Me, the Mob, and the Music - LA Record

Tommy James
Me, the Mob and the Music - One Helluva Ride with Tommy James & the Shondells

Midwesterner Thomas Jackson found fame, and a little fortune, through a cover of Brill Building fluff "Hanky Panky". Attracting a fair amount of radio play Jackson slowly made his way east until he landed in the hands of Morris Levy - Roulette Records owner and infamous payola king to Alan Freed. In Manhattan Jackson became James and the Raconteurs became the Shondells and for the next four years he owned the pop radio charts with hits like "I Think We're Alone Now", “Mony, Mony” and "Crimson and Clover". James details these years as a pop phenom as well as where all that money may have gone. James seems both thankful and betrayed by the man who made him a household name while profiting off of his work, praising Levy for his artistic freedom in the studio while also noting all the fishy behavior and mercenaries/label heads Levy employed who were occasionally found dead, if found at all. James was one of few artists to successfully transition from bubblegum pop to pyschedelic rock (with very little help from hallucinogenics) and eventually cashed in on it thanks to 80s new wave covers by Billy Idol and Tiffany. Overall James seems astonished by his success, writing about his time working with Hubert Humphrey’s presidential campaign and passing on a slot on the Woodstock stage with little resentment towards those who owed him millions of dollars in back royalties. It is a wide-eyed account of a dark and brutal business told in awe at having survived it.

LA Record Issue 102

Hesitation Blues #3 - LA Record

Hesitation Blues - #3

With a dearth of good jazz rooms in Los Angeles it is up to the major institutions to fill in some of the blanks for open-minded ears. Sometimes they pull through and sometimes they don’t. But if you comb through enough calendars you can piece together a season’s worth of entertaining veterans as well as handful of jazzbos in the midst of ever-evolving projects. In Keith Richards’ nursing handbook/autobiography Keef goes so far as to describe drummer Zigaboo Modeliste as “one of the best ever”. He may be right. Modeliste’s hard-driving drums provided the support for the Meters from the very beginning thus providing the backbeat for countless hip-hop samples throughout the decades. Although it appears that the Mint has totally given up on the jazz bookings, on January 20th they’ll redeem themselves with a solid funk act.

Disney Concert Hall kicks off the year with two disparate performances starting with Brad Mehldau’s engaging Highway Rider project featuring saxophonist Joshua Redman, two drummers (Jeff Ballard and Matt Chamberlain) and a chamber orchestra on January 21st. The album, produced by wunderkind Jon Brion, is a lush genre-less collaboration that should translate well to the stage with enough brooding to last a lifetime. February 15th sees the Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, keepers of the old-school flame, wearing their swinging tuxedos under the direction of the self-appointed arbiter of jazz, Wynton Marsalis. Why doesn’t the LA Philharmonic have their own jazz orchestra? At the Getty spidery ax-master Nels Cline performs a concert on February 5th with his “singers” as well as his lady-friend Yuka Honda. Cline, who has been slinging for Wilco lately, can just as easily summon the murderous shred of John McLaughlin as he can the Allman brothers. Cline’s fleet-fingered pyrotechnics are always worth the trip and this one is free! At Largo Martha Wainwright will perform an entire show of Edith Piaf tunes February 11th and 12th. As Rufus’ kid sister, shouldn’t she be doing an evening of Mickey Rooney routines? Ah, la vie en Melrose.

