Frank Lowe

On this free jazz date the powerful tenor Frank Lowe teams up with trumpeter Leo Smith, trombonist Joseph Bowie, bassist Alex Blake and drummer Charles Bobo Shaw for five group originals including the collaboration "Third St. Stomp." The very explorative and rather emotional music holds one's interest throughout. These often heated performances are better heard than described.

This series of short duets reveals a different side of free jazz icon and tenor saxophonist Frank Lowe, who joins the relatively obscure French bassist Bernard Santacruz. Except for the occasional abstract passages, the music is quite accessible, beautiful, and engaging. The two musicians share compositional duties and perform some fine tunes by the likes of Don Cherry, Dollar Brand, Sun Ra, and Denis Charles…

Frank Lowe - Black Beings (1973) {ESP 3013 rel 2008}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 470 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 145 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 7 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1973, 2008 ESP-Disk' Ltd | ESP 3013
Jazz / Avant-Garde Jazz / Soul Jazz / Saxophone

One of the later ESP blowouts, this CD reissue features the powerful tenor of Frank Lowe interacting with Joseph Jarman (heard here on alto and soprano), violinist Leroy Jenkins (operating under the pseudonym of "The Wizard" but quite recognizable), bassist William Parker and drummer Rashid Sinan. Two of the three originals (which include the 25-minute "In Trane's Name") are lengthy and wander a bit, but the intense music is well worth hearing by free-jazz collectors.

Among musicians, Arthur Alexander was always considered one of the greatest R&B songwriters. Both the Beatles and the Rolling Stones covered his songs, "Anna (Go to Him)" and "You Better Move On," respectively, early in their careers. But they weren't the only ones – throughout the years, his work was rich source material for many blues, soul, rock, and country artists. He may have earned the recognition of his peers, but he remained relatively unknown to the general public, right up to his death in 1993. In order to raise his profile, Razor & Tie released Adios Amigo: A Tribute to Arthur Alexander in 1994, assembling a stellar and diverse lineup to record new versions of his songs. The diversity and the fresh arrangements illustrates the depth of Alexander's songs and how well they lent themselves to new readings. Like any tribute album, Adios Amigo is uneven, with a few tracks falling flat, but the best moments – Elvis Costello's "Sally Sue Brown," Robert Plant's "If It's Really Got to Be This Way," Chuck Jackson's "You Better Move On," Frank Black's "Old John Amos," John Prine's "Lonely Just Like Me," Gary U.S. Bonds' "Genie in the Jug," Graham Parker's "Every Day I Have to Cry" and Nick Lowe's "In the Middle of It All" – are affectionate salutes to a departed master, and they're damn enjoyable in their own right as well.

Filling in a gap in Frank Sinatra's history, Legacy's 2015 box A Voice on Air collects over 100 radio broadcasts recorded between 1935 and 1955. This is the first collection to chronicle this era – over 90 of its 100 tracks are previously unreleased – and it's pulled from a variety of sources, including the Sinatra estate's vaults, the Library of Congress, and the Paley Center for Media, each strand assisting in sterling re-creations of original broadcasts from Frank's bobbysocks days, World War II, and the nascent saloon singer of the '50s. Sinatra wound up singing some of these songs in the studio but not necessarily in these arrangements, a wrinkle that would be tantalizing enough but a good portion of A Voice on Air is devoted to songs he only sang on the air.