Harlan Leonard

Swing was the thing, the pop music of its day. Many bands have swung, and most are featured here . It still exercises a powerful effect on the brain and feet. There are few sounds more thrilling than a big band at full pelt. These three discs give an idea of how it all began.

Once the intro to opener “Human” gives way to its fully-realized sonic purpose, it’s obvious that Harlan T. Bobo’s fourth proper album, A History of Violence, is quite different from his previous body of work. The classic historical emotional heft of a songwriter trying to make sense of life’s chaos, think mid-70s Lou Reed, especially Coney Island Baby, is a thread that can be heard running through the album’s mid-tempo tracks like “Human” and the miniature literary tragedy that is “Nadine”. The punchier tracks on the album, like “Spiders”, might conjure very early Green On Red, what X’s mid-80s output could have been, or even the roots-rock tendencies of overlooked genius, Cass McCombs.

Averaging a pair of new albums a year, Willie Nelson, who is on the cusp of turning 90, has become a recording engine. In the past decade alone he has made albums that focused on gospel and the music of the Gershwins, followed in Bob Dylan's footsteps and made a live album at Budokan, assembled a sparkling collection of duets with female singers and cut a pair of tributes to Frank Sinatra.

While Dameron is fairly well-known for some eight compositions that have become part of the jazz canon, there are many more of his works that deserve our attention. The 12 selections recorded here were either never recorded, or only recorded rarely, and not easily available. Conversation (1940) was copyrighted along with other pieces Tadd wrote for Harlan Leonard; Moon From The East (1962) was written for Benny Goodman's USSR tour in 1962; Take A Chance On Spring (1963), with lyric by Maely Danielle, was recorded by Karin Krog and Per Husby on a record that won an award in Europe; Don't Forget It (1942) written during Dameron's tenure with Jimmie Lunceford, is very much in the vein of the popular songs of the day-It was never recorded; The Search (1948) was copyrighted along with some other tunes that were recorded by Dizzy Gillespie at the time; Never Been In Love (1963), lyric by Irving Reid, was first recorded by Bill Lee and Muriel Winston; Sando Latino, written for a 1962 Milt Jackson session on Atlantic, was lost in a vault fire at Atlantic that year; A La Bridges (1940) was written for and recorded by Harlan Leonard's Kansas City Rockets; Zakat (ca 1945) was written for Jimmie Lunceford, it was never recorded; Come Close (1962) only appears as a piano arrangement filed with the Copyright Office.

While most of Bennie Moten's music has been released, a single and complete volume of his important Victor recordings is still missing. Now there's Hep's Band Box Shuffle, which takes in Moten's prime 1929-1932 stretch for the company via 47 superbly remastered tracks. And mirroring the sterling transfers engineer John R.T. Davies has supplied, the liner notes, written by jazz photographer and historian Frank Driggs, provide a hugely readable and exhaustive account of the group's history.