There are also a few noteworthy events occurring a few miles down the 5. Keely Smith became a household name when she began performing as a sort of Tin Pan Alley Alice to Louis Prima’s red-sauce Ralph Kramden – rolling her eyes and belting her way through riotously charismatic pop tunes. Smith, now in her late 80s, brings her dead-pan bob to the Cerritos Performing Arts Center on February 13th to conjure a little of that very old black magic. The Orange County Performing Arts Center can be one of the most interesting sources for mid-tier touring jazz acts. For awhile there the Center could draw enough tuned in subscribers to sip some chardonnay and see what New York had to offer without having to venture beyond Long Beach. These days the shows aren’t as adventurous but on March 4th Chick Corea and Gary Burton definitely have the potential to transfix with their 40-year history of exhaustingly meticulous arrangements. If you want even older people drinking even older chardonnay you can dig out a few gems at the Newport Jazz Party between February 17 – 20th. Aging young lions Benny Green, Lewis Nash and Eric Reed lead their own ensembles while clarinet sensation Anat Cohen makes a rare appearance outside of downtown New York.


LA Record Issue 102

Hesitation Blues #2 - LA Record

Hesitation Blues - LA Record

One of the joys of living in Los Angeles is that you can attend outdoor shows in November without needing clothes stuffed with goose down. LACMA keeps up their jazz series through to Thanksgiving and they have booked some music worth a jaunt down the Miracle Mile. Harold Land Jr., piano-playing son of the West Coast saxophone legend has been playing around Los Angeles for years. On October 29th he’ll bring his tasteful sense of swing and unchanging facial expression to the courtyard with some help from local vocalist Rita Edmond. A couple of weeks later the invaluable Littleton Brothers return to share a bill. Between Jeff, the bassist, and Don, the drummer, the Littleton boys have probably played with every major jazz musician to set foot in Los Angeles in the last twenty years. Their encyclopedic knowledge has kept them in constant demand and here they finally get to call the tunes.

With colleges back in session some of the more respectable halls get dusted off and unlocked. That cathedral out in Westwood is hosting some of the most regal jazz available. Avant sage Ornette Coleman returns to Royce Hall with his son Denardo. They recorded their first album together in 1966 when Denardo was only 10. Witness one of the most polarizing characters in jazz - 62 years running. A few weeks later an all-star cast will converge to honor Alice Coltrane. A recently passed legend and a tremendous holy link to the Church of John, Coltrane was a Bud Powell devotee before carrying the torch into the 1970s as the widow of Impulse. Her meditative composure and glissanding harp are regrettably over-shadowed by her social status but the proof is in the wax. Led by TV on the Radio’s Kyp Malone and featuring Nels Cline and Pharaoh Sanders, the band will dig into what could be completely amazing or a total mess. Or a little of both.

A little further from the ocean, Chucho Valdes, the Cuban Art Tatum, hits up the Luckman Fine Arts Complex on October 16th alongside his Afro-Cuban messengers. One of the most astounding pianists touring the planet Valdes can leap from spitfire montunos to Chopin-esque agility in seconds. A rare treat in the heart of East LA.

Meanwhile downtown, merry evangelical prankster Reverend Billy, with his street corner preaching and Wayne Cochran hair-do, returns to California on October 21st for a little west coast exorcising. The Life After Shopping Gospel Choir, his rag-tag bunch of robed disciples, channel his anti-commercialism message through song. In the past year he ran a legitimate campaign for mayor of New York as well as getting arrested for putting a hex on JPMorgan Chase. It’s a sincere put-on, part Jimmy Swaggart, part Andy Kaufman. But when the choir gets going there is no denying his preacher-blues transformation. December 20th, however, through the garage and up the escalator at Disney Concert Hall, the Blind Boys of Alabama will lay down some real gospel. Formed in the early 40s the group has found its largest audience in the 21st century performing songs by the likes of Tom Waits and Curtis Mayfield. Think they’ll cover “Pasties & a G String”?

LA Record Issue 101

Springsteen's The Promise - LA Weekly

Bruce Springsteen's The Promise for LA Weekly's "West Coast Sound"


Now some guys they just give up living

and start dying little by little, piece by piece.

Some guys come home from work and wash up

And go racing in the streets.

