Microscopic Septet

The last of four albums recorded by this madcap New York City band co-led by Phillip Johnston and Joel Forrester, Beauty Based on Science ends their all-too-brief career on a high note. As usual, the pieces take their cues from a multitude of sources, including film noir soundtracks, Ellington, barrelhouse blues, and Steve Lacy, all performed with an odd combination of homage and tongue-in-cheek, spiced with a liberal dose of free jazz in the solo work. The near-obligatory tango shows up in Johnston's slyly titled "Waltz of the Recently Punished Catholic School Boys." Their horn arrangements are possibly richer than ever, shown to great advantage in compositions like "Come From Behind" (a small classic and frequent live performance highlight) and Johnston's "Rocky's Heart." Forrester's bouncy, infectious "Lobster in the Limelight," also a band mainstay, offers another example of the Micros at the top of their game, with its giddy riffs providing exactly the right balance and support for all manner of free soloing by Paul Shapiro and Dave Sewelson.

The Microscopic Septet - Seven Men In Neckties (2006) {2CD Set Cuneiform RUNE 236/237 rec 1983-1985} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 959 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 313 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 45 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1983-85, 2006 Cuneiform Records / Phillip Johnston | RUNE 236/23
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Post-Bop / Saxophone

A nearly brassless little big band and a guitarless R&B group all at the same time, the Microscopic Septet was to the 1980s New York Downtown scene something of what the Art Ensemble of Chicago was to its own home town. Both bands were steeped in and respectful of the jazz tradition, but both deconstructed, recalibrated, juggled and played around with its component parts to create affectionate, often witty new amalgams of the old—and intimations of the future. The two-disc Seven Men In Neckties collects the Micros' immortal, mind-expanding but long unavailable, first two albums—Take The Z Train (Press Records, 1983) and the live Let's Flip! (Osmosis Records, 1985)—along with previously unissued, contemporaneous material.

The Microscopic Septet - Lobster Leaps In (2008) {Cuneiform RUNE 272} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 486 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 172 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 38 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2008 Cuneiform Records / Phillip Johnston | RUNE 272
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Post-Bop / Saxophone

The Microscopic Septet had been disbanded for quite a few years by the time a pair of twin CD reissue compilations appeared on the Cuneiform label in 2006, prompting a brief reunion of the group to support sales. The musicians had so much fun that they decided to get together again to record a few of the many compositions that the band played during its existence, reuniting pianist Joel Forrester, soprano saxophonist Phillip Johnston, alto saxophonist Don Davis, baritone saxophonist Dave Sewelson, bassist David Hofstra, and drummer Richard Dworkin, with the one new addition being tenor saxophonist Mike Hashim.

The Microscopic Septet - Been Up So Long It Looks Like Down To Me: The Micros Play the Blues (2017) {Cuneiform RUNE 425} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 374 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 147 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 25 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2017 Cuneiform Records / Phillip Johnston | RUNE 425
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Jazz-Blues / Post-Bop / Saxophone

Saxophonist Phillip Johnston founded The Microscopic Septet in 1980 when the group briefly counted John Zorn as one of its members. They recorded four albums and were a regular presence in New York's downtown scene before disbanding in 1992. In 2006 Cuneiform Records re-released the four albums leading to the reformation of the group and presently, to their new release Been Up So Long It Looks Like Down to Me: The Micros Play the Blues.

The Microscopic Septet - Friday the 13th: The Micros Play Monk (2010) {Cuneiform RUNE 310} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 364 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 140 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 36 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2010 Cuneiform Records / Phillip Johnston | RUNE 310
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Post-Bop / Saxophone

Very few jazz composers have experienced the extremes of acceptance and rejection that were Thelonious Monk's lot. Ignored and rejected early in his career – in part for the oblique weirdness of his piano style, in part for the difficulty and angularity of his compositions, and in part because he was quite clearly mentally ill – he did at least live to see his music given the appreciation it deserved, and his work has only grown in esteem since his death in 1982. Today, his pieces are among the most frequently performed and recorded of any jazz composer; as popularity among musicians goes, his music is on the same level as that of Duke Ellington and Miles Davis.

The Microscopic Septet - Manhattan Moonrise (2014) {Cuneiform RUNE 370} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 379 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 144 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 22 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2014 Cuneiform Records / Phillip Johnston | RUNE 370
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Post-Bop / Saxophone

In the 80s, the band engendered a cagey slant on mainstream swing and then morphed into the risk-taking New York downtown scene, eventually garnering widespread attention and sell-out crowds at the Knitting Factory and other hip venues. They regrouped in 2006, carrying the torch for what has become a singular sound, ingrained in classic jazz stylizations, bop, funk, and the free-jazz domain. Known for its quirky deviations, razor-sharp horns arrangements and melodic hooks, the septet's spunkiness and tightknit overtures align with the stars on Manhattan Moonrise.

The Microscopic Septet - Take The Z Train (1983) {Koch Jazz - KOC-CD-7863 rel 1998} (Phillip Johnston)
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 287 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 100 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 33 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1983, 1999 Press / Phillip Johnston / Koch Jazz | KOC-CD-7863
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Modern Creative / Post-Bop / Saxophone

The quirky music of the Microscopic Septet defies classification, other than it is swinging jazz blended with R&B and a host of other influences, full of twists and turns, yet remaining very catchy and accessible. Their debut LP originally came out on the Press label and was finally reissued as a Koch CD in 1998. Much like the musicians that made up Spike Jones' City Slickers in the 1940s, only some very talented players could follow these demanding charts; yet unlike the comparison to Jones' records, there is nothing that is obviously or purely cornball about this music.

The Microscopic Septet is one of those rare groups that have been able to take a unique and enduring approach to various forms of popular music, be it jazz, blues, R & B, rock, pop, and so on, by balancing respect with irreverence, namely such outfits as Frank Zappa's Mothers of Invention, the New Rhythm and Blues Quintet (NRBQ), the Sun Ra Arkestra, the Jazz Passengers, the Vienna Art Orchestra, and Mostly Other People Do the Killing.

Phillip Johnston's Transparent Quartet - Page of Madness (2009) {Asynchronous ‎001}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 314 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 185 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 32 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2009 Asynchronous ‎Records | 001
Jazz / Progressive Jazz / Avant-Garde Jazz / Stage & Screen / Modern Creative / Post Bop / Saxophone

Page of Madness is an original film score for Teinosuke Kinugasa’s Japanese 1926 silent film masterpiece, Kurutta Ippeiji, (A Page of Madness). It was recorded in 1998, and is just being released on CD now for the first time. It features The Transparent Quartet, and was recorded by Jon Rosenberg.