Articles by Greg Simmons
Hank Mobley: Soul Station
by Greg Simmons
Music Matters continues to release exceptionally high quality, all analog reissues of classic Blue Note Records' albums from the golden mid-century age of small-combo jazz. They've recently upped their game with the introduction of a higher-quality raw material formulation they call SRX Vinyl. Hank Mobley was Blue Note Records' most prolific artist, with over thirty albums released under his own name, countless sessions as a sideman, and—according to his own telling in a rare interview shortly before he ...
Continue ReadingLee Morgan: The Sidewinder
by Greg Simmons
Legend tells us that 1964's The Sidewinder was the album, and indeed the song, which saved Blue Note Records at a time when the label was struggling financially. Dashed off to fill some tape, at the end of the recording session, it peaked at number 25 on the Billboard charts—almost unheard of for a hard-bop record—stabilizing the label's finances as well as providing Lee Morgan with steady royalties for the remainder of his tragically abbreviated life. Although the ...
Continue ReadingJoe Henderson: The State Of The Tenor • Live At The Village Vanguard • Volume 2
by Greg Simmons
If any jazz performance from the 1980s could be thought of as a landmark statement, Joe Henderson's live State of the Tenor sessions would surely float to the top of the list. Recorded at the Village Vanguard over three nights in November 1985 and originally released on Blue Note Records two years later, State of the Tenor -Live at the Village Vanguard -Volume 2 has now received a high-quality vinyl reissue treatment courtesy of the label's Tone Poet series, curated ...
Continue ReadingMusic Matters: SRX Vinyl
by Greg Simmons
Music Matters, the vinyl reissue house known for it's long string of high-quality all-analog pressings of classic Blue Note records, has released a dozen additional titles just a year or so after completing what was supposed to have been their final offerings. The new records include some that Music Matters had released in earlier series, as well as new titles. All of them are being pressed on a new vinyl formula that purports quieter surfaces and improved resolution. The material, ...
Continue ReadingWayne Shorter: Adam's Apple
by Greg Simmons
In all the perpetual hubbub surrounding Blue Note records from the 1950s--the aggressive opinions and stratospheric prices--it's sometime easy to forget that the label released really high quality music all the way through the 1960s, and some of the recordings from the later years of the decade are every bit as worthy of attention as the legendary 1500 series dates. Case in point: Wayne Shorter's Adam's Apple, a quartet date recorded in 1966 when Shorter was a mainstay ...
Continue ReadingGrachan Moncur III: Evolution
by Greg Simmons
One of the more unusual records in Music Matters series of Blue Note Records reissues is Grachan Moncur III's avant-garde classic Evolution, released here on a 45 rpm double LP. The Music Matters Blue Notes are among the highest quality jazz vinyl available, with fanatical attention to sound, packaging, and pressing quality, here doing serious justice to true milestone performance. Recorded on November of 1963, the date features the horns of Jackie McLean and Lee Morgan, as well ...
Continue ReadingLee Morgan On Music Matters
by Greg Simmons
Somewhere up in the sky there's a pantheon of jazz legends. Lee Morgan rightfully has a seat in the top tier, and the jam must be extraordinary. Morgan hit the scene in 1956, an obvious prodigy who'd scored two triumphs at the tender age of eighteen: a standing gig in Dizzy Gillespie's big band and the commencement of a prolific recording career as a leader for Blue Note Records. Following his first LP, Indeed, he went on to ...
Continue ReadingDuke Pearson: WAHOO!
by Greg Simmons
Duke Pearson occupied an unusual position within Blue Note Record's roster of artists. In addition to recording as both leader and sideman he also served as the label's A&R man, following in the footsteps of Ike Quebec. Pearson also served as the arranger on many albums, including sessions--Stanley Turrentine's Rough 'n' Tumble, comes to mind--where other pianists took over the keys. Pearson's own WAHOO! carries an exuberant title for what turns out to be a pretty laid back ...
Continue ReadingHank Mobley: Hank Mobley
by Greg Simmons
During the 1950s and '60s Hank Mobley was an especially prolific musician. In addition to many dates as a sideman, his string of 26 or so records under his own name for Blue Note certainly makes him the one of, if not the label's productivity champion. Most of his dates are excellent performances, yet somehow his name has faded from the public conscious. Jazz people know him of course--we thrive on even the smallest esoteric historical details, after all--but Mobley ...
Continue ReadingThad Jones: The Magnificent Thad Jones
by Greg Simmons
It's all about the swing. Featured in the Count Basie Orchestra, one of the hardest swinging bands ever, Thad Jones had more swing in his little toe then most musicians will ever dream of. Even when he slowed the tempo he still swung, and his second date as a leader for Blue Note Records, The Magnificent Thad Jones, swings more at mid-tempo than almost any record I know. The rhythm on this record is a relentless pendulum: It swings left; ...
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