--Bruce Springsteen

In 1975, at the age of 25, Bruce Springsteen released his third album Born to Run, a commercial and artistic success that solidified his place as the official raconteur of middle-class New Jersey. His tales of paved expanses and the salt-corroded machinery carrying misfits from boardwalk to boardwalk were wrapped in layers of rock orchestration unheard since Phil Spector was regularly terrorizing the studios of Los Angeles. (Few men can get away with using a piano, an organ and a glockenspiel all at once.) But following the album's success, Springsteen found himself locked in a legal dispute with his manager. He spent three years recording and touring before releasing his next album Darkness on the Edge of Town.

Now Springsteen definitively proves it wasn't writer's block that was keeping him off the radio with the release of The Promise: twenty-one tracks of Darkness-era outtakes, unreleased studio versions of live staples and even a newly recorded song (just to give the purists something to complain about). Overall the new tracks are interesting--but Springsteen's thirty-two year old decisions still seem like the right ones.

The double album opens with a Darkness outtake of "Racing in the Street" that is a little too reminiscent of "Thunder Road." An identical harmonica intro directs it immediately into the alternative takes bin. The alternate has a more grandiose conclusion but there was already plenty of that on the official release. "Come On (Let's Go Tonight)" is an alternative take to "Factory", an equally brief working-class dirge that could have just as easily fit on the Billy Elliott soundtrack. "Candy's Boy" is an alternative take on the breathy-but-bombastic "Candy's Room" with a more "classic rock" structure than the official release: Springsteen takes the sparse official track, adds a few verses and trades the guitar pyrotechnics for a roller-rink organ solo to diminished effect.

Springsteen has always been a scholar of rock 'n' roll--especially with the official garage rock professor, Steven Van Zandt, hanging somewhere off to his left for the last forty years. So it is no surprise to find a fair number of genre exercises littered throughout the album. "Ain't Good Enough for You" is the band's take on one of those party-in-the-studio albums that came out in the mid '60s--from the Beach Boys' Party! to Cannonball Adderley's Mercy Mercy Mercy. The band's off-time background vocals, whistles and handclaps capture the party vibe while Springsteen goofs his way through a litany of romantic frustrations. "Outside Looking In" is a Buddy Holly rave-up with rumbling tom-toms and scratchy guitars that is just a few vocal hiccups short of a tribute band.

While Springsteen was recording his highly orchestrated epics, the music world around him was changing. The punk movement, boiling less than forty blocks south of Springsteen's New York recording studio, was in mid-battle cry: Talking Heads '77, Marquee Moon and Ramones. Springsteen wasn't oblivious. His collaboration with Patti Smith, "Because the Night," became one of the biggest selling singles to come out of the CBGB's scene. (Is it surprising that the combination of these two artists sounds remarkably like Cher?) But Springsteen never released a version of his own at the time although it has remained in his live repertoire to this day. The studio version here is a little slower and grander than the Smith version but Springsteen adds a mid-song key change that lifts it to another level.

Springsteen also scored a chart hit when the Pointer Sisters covered his song "Fire" in 1978. The song was originally written for Elvis Presley but became a tribute to him when he died as Springsteen was still toiling in the studio. The Pointer Sisters version is sparser than Springsteen's--more indebted to the Motown girl groups with its tambourine and organ. Springsteen, when performing the song live, often brings out his more theatrical side with coy poses that say more than the lyrics ever could. The resulting studio version is an Elvis tribute that is as much white jumpsuit as pre-Army provocateur.

A lot of purists have shed some tears over Springsteen's decision to add overdubs to his old recordings. This revisionist history has become a bit of a genre these days with albums like Paul McCartney's Let It Be...Naked or the Rolling Stones' recent release of Exile on Main Street and even Brian Wilson's SMiLE. How can there be anything wrong with an artist choosing to alter his own work? The songs might not have benefited from the added work but it's not like he's finishing some lost Jim Morrison bootlegs. In releasing these tracks he has already yielded to some higher marketing power, otherwise he would have released them 30-something years ago. The man wants to do all he can to protect his integrity while preserving his brand. So aside from the added strings and vocals Springsteen has recorded a new song, "Save My Love"--a textbook "Springsteen" song with cascading piano octaves, precision drumming and a soaring chorus. It fits right alongside the other songs, which attests to both the sturdiness of his trademark sound as well as his willingness to exploit it.

