JSngry

Al Green on today's Blue Note? Now THAT could be interesting!

Hmmm 38, eh? Old enough to know better, young enough to do it anyway, but usually too busy (and therefore too tired) to bother. The key word being "usually"... PERFECT! Happy birthday buddy!

Sorry dude, that's the best I can do. I puuled it off an e-mail from DoubleTime Jazz that was forwarded to me. The cover shot was a link to Music Resource.com. but the image doesn't even show up there. I had to copy it into Paint and then PaintShop Pro, and THEN change the file format just to get it into a format that I could attach here. Actually, I didn't do any of that - my daughter did. She's the image manipulation whiz of the family. Those LT covers get a bad rap, I think. They are indeed bare bones, low budget jobs, but a lot of them are quite effective in a minimalist way if you pay attention and use your imagination. The MOTHER SHIP cover had a photo of something that looked like a closeup of some solar panel or something. I don't know what it was, but it sefinitely looked like something that would be found on a Mother Ship, I like it, think it fits the title of the album quite nicely. A lot of the LT covers were like that too - the overall design was Spartan, but the actual photo quite often fit the title of the album in a really evocative manner. THINKING OF HOME & COOL BLUES come readily to mind. But they're not covers or photos in the "classic" BN style, and BN can certainly be understood for wanting to play to the whole "Blue Note Mystique" thing with these new covers, especially seeing that a lot (most?) people who will be buying these things either weren't around for the LT series, or if they were, might have missed them (they were usually here today, gone later today affairs). Another thing about the LT covers - they don't post worth a damn - whatever effectiveness they had almost has to be experienced by holding the things in your hands and looking at them yourself, maybe even pondering them. The of-necessity minimalism just doesn't create impact any other way. If you see a scan of one, you're going to think that it's nothing. This is all just my opinion, of course, and I know people who have the actual things who can't stand them. But I bought a lot of them when they came out, and I usually found them to have their own vibe, one that I liked. That, of course, was then, and this is now, however, and if it's on Blue Note, it's going to have that "Blue Note Look", meaning that Reid Miles look. Ok, whatever. But considering what MOTHER SHIP actually is (a post-lion, post-Miles, non hard bop session that wasn't even released for 20 or so years), I think the LT cpver is actually a better fit for both the music and the document. This is all quibbling over nothing, of course. The bottom line is that this is a great session that's been long overdue for reissue, and I'd be picking it up to supplement my LT LP even if it had one of those creepy Mode-type painings for a cover.

REAL PLAYER REQUIRED

27? With even a litttle luck, your life's not even 1/3 over yet. Live it up, do it right, and MANY happy returns!

I remeber the Sons. Good stuff. Don't know how big of an influence on Chicago they were though. I had a REAL mindfuck of an eyeopener when I finally got around, ca. 1978 or so, to hearing the Buckinghams' TIME AND CHARGES & PORTRAITS albums, both heavily involving the production and arranging of James William Guercio. The similarities between these albums and the early Chicago ones are more than occasional, and more than passing. Defintiely something to make you go hmmmmmmmmmm in regards to Guercio's role in that band in it's early days. Now, what influence the Sons had on Guercio, I cannot say. Howzabout Cold Blood and the profoundly nasty Lydia Pense? Seldom captured to their best effect on record, but when they were, WHOOOOO!!!! And weren't they the first to cover, if not actually record, "Va;dez In The Country"?

