Clown

Didier Raoult, Éric Zemmour, J.-M. Bigard, Michel Onfray, Cyril Hanouna, Jacline Mouraud, Éric Drouet, Francis Lalanne… Quarante ans après Coluche et en pleine vague de démagogie mondiale, les Français sont-ils prêts à élire un clown ? Un candidat hors système, un outsider qui brise les codes et offre l’occasion de se débarrasser définitivement de l’ancien monde. Beppe Grillo a ouvert la voie en Italie, Donald Trump a marqué au fer rouge les États-Unis, la France aura-t-elle, à son tour, son champion ? …

The Clown was Charles Mingus' second masterpiece in a row, upping the already intense emotional commitment of Pithecanthropus Erectus and burning with righteous anger and frustration. With Pithecanthropus, Mingus displayed a gift for airtight, focused arrangements that nonetheless allowed his players great freedom to add to the established mood of each piece. The Clown refines and heightens that gift; instead of just writing heads that provide launch points for solos, Mingus tries to evoke something specific with every piece, and even his most impressionistic forays have a strong storytelling quality. In fact, The Clown's title cut makes that explicit with a story verbally improvised by Jean Shepherd (yes, the same Jean Shepherd responsible for A Christmas Story) from a predetermined narrative…

The Clown was Charles Mingus' second masterpiece in a row, upping the already intense emotional commitment of Pithecanthropus Erectus and burning with righteous anger and frustration. With Pithecanthropus, Mingus displayed a gift for airtight, focused arrangements that nonetheless allowed his players great freedom to add to the established mood of each piece. The Clown refines and heightens that gift; instead of just writing heads that provide launch points for solos, Mingus tries to evoke something specific with every piece, and even his most impressionistic forays have a strong storytelling quality.

Charles Mingus - The Clown (1957) {2007 Japan MiniLP, WPCR-25144}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC+CUE+LOG -> 210 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 97 Mb
Full Artwork @ 400 dpi (png) -> 61 Mb
© 2007 Atlantic / Warner Music Japan | WPCR-25144 | 24-bit remaster
Jazz / Post Bop / Bass

Mingus is a true original, and THE CLOWN is an album on which his genius for melding tradition with experimentation is particularly pronounced. In the stunning "Haitian Fight Song," the track which opens the album, there are strains of indigenous folk styles and church music pastiched with raw-nerve intensity and compositional sophistication. Mingus's bass, in particular, in its strident manipulation of the fretboard and powerful sound, seems to express the emotional ferocity which propels the track.