The Promise is rather great as a collection of outtakes, but it is an exemplary indicator of the standard that Springsteen upheld in releasing his long-awaited follow-up. As an album, the collection falls a little short of coherence. The quantity of tracks is enough to indicate that it was never intended as an album. The best tracks were chosen for Darkness on the Edge of Town.

Nothing touches the greatness of songs like "Streets of Fire" or "Adam Raised a Cain" for sheer exuberance and screeching guitar. Springsteen is at his jaded best on Darkness, sneering alongside the rest of his generation in denim and a bandana rather than leather and a mohawk. Now in his 60s, Springsteen has lived long enough to see his work interpreted by multiple generations. He has received considerable hints to what his legacy will be. With Promise, he is responding as he sees fit. Who wouldn't, at the age of 61, change of few things they might have done when they were 25?

Springsteen's The Promise @ LA Weekly

Rock & Rule - LA Weekly

Rock & Rule dvd review for LA Weekly's "West Coast Sound"

How many big-budget rock and roll movies were made by Canadian animators in the early 1980s? How many of them featured at least one cast member from SCTV, the voice-over work of journeyman Don Francks, and a song by Cheap Trick? Well, at least two.

Heavy Metal is the quintessential animated science-fiction rock film; a attention-deficit-friendly collection of intergalactic vignettes brimming with hard rock (Blue Oyster Cult, Grand Funk Railroad) and familiar funnymen (Eugene Levy, John Candy).

Rock & Rule, which was released two years later in 1983, traded Stevie Nicks and Sammy Hagar's sun-bleached smiles for Debbie Harry and Lou Reed's Lower East Side sleaze, set in a Blade Runner-esque post-nuclear cityscape, inhabited by wet-nosed mutants equipped with electric guitars and expertly blow-dried hair. And after 25 years (and then some) Lou, Debbie, Iggy Pop and Cheap Trick are finally released on Blu-Ray by Unearthed this week.

Despite its bleak setting Rock & Rule was the more family-friendly film of the two. Its plotline and animation style forms a strange link between Fritz the Cat and Thundercats--boobs but no nipple, drugs but no needles. The plot revolves around a four-piece rock band whose songs are provided by both Cheap Trick and Blondie.

Angel, the confident heroine of the story, is kidnapped by Mok, an aging rock superstar resembling Mick Jagger, circa 2065. She is kidnapped because her voice has the ability to summon a rather cumbersome fire demon with a penchant for Debbie Harry and glowing pentagrams. The rest of the band set out for Nuke York to rescue her with a little participation from Iggy Pop and Catherine O'Hara, the Jane Curtin of Canada.

Most of the songs composed for the film are kind of forgettable; tossed-off tracks from middle-aged downtowners, restless and a little too hungry for work. Cheap Trick kick it off with a anthemic bang and Debbie Harry has a few good ballads. Lou Reed's main contribution is a driving monotone rocker complete with Brill Building girls "sha-la-la"ing behind him but the standout track, oddly enough, is Earth, Wind, & Fire's funky club jam "Dance, Dance, Dance." It's a mixed bag of rock songs that was at least worthy of an official soundtrack album. Alas, funds dried up long before that point.

For all the work that went into the film ($2 million a year in studio costs over four years) it never saw wide release in North America. By the time they were ready for distribution all of their studio champions had moved on to other jobs and it ended up shelved for over twenty years; surfacing only as fill-in material for HBO and Showtime in the '80s and circulating on bootleg VHS tapes often incorrectly crediting Ralph Bakshi as the director. (It was Clive A. Smith.)

