Articles by George Wallace
Tom Waits In The House: Three Jazzy Winners From The Noir Prince Of La Pop
by George Wallace
No assessment of the interchange between jazz music and the spoken word idiom in contemporary music can be complete without paying a visit to Small Change, the fourth studio album by singer and songwriter Tom Waits, released on September 21, 1976 on Asylum Records. It was recorded in July at the Wally Heider Recording Studio in Hollywood. Harry Bluestone, violin, concertmaster and strings, Jim Hughart, bass, Ed Lustgarten, cello, orchestra manager and strings, Shelly Manne, drums, Lew Tabackin, tenor saxophone, ...
Continue ReadingSubway Music
by George Wallace
The subway is full of high driving music tonight -- round eyed men & women jazzified in the hot wet tunnel --eyes flashing hips moving in & out of the crowd moving in & out like a slide trombone --at 14th street it's the flyaway boys from the foothills of North Carolina playing some gospel banjo--next stop West 4th St--cool, some very strange cats have set up shop they've got brass instruments & are wailing an up-tempo version of 'Don't blame me' by the light of the A train --the steps go ...
Continue ReadingA Little Rain In Arkansas
by George Wallace
Professor fear & his longhair piano sat on the bandstand he was just about to play some boogie-woogie when somebody fresh from pontchartrain with a three-piece suit walked in--did you see that thing go down, bartender? Walked right in & the door slapped shut tight as a tornado behind him a man in a three piece suit & he walked right up to ruby (some people called her needle of smoke) who was addicted to jazz & yes he was a handsome man, a blues pantomime, ...
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