Takehiro Honda It's Great Outside

Takehiro Honda - What's Going On (1971) {Solid Japan Cardboard Sleeve CDSOL-1482 rel 2012}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 253 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 81 Mb
Full Artwork @ 300 dpi (jpg) -> 53 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 1971, 2012 Trio Records / Solid Records Japan | CDSOL-1482
Jazz / Jazz Funk / Soul Jazz / Groove

Recorded in the U.S. with arranger Teddy Adams, What's Going On embraces in full the American influences that shape it – the polemical R&B of James Brown and Marvin Gaye looms heavy via covers of "Ain't It Funky Now" and the title cut, while the sound and sensibility clearly draw from West coast soul-jazz innovators like Les McCann and Gerald Wilson. But the curiosity and estrangement inherent in the album's stranger-in-a-strange-land origins are in fact its dominant element: Takehiro Honda doesn't simply channel his myriad influences, he also dissects them, taking them apart and putting them back together to understand how they work. The result is a wonderfully eccentric and heartfelt interpretation of American funk rendered in distinctly Japanese terms – studious but a bit goofy, formal yet passionately groovy.

This album is dedicated to Masabumi "Poo-Sun" Kikuchi (1939-2015). Tamaya Honda is a Japanese drummer, son of Takehiro Honda. His mother is the jazz singer Chiko Honda, and he is a nephew of Sadao Watanabe and Fumio Watanabe.