It wasn't until 2005 that the film was granted a home video release. This week it is being released on Blu-Ray in a special 25th anniversary edition--two years too late. Still: definitely one of the top two barely released Canadian rock and roll cartoons from the 1980s.

Rock & Rule @ LA Weekly

Cory Weeds & Joey DeFrancesco - All About Jazz

The Many Deeds of Cory Weeds
Cory Weeds & Joey DeFrancesco (Cellar Live)

Snapshot
Joey DeFrancesco (High Note)


This pair of live recordings featuring organist Joey
DeFrancesco finds him in two very different mindsets.
The Many Deeds of Cory Weeds, recorded in Vancouver,
puts DeFrancesco behind saxist Cory Weeds alongside
Chris Davis (trumpet) and Byron Landham (drums),
playing with a straightahead vigor, blasting through
hardbop classics. Snapshot sets DeFrancesco in a classic
jazz organ trio with guitarist Paul Bollenback and
Landham once more, using a greater sense of space to
create a more modern record.

The Many Deeds opens with Horace Silver’s “Juicy
Lucy”. Weeds confidently struts through a tasteful
solo with Davis close on his heels, spouting gravelly
lines over the rhythm section’s unerring sense of
swing. “Goin’ Down” is a great boogaloo vehicle for
DeFrancesco’s funky fingers to build an explosion of
syncopated vibrato. The album features two Hank
Mobley tunes: “Fin de L’Affaire” and “Boss Bossa”.
The former, a steamy ballad, brings out the best in
Weeds’ delicate touch while the latter features Davis
evoking Clifford Brown through his breathless runs.
DeFrancesco’s unwavering basslines provide
invaluable support, embracing his inner Jimmy Smith
with split-brained precision. In just eight tunes, half
over ten minutes, The Many Deeds is an excellent oldschool
blowing session that never seems excessive.

Snapshot is a reunion for DeFrancesco. Guitarist
Paul Bollenback left DeFrancesco’s band some time
ago but has joined up again to revel in the band’s 15-
year history. Bollenback’s choppy, staccato notes blaze
across the record, drawing DeFrancesco into more
adventurous support from his basslines to his
syncopated chord clusters. The album opens with Ron
Carter’s “Eighty One”. Unlike with The Many Deeds
DeFrancesco gets some chordal support, which allows
him to drift a little further into reharmonization and
dissonance. Harold Land’s “Ode to Angela” highlights
Bollenback’s ethereal accompaniment behind
DeFrancesco’s soaring, quick-fire lines, with a few
cheeky quotes in between. The Eddy Arnold classic
“You Don’t Know Me” gets a slow, gospel reworking with
Landham’s chiming cymbal pushing the band
into the more soulful corners of their instruments
while “Fly Me to the Moon” goes in directions Frank
Sinatra would probably have had trouble following;
pedal tones build the tension while the band makes a
tried and true standard new again.

Snapshot proves that the DeFrancesco trio never
lost their musical connection with telepathic shifts
occurring with every chorus. Here’s hoping their
partnership is renewed for a few more albums.

Cory Weeds & Joey DeFrancesco @ All About Jazz - New York

Bill Cunliffe - All About Jazz

Three's Company
Bill Cunliffe & Holly Hoffman (Capri)

Bill Cunliffe, long a fixture of both Southern
California’s cover charge and course reader scene, has
been working with flutist Holly Hofmann for over two
decades. Three’s Company, their third recorded
collaboration, finds the duo aided by an allstar cast of
musicians.

