted to get the word out on what AOTW I had picked since I'm running a day late and a dollar short.

I notice MOST labels have very nice stickers that come right off. Unfortunately EMI must buy all theirs from the cheapest source in the world, they almost never come off cleanly and leave that damn sticky crap all over the place. Thanks again BN!(and did I mention you suck for closing the BNBB. hope Norah's selling well for you).

One of the oddest autographs I have is a beautiful official Blue Note pulicity shot signed by none other than Freddie Roach himself. Now that's GOT to be one in a million.

I had all the Blue Note organists that ever played my B3 sign the inside. It includes.... Big John Patton Jack McDuff Jimmy McGriff Reuben Wilson ...sadly, Jimmy Smith played that B3 on 3 different gigs but never would sign it.

I think we all are feeling squashed by the machine.

I used to live on my grandfather's farm in Oklahoma during summer school breaks when I was growing up. Mouse traps worked then and continue to work today I'd imagine. I think rodents are just an inevitable part of living in the open, exposed to all elements. Make your peace with them now and learn to live with them is what I think you basically have to do.

One of the most memorable clips to me was of George Wallace's presidential stump speech at a rally in San Francisco. A huge crowd he commanded using the same language and images that are used to rally today's Americans against the same fears and hatreds that remain timeless. We are destined to repeat history, no doubt about that in my mind. We doing it as I type this out.

Yes, one is better than the other. Didn't you know Bird and Diz suck. And so does Monk and Trane. Matter of fact, we should all just buy the new Jessica Simpson CD and be done with it.

I agree with Free on this. They're both great. But I'll take Dan's bait and say this...the sound quality is so good on the Monk and so distant on the Bird that I get much more enjoyment from the Monk/Trane.

I don't know think it's nostalgia or rewriting history here. This is just plain great music by great musicians. And it points out so many shortcomings of today's music, thus the lack of modern day tears. Name something today that has this kind of delivery and I'll be the first one in line to buy it. Like Barry Harris said, there's always a golden age to every kind of music. And this a golden age treasure.

Welcome back Larry!

Hey Free, just a little jab at the BerklEE crowd. As you can tell, I'm not a huge fan of music schools in general in the sense that if you have the same few people teaching a lot of people, no matter how good the teaching is, it leads to a certain musical DNA interbreeding.

I just used the office paper cutter to slice Baraka's page right out of the booklet. It feels cleaner now. ← To be honest, I just skipped right over his and didn't even read them. His being right up front is just silliness.

Yes, a VERY bad record to listen to when you're in your "militant jazz purist" mindset. However, if you can stop your "sus4" mantra long enough to get drunk and listen, it might just sink into your soul a little bit.

How is it? How is air? How is water? You have to have them to live.

I can't disagree with any of that. And as much as I adore the recordings with Johnny Griffin, the level of interaction between Monk and Trane here is quite staggering (and perhaps even a little surprising given the difference in their approach to instrumental technique). They seemed to have achieved such profound empathy and in such a short time span. It doesn't just feel like Coltrane sitting in with the Monk trio (which I kind of felt about 'Discovery'), it feels like a fully integrated group. This is one of those releases that is genuinely revelatory. ← I totally agree. It's amazing what the approaches of Monk and Coltrane get from the SAME music, completely opposite, yet exactly the same. It's like hearing a conversation between two people from an unknown land speaking a mysterious language unfamiliar to the ear. To hear what Monk plays on Evidence and then to hear Coltrane on the same changes is staggering.

...and now back to our scheduled program... Anybody want to comment on Wynton Kelly!(The Vee Jay LP). This thing swings like hell. The piano sounds great and Paul and Jimmy are swinging for the fences as well. Wynton never sounded better to these ears. Songs are relatively short, but in a good way, no bullshit involved. When the logical thinking was still to play 3 or 4 choruses for the most part and get out.

It's funny, I find the real discovery here to be Coltrane. Coltrane framed by Monk in this way is absolutely....everything. Monk sounds great too. Monk being Monk and playing Monk songs. But Coltrane is bobbing and weaving, fitting his concept fully into what Monk's music is demanding. Yet unlike other tenors, Coltrane explodes with Monk. He's been set free here and you can hear it on so many levels. Just mho....

Both discs, I hope! ← Yes, I ordered it from Amazon. The 2 disc set...

I LOVE WYNTON TOO!!!! I'm also bummed that I slept on the Mosaic. Couldn't help it in a sense that it "timed out" or something like that. To my knowledge, one day it was there and the next day wasn't, unlike most slowly dwindling Mosaics. Anyway, sour grapes on my part! Still, you're right. If Wynton's on it, I'll buy it. Just ordered the Wynton trio live with Joe Henderson last night. Do you have that one Free For All? I was surprised at hour good the quality was on the sound clips given the Mobley/wynton trio recording from the previous year sounded so bad.