Music Then And Now

This is one of Grover Washington, Jr.'s occasional strays away from R&B-oriented jazz to play in a more straightahead setting. Switching between soprano, alto and tenor, Grover is accompanied by either Tommy Flanagan or Herbie Hancock on piano during five of the eight selections and he performs such numbers as Ron Carter's "Blues for D.P.," "Stolen Moments" and "Stella by Starlight" with swing and taste. Tenor-saxophonist Igor Butman also helps out on three songs. Worth acquiring.

Leroy Burgess, Stuart Bascombe, and Russell Patterson were Black Ivory, an exceptional and occasionally brilliant soul group from Harlem that recorded throughout the '70s and returned sporadically during the decades following. The trio developed out of the late '60s as a group called the Mellow Souls and were eventually taken under the wing of Patrick Adams. Adams had been in a group called the Sparks, but he developed his skills as a songwriter, arranger, and producer with Black Ivory. Adams scraped together all the money he possibly could in order to have the group record their first single, "Don't Turn Around." Adams took the demo to several unimpressed labels before hitting Today Records.

Bob Stewart - Then And Now (1996) {Postcards POST1014}
EAC rip (secure mode) | FLAC (tracks)+CUE+LOG -> 324 Mb | MP3 @320 -> 131 Mb
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© 1996 Postcards | POST1014
Jazz / Post Bop / Tuba

Tuba player Bob Stewart's CD came out about the same time as Howard Johnson's Gravity release, and Stewart suffers by comparison. Bluesman Taj Mahal contributed the much too talky "Big Kneed Gal" and very tedious "Fishin' Blues." Carlos Ward's "Nubian Stomp" is at best uninspired reggae, while his street strut "Nette" barely gains headway in spite of trumpeter Graham Haynes' spirited solo.

'Then and Now' just about justifies its 4 star rating if only because of the unseen early band footage and all too rare Manfred Mann interviews, both then and now!
Not so much a career retrospective as flash back to the beginning of the Earth Band circa 72 and a flash forward to current times, 'Then and Now' has its moments but would have been bolstered with some bonus footage of both Chris Thompson and the late Steve Waller, who were important mainstays in the band; that said, there's an accompanying CD box set reviewed elsewhere.