The album opens with a duet on Burton Lane’s
“Too Late Now” in a limited, Claude Bolling-esque
interplay before giving way to a more guttural and
swinging partnership that lasts for the remainder of
the record. “Dalto”, the second track, is the first of
Cunliffe’s four contributions to the album. A persistent
syncopated bass line opens the track before Cunliffe
sparingly implies it below his own solo. Hofmann’s
approach, rising and falling in quick-fire steps, is
supported by Cunliffe’s unwavering montuno.
The first trio formation comes courtesy of violinist
Regina Carter who, alongside Hofmann’s underscoring,
string-like vibrato, works through a rendition of
Strayhorn’s “Star-Crossed Lovers”,
simmering through nine minutes of nuanced phrasing
and glissandos. Carter’s contribution, the only
stringed instrument on the album, is refreshingly
subdued, free of the electric baroque figures that can
riddle her more uptempo performances.

The titular following track, a Hofmann original, is
a swiftly driven tune with Cunliffe providing sparse
clusters behind her and trumpeter Terell Stafford. The
trio is at their swinging best with Stafford’s muted
trumpet spinning across the changes. Cunliffe’s Bud
Powell-indebted bop tirade follows effortlessly while a
minimal left hand bookmarks the chord changes.
Cunliffe’s “Reunion”, which features clarinet
throwback Ken Peplowski breathing in unison
alongside Hofmann, finds a symphonic touch as the
two winds wind through Cunliffe’s ten-fingered
orchestra, eventually pitting the two soloists against
each other while Cunliffe holds down the fort. Fauré’s
“Pavane” restores things to duo status with Cunliffe
and Hofmann ebbing through a gentle, chamber
performance, achingly slow before closing with
Hofmann fluttering around the lower register while
Cunliffe lays down a gentle bassline.

The last two tracks are a pair of Cunliffe
goodbyes: “Sweet Andy”, his tribute to bassist Andy
Simpkins featuring drummer Alvester Garnett’s
nimble brushes and punctual bass drum, and
“Farewell”, wrapping up the album with just Cunliffe
and Hofmann. Three’s Company finds the duo creating
well-seasoned instrumentals with and without the
help of their virtuosic contemporaries.

Bill Cunliffe & Holly Hoffman @ All About Jazz - New York

Orange Sunshine - LA Record

Orange Sunshine - book review & interview for LA Record

Orange Sunshine
By Nick Schou

When people see a book about acid they feel compelled to share their personal stories – often too personal. But few question how that little tab traveled from some Bay Area chemistry lab to the center of their innermost fears. Nick Schou’s new Orange Sunshine charts the rise and fall of the Brotherhood of Eternal Love – an organization that reached from the resin-coated hookahs of Afghanistan to the hem of Tim Leary’s tunic. During the mid 1960s, psychedelic swami John Griggs helped create what would become one of the largest smuggling organizations in the United States – distributing extravagantly obtained bricks of hash and LSD out of a small storefront on Pacific Coast Highway in Laguna Beach. (The group supplied Hendrix with the titular tabs in Hawaii during his Rainbow Bridge concert.) Eventually cocaine blew the whole organization to pieces, leading to homelessness, arrests and a few fatal overdoses. Through extensive interviews and painstaking research, Schou, a staff writer for OC Weekly, presents a precise and unbiased view of one of the most radical organizations to come out of Orange County.

Does anyone appear to have held on to the money they made?

With few exceptions, nobody in the Brotherhood got rich. A couple of guys managed to get out of the business and reinvest their money in real estate, so they are now retired and playing golf and meditating at nice resort-style ashrams. A lot of them spent years in jail and others became addicted to cocaine in the 70s and endured harrowing experiences behind bars in third world prisons, so you really have the whole range of outcomes – some redemptive, others tragic.

How many times did you have to watch Rainbow Bridge? Are you concerned about what that may have done to your psyche?

I actually discovered Rainbow Bridge in college, when I was listening to a lot of Hendrix. I thought the film was a joke. After I realized how it fit into the story, I watched it again and still had no idea what the hell was going on. The scene with the hash inside the surfboard used to be on YouTube, so I was able to transcribe the dialogue from there. There are other clips on YouTube, but the only part of the film I enjoy is when Jimi plays ‘Hey Baby, Land of the New Rising Sun’ to the Brothers and their friends at the end of the film. The movie is mostly painful. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s been used to torture detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

Do you think getting Jimi Hendrix to perform on the edge of a volcano in Hawaii was the greatest stoned epiphany ever actualized?

