Lucky Bobby

Digitally remastered and expanded three CD deluxe edition of this 1972 album housed in a cardboard replica of a wooden box. Includes a remastered version of the original album with a wealth of unreleased material recorded during those sessions and others recorded at Bearsville Studios throughout 1974. The set closes with a newly unearthed, 30-minute interview Charles did that was recorded shortly before the Bobby Charles album was released in August 1972.
Hooking up with the Band, specifically Rick Danko and their producer John Simon, was one of the smartest moves Bobby Charles ever made. His subsequent eponymous album on Bearsville not only gave him a bigger audience, but led to the perfect production for his sly, subtle blend of New Orleans R&B, rock & roll, and country…

This CD includes the early steps of Bobby Jaspar as a jazz musician, when he started on clarinet and then tenor saxophone, as he formed the young award-winning Belgian band they called “Bob Shots” —the first in Europe to play “be-bop” back in 1947 under the guidance of Jaspar's influence, Don Byas. One year later he met Lucky Thompson onstage in an enriching experience, and he became his new inspiration. These two encounters helped Bobby grow musically in a way that would make him a success everywhere, a blend of styles that was a compromise between the turbulence of Thompson, Lester Young, Eddie 'Lockjaw' Davis, etc., and the rhapsodic style of Byas and Hawkins.

Tenor saxophonist Eli "Lucky" Thompson came up in Detroit but made all of his earliest recordings in the Los Angeles area during the 1940s. This fascinating album of rare jazz opens with a mind-blowing Timme Rosenkrantz-sponsored jam session recorded on December 26, 1944. Thompson leads an ensemble combining violinist Stuff Smith, trombonist Bobby Pratt, pianist Erroll Garner, and drummer George Wettling. "Test Pilots" appears to be a collective improvisation during which, like many Stuff Smith dates, the mood is wonderfully relaxed and informal. Recording for the Excelsior label in September of 1945, Lucky Thompson's All-Stars consisted of trumpeter Karl George, trombonist J.J. Johnson, bop clarinetist Rudy Rutherford and a tough rhythm section in Bill Doggett, Freddie Green, Rodney Richardson, and Shadow Wilson…

Total Eclipse was Bobby Hutcherson's first recording session with tenor saxophonist Harold Land, who became one of his major collaborators (and a quintet co-leader) during the late '60s. Land's rounded, echoing tone is a nice contrast for the coolly cerebral post-bop that fills Total Eclipse. Hutcherson contributes four of the five compositions (the other, "Matrix," is by pianist Chick Corea), and he's in a mood to intellectually challenge himself and the rest of the quintet, which also includes bassist Reggie Johnson and longtime drummer Joe Chambers. The results are full of the sort of skillful musicianship one would naturally expect of Hutcherson's '60s-era Blue Notes. Land's solo lines are fluid and lengthy, assimilating some of Coltrane's innovations while remaining accessibly soulful…

As a child prodigy, keyboardist and organist Lucky Peterson's exploits were legendary. The stories grew even more widespread as he became a teen and stints with Little Milton and Bobby "Blue" Bland only added to his fame. But Peterson's records have not always justified or reaffirmed his reputation. That is not the case with the cuts on this 1984 set, recently reissued by Evidence. The spiraling solos, excellent bridges, turnbacks, pedal maneuvers, and soulful accompaniment are executed with a relaxed edge and confident precision. If you have wondered whether Lucky Peterson deserves the hype and major label bonanza, these songs are the real deal.

Beat music, British beat, or Merseybeat (after bands from Liverpool and nearby areas beside the River Mersey) is a pop and rock music genre that developed in the United Kingdom in the early 1960s. Beat music is a fusion of rock and roll (mainly Chuck Berry guitar style and the midtempo beat of artists like Buddy Holly), doo-wop, skiffle and R&B. The genre provided many of the bands responsible for the British Invasion of the American pop charts starting in 1964, and provided the model for many important developments in pop and rock music, including the format of the rock group around lead, rhythm and bass guitars with drums. The Beat Of The Pops - excellent selection of beat tracks.