Breathe All That Jazz

Summer 1988 and as Acid House raged across the UK pockets of resistance began springing up delicated to a very different beat. Inspired by Hip-Hop, Jazz and a wealth of Soul and Funk recordings stretching back to the 60's America, young musicians breathed life into old sounds, recorded new ones and set about spreading their message worldwide. Soul Jazz Sessions celebrates those bands, producers, and DJ's who took the next step into the studio and produced some dancefloor magic in the process.

It is believed that the rush hour lounge music falls on the 50-60s. Then it executes unknown bands, but the rooms were great friends. While implementing lounge music could be called any musician who played in a cafe or restaurant to the public. In the 60s there were ensembles, records which are related to Lounge. Among them - the bands of James Last, Bert Kempferta, Paul Mauriat, Herb Alpert. Distinguished as a lounge music and musical design films, because this style of music can rightly be called the background.

Following up her standards-focused 2017 debut A Social Call, Dallas-born, New York-based singer Jazzmeia Horn offers mainly originals on Love and Liberation, boldly stepping ahead as an artist. Along with her deep and effortless vocal expression and turn-on-a-dime scat solos, she proves herself an engaging writer with a lot to say at any tempo or feel. The breakneck bebop number “Searchin’” and the luxuriant ballad “Legs and Arms” are among the highlights. Pianist Victor Gould, bassist Ben Williams, and drummer Jamison Ross provide stellar backing, with Ross delivering strong vocals in tandem with Horn on the George Duke/Rachelle Ferrell cover “Reflections of My Heart” (and the intriguing spoken-word “Only You,” which directly precedes it). Tenor saxophonist Stacy Dillard and trumpeter Josh Evans add spice along the way, while pianist Sullivan Fortner, brimming with old-school stylistic wisdom, lends his brilliant touch on four tracks.

With ensemble vocal jazz, the danger is always that tight and complex harmony writing will come across as too smooth and too sweet – for some reason, chords that sound sharp and bracing when distributed among reed instruments can sound cloying and overly slick when sung by human voices. The vocal/instrumental quartet New York Voices don't avoid that trap entirely on their latest album (and their first as an ensemble in seven years), but they continue to demonstrate their mastery of the genre with a solid program of new and old songs and innovative arrangements. Their take on "Darn That Dream" is startlingly new (and features a fine bass clarinet solo by Bob Mintzer), and the lyrics that group members added to John Coltrane's "Moment's Notice" work very nicely. Not everyone will agree that the world needed a vocal jazz version of Laura Nyro's "Stoned Soul Picnic," but the New York Voices' version is really lots of fun and is sure to bring a nostalgic tear to more than one baby-boomer eye. Apart from a couple of saccharine moments on "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning," A Day Like This is a pleasure from start to finish. Recommended.

Christophe Wallemme - Namaste (2006) {Bee Jazz Records Bee 016}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 348 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 124 Mb
Full Artwork @ 600 dpi (jpg) -> 162 Mb | 5% repair rar
© 2006 Bee Jazz Records | Bee 016
Jazz / Contemporary Jazz / Post Bop / Bass

The achievement of Namaste—and it is a genuine achievement—is also the achievement of Miles Davis's In a Silent Way (Columbia, 1969): namely, providing room to breathe in a crowded room of musicians—soloists all, not a big band. (On Miles's subsequent Bitches Brew (Columbia, 1969), in contrast, a crowded room of musicians was happy to sound like a hot and tumultuous marketplace.) Despite the carefully-crafted compositions and arrangements, it's that sumptuous but spacious sound fabric that is most remarkable about this record.

Packaging-wise and title-wise, the Rhino label's Hip Hop: The Collection is as generic as they come, but after that, all complaints are minimal. Get it at the right price, and it doesn't even matter that the theme is mega-broad and that the T.I. hit isn't one everyone knows, because when a collection goes from Afrika Bambaataa's seminal electro-rap "Planet Rock… Don't Stop" to Missy Elliot's "Get Ur Freak On" with barely any filler in the middle, the freak is on and the planet is certainly rocked. The set jumps time periods at will, and yet the sequencing works, so consider it a time capsule or a portable party, because it's both.