Despite the really poor sound quality and drugged-out vibe, the performance on the slope of Haleakala includes some of Jimi’s best playing, and it captures him right before his untimely death. Supposedly he shared Chuck Wein’s belief in extraterrestrials. Brotherhood guys who surfed in the movie insist that a ‘Mothership’ full of ‘Space Brothers’ did flyovers during filming – but the reels came out blank.

Orange Sunshine
By Nick Schou

When people see a book about acid they feel compelled to share their personal stories – often too personal. But few question how that little tab traveled from some Bay Area chemistry lab to the center of their innermost fears. Nick Schou’s new Orange Sunshine charts the rise and fall of the Brotherhood of Eternal Love – an organization that reached from the resin-coated hookahs of Afghanistan to the hem of Tim Leary’s tunic. During the mid 1960s, psychedelic swami John Griggs helped create what would become one of the largest smuggling organizations in the United States – distributing extravagantly obtained bricks of hash and LSD out of a small storefront on Pacific Coast Highway in Laguna Beach. (The group supplied Hendrix with the titular tabs in Hawaii during his Rainbow Bridge concert.) Eventually cocaine blew the whole organization to pieces, leading to homelessness, arrests and a few fatal overdoses. Through extensive interviews and painstaking research, Schou, a staff writer for OC Weekly, presents a precise and unbiased view of one of the most radical organizations to come out of Orange County.

Does anyone appear to have held on to the money they made?

With few exceptions, nobody in the Brotherhood got rich. A couple of guys managed to get out of the business and reinvest their money in real estate, so they are now retired and playing golf and meditating at nice resort-style ashrams. A lot of them spent years in jail and others became addicted to cocaine in the 70s and endured harrowing experiences behind bars in third world prisons, so you really have the whole range of outcomes – some redemptive, others tragic.

How many times did you have to watch Rainbow Bridge? Are you concerned about what that may have done to your psyche?

I actually discovered Rainbow Bridge in college, when I was listening to a lot of Hendrix. I thought the film was a joke. After I realized how it fit into the story, I watched it again and still had no idea what the hell was going on. The scene with the hash inside the surfboard used to be on YouTube, so I was able to transcribe the dialogue from there. There are other clips on YouTube, but the only part of the film I enjoy is when Jimi plays ‘Hey Baby, Land of the New Rising Sun’ to the Brothers and their friends at the end of the film. The movie is mostly painful. I wouldn’t be surprised if it’s been used to torture detainees at Guantanamo Bay.

Do you think getting JImi Hendrix to perform on the edge of a volcano in Hawaii was the greatest stoned epiphany ever actualized?

Despite the really poor sound quality and drugged-out vibe, the performance on the slope of Haleakala includes some of Jimi’s best playing, and it captures him right before his untimely death. Supposedly he shared Chuck Wein’s belief in extraterrestrials. Brotherhood guys who surfed in the movie insist that a ‘Mothership’ full of ‘Space Brothers’ did flyovers during filming – but the reels came out blank.

Orange Sunshine @ LA Record

Hesitation Blues #1 - LA Record

Hesitation Blues - LA Record

It's that time of year when old jazzbos are trotted off to European festivals to breathe some fresh air and teach high school kids how to play a blues scale on their days off. While they are out spending their increasingly valueless Euros, the rest of us are left with the weakest season of the jazz calendar. Unless you dig those breezy, barefoot, strolling-on-the-beach, saxophone-and-wind -chime sounds, you've got some slim pickings this summer.