Just finished a micro-mini 30 minute obsessive replay of this song, neither the first time I've done so (not by a long shot) nor the longest (ditto - the longest would be about 1 week, although not non-stop, obviously). I'm becoming convinced that as great and epochal as JBs King years were, that this one song might be his heaviest moment. Unlike most, nearly all, of his Polydor output, the band here is HOT funky, not just groovy funky. The wah-wah chicken scratch guitar is the type of thing that Miles was into, no doubt courtesy of JB, but here they actually get into that EVIL vibe that Miles made his own. The bassist his holding it down and wouldn't give it up even if you put pistol to his head and another one up his ass. The drummer is, like on any happenin' JB side, locked into Brown's mind, soul, body, and feet whether he wants to be or not. Brown had a SERIOUS mojo in those years, and nobody got caught up in it musically more than his drummers. "So what?", you'd be well excused for thinking. "That's James Brown for ya'". And you're right. What trips me out about this cut is, don't laugh, the lyrics. The standard for funky internal psychodrama lyrics is nearly always cited as Sly's THERE'S A RIOT GOING ON (justifyably so), and Prince in general (somewhat justified imo). But what the hell got into JB when he cut this one? There's enough ambiguity and internal conflict coming out of this man's grunts, squeals, screams, and decidedly non-linear stream-of-consciousness variations on a loosely preset lyric to scare the shit out of anybody who has just a fraction of the same thing going on inside themselves (and that's most of us, if we're honest). No, these aren't "lyrics" in the tradititonal Tin Pan Alley sense. These are more like symbols, shorthand, with a phrase of just two or three words conveying a fullbodied scenario worth the proverbial thousand words, and this scenario is of a man haunted by time closing in on him for no particualr reason other than that's the nature of he beast, and by a pathological fear that somebody, ANYBODY is going to run a game on him and bygod that's NOT going to happen. These lyrics take HARD left turns - one minute he's pumped as hell that his main thing is in town, so pumped that he wants her to get up in front of everybody and do her thing. Why? So the world can see that her game don't mean nothing to him. Then he's off to the Georgia sun, home sweet home, where he's gonna "wiggle". You'd think he'd be happy, and oh yeah he is, at least until when, literally out of nowhere, time starts getting short and he's got to move because, yeah, you can't run a game on him. It's a harrowing ride, I tell you, if you can set aside the "typical" tendency to pay less attention to Brown's actual words that their rhythmic placing and colorations. Franklyn Ajaye's old joke about the James Brown lyric sheet rings true, for sure. But here, there seems to be something really, REALLY deep going on in the lyrics, something primal, like the man who made it a point to be TOTALLY invincible to all emotional peril finally got scared shitless once too often and once too heavily and had to battle it out in public, in front of a microphome and a band to be captured for the whole world to witness in a desperate attempt to banish the demons through public humiliation, not private triumph. There's three choruses here. The first is straightforward enough, at least in JB terms, although it's obvious that the heat is turned up WAY high, higher than anything he'd done in a while, and possibly, POSSIBLY, higher than anything he'd done before. The second is where things start getting really scary, what with Brown literally fighting with his emotions, getting caught up in a lyrical phrase/emotional meaning and wrestling it into submission. Or so he hopes - the third chorus doen't sound too optimistic in this regard, as Brown resorts to nonverbal communication of the same claustrophobic sentiments of the lyrics, and he is DEEP into it, as sharp in his timing, as fiery in his temperature, and as deep in the pocket as he's EVER been. And oh yeah, these "typical" Brown grunts, squeals, and screams come in a decidedly NON-typical flow, conveying the sound and feel of a man who feels terrifyingly close to being trapped once and for all and is using his resources to punch his way out, the same way that Ali would rope-a-dope and bust-a-move when the time was right. Only, Ali KNEW that he had the upper hand, and Brown doesn't sound like he knows ANY such thing, only that you're not going to run a game on him and recognizing, for once, and with horrific if fleeting clarity, that quite possibly, by not letting that happen that he's being his own worst enemy, but dammit, that's ALL he knows and it damn well BETTER work. Seperating the three choruses are two intervals of electric piano (Wurlitzer?), played by Brown. Now, this guy was NOT a "player" by any stretch of the imagination - he had a hip bag of tricks that he employed artfully, but that was it. Hipper than shit, but not a player with a deep well to go to, if you know what I mean (although his work on "Papa Don't Take No Mess" comes REAL close to making me reconsider that assessment...) Here, however, his electric piano work serves the function of a fighter's time in the corner between rounds. You can hear him getting his thoughts together, giving himself advice and tips, all in anticipation of the next round. And in the second interval, you can here him REALLY getting anxious about Round Three, and sure enough, Round Three is the one where words don't suffice anymore, where he takes the battle to the abstract realm, perhaps because he senses he's not winning it taking his typical tact. Many people have made many attempts to convey the greatness of James Brown in his prime, and I'll not even attempt to do that - the music literally speaks for itself, no words are going to be as great as the actual music. But I'm sure I'm not the only person who's wondered what made this guy tick, what drove him to such superhuman heights, just what made him SO damn super bad, how he could say "HIT ME" so defiantly, so confidently, so GODDAMN sure that it wouldn't hurt, or if it did, that he wiould be stronger than the hurt, MUCH stronger, strong enough to laugh it off and kick it's ass with the goodfoot. Just what the hell was going on inside this motherfucker anyway, this man would be king, who WAS king, and who in his own mind would always be king, not just of his world, or THE world, but of ALL THAT EVER WAS OR WOULD BE? Well, for whatever reason, consciously or not, I think he let us see all the way inside himself for just once, opened the door for us to see, and dared us not to flinch, gave us a chance to get hit with the same shit that he'd been hitting himself with for God knows how long, perhaps forever... Yeah - there it is. Indeed. Hit me.

Sorry, I like the LT cover better. But I am in the minority on that, no doubt.

A little perspective...

But I only have two ears!

Yes, I am getting sleepy, and no, it's not from your attempts at hypnosis, it's from that damn accordion.

The Doctor Moreau All Stars!

Take care, John.

Maybe so, but I'd like to find out myself...

Promise?

And the label is lying about the "sensational" part!

Ever get a feeling that a record's REALLY going to suck just by looking at it?

Looks like Mr. Trombone just mugged Mr. Peanut...