While the Jazz Bakery continues to jump from one melting iceberg to another in search of a permanent home, they will stop August 1 at the Silent Movie Theatre for the LA premiere of The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi, the pianist everyone of a certain age knows for the dance scene in A Charlie Brown Christmas. But Guaraldi was already well-known by the time he met Charles Schulz and co., coming off early work with Cal Tjader and Mongo Santamaria and a surprise B-side hit called "Cast Your Fate to the Wind." Anatomy presents pretty-much-thought-lost period footage of prime Guaraldi with unreleased recordings and commentary from everyone from Dave Brubeck to Paul "The Realist" Krassner.

Kenny Burrell - guitarist, educator, Ellington's #1 fan - is one of our most treasured local (by way of Detroit) elder statesmen. His status in the jazz community looms large thanks to his performances with Jimmy Smith, John Coltrane and Bill Evans. Burrell's effortless authority over his guitar and his sidemen is compelling not only to listen to but also to watch. Never a drop of sweat on that guy. Burrell will return to Hollywood's Catalina Bar and Grill for his annual engagement August 5-7. As long as the synth strings stay home, there should be some great meaty guitar lines provided by a nattily dressed professional.

Herbie Hancock is one of those guys that you think is older than he really is. He may have played with Miles in the early 60s, but he was still in his early thirties when he released Head Hunters. It's safe to say he probably has the largest keytar collection of any 70-year-old man. This is part of the problem of encountering Herbie Hancock in the 21st century. Sometimes he acts like an old jazz cat and sometimes he acts like a middle-aged pop star. Unfortunately, the old jazz cat doesn't seem to have had much input in Hancock's curated jazz series at the Hollywood Bowl this season. This is my problem more than his. Nevertheless, I wouldn't miss a night with blues guitar greats Buddy Guy and BB King on August 11. Guy, who reached sweat-drenched heights alongside Junior Wells in the late 60s while everybody else ripped his style and fizzled out, still rocks the polka-dot guitar like no one else. King has outlasted even more - playing nearly as many shows as there are seats at the Bowl.

LA Record Issue 100

Antonio Sanchez - All About Jazz

Live in New York at Jazz Standard
Antonio Sanchez (CAMJazz)

When seated behind the drums Antonio Sanchez
takes on an intense command of every sixteenth note
that swings through his wrists, navigating an
unwavering groove through myriad twists and turns.
In just under two hours, Live in New York at Jazz
Standard thunders across two discs and eight tunes
with pinpoint precision and a white-knuckle pace.
Aided by bassist Scott Colley and saxophonists David
Sanchez (tenor) and Miguel Zenon (alto), the album
was recorded at the end of a tour nearly two years ago.

The quartet, free of the chordal restrictions of
piano or guitar, is an extremely tight ensemble, like a
flock of birds jutting out in one direction before
instinctively turning into a driving pulse, seemingly
unannounced but without any member missing a cue.
The album opens with the saxophonists locked in tight
harmony, jumping around the spastic intervals of
Sanchez’ “Greedy Silence”. After a simultaneous horn
duel each launches into the stratosphere. Sanchez’
“Ballade” plays the horns off of each other in gentle
swoops while brushes spaciously crash across the
drumkit. The second disc, equally lithe and
propulsive, highlights more of Sanchez’ compositional
talents, opening with the heavy funk of “It Will Be
Better” and closing with “Challenge Within”, a
cowbell-driven smattering of polyrhythms that is
feverishly complex yet melodic.

Throughout the record Sanchez is masterfully
supportive, drifting into avant garde realms without
losing sight of the pulse. What space is left by the hardhitting
saxophonists and Colley’s hyper-kinetic
walking, if not running, is filled by Sanchez’ busy
hands and feet, sounding at times like two or three
drummers. Sanchez’ exuberance can be a little
exhausting at times but the record provides enough
room for the listener to breath before ripping into
another fast-paced exploration. This is music that
demands attention and rewards the listener with
astounding moments of interaction and trust.


Antonio Sanchez @ All About Jazz - New York