Early in his New York days James Blood Ulmer played on a session with Larry Young– 'Lawrence of Newark.' The track I present here is another glorious mess from the days when jazz was still coming to grips with amplification and rock influences. Parts of this track remind me strongly of 'Bitches Brew' (on which Young's organ contributed to the overall sound). A horde of drummers are present – bongoes, congas, trap drums, kitchen sinks... Plus a couple of electric pianos thrown into the stew – or more appositely the cous-cous (Young had adopted the Islamic name Khalid Yaseen). Pharoah Sanders is supposed to be in there somewhere as well... You can't hear much of Ulmer – he is strictly a sideman on this date. But the track gives a good snapshot of the post 'Bitches Brew' early seventies after the major upheavals of the sixties/avant garde etc. It ends rather abruptly in my (ahem) copy – apologies...
Young like many another jazz musican, died too early... same old same old....
Let us bring in that other doyen of American free jazz guitar from the same era – Sonny Sharrock. Oddly enough (or not...), this continues the Miles/Ornette dichotomy I mentioned in a previous post. Sharrock played with Miles and his electric guitar, alongside the more heavily featured John McLaughlin, stands in an interesting relationship to Miles developments of his electric muse – in the same way, maybe, that Ulmer stands with Ornette. Sometimes teachers can learn a lot from their pupils... Of course, original fountainheads for both Sharrock and Ulmer were probably that quintessential Sixties mixture of Jimi Hendrix (who influenced Miles as well) and John Coltrane. Put these two together and you can see where so much of this music came from and went to...
Sharrock recorded the album 'Black Woman' with his wife Linda and a selection of the New York avant -garde scene around in 1969. The track given here is 'Peanut' and Milford Graves on drums is especially interesting, alternately floating and rolling the rhythms– a man known more by reputation than extant recordings. Sharrock languidly states the theme then speeds up into fast strummed chords and jagged lines (reminding me, oddly, of Richie Havens over-belting the hell out of an open-tuned guitar). In places it sounds as if he is using some kind of bottle neck way up the neck. Skittering and scrabbling in gay abandon, not especially technically brilliant but possessed of a great fire. As Albert Ayler said: 'It's not about the notes anymore, it's about emotions.' Linda Sharrock's voice (jazz singer: she ain't)– well, I can usually take it or leave it but texturally here it blends to give an unearthly quality that suits the mood of the track – a wordless wailing back in the mix. The pianist Burrell comes in for some glissando-ish ripples and Norris Jones is solid all the way. One of Graves' cymbals sounds like a distant higher-pitched relation of the J. Arthur Rank gong (for older British moviegoers). Sharrock returns for more wild flailing plectrum attack as Linda testifies in the distance. (Some would say that she should have stayed there but it's a nice day and I'm feeling charitable...). An abrupt end...
As mentioned in the last post, James Blood Ulmer came out of r and b/funk and travelled through the jazz world as he expanded his music until his fateful meeting with Ornette Coleman. In latter years he has returned to his roots with, as they say, a vengeance. On the album 'No escape from the Blues,' he recorded the old Richard M Jones number 'Trouble in Mind.' Ulmer has developed into a wonderful blues singer, his low down bass baritone as deep as the Mississippi river. Vernon Reid, who produced, also played guitar and electric sitar (which is buzzing in the back ground on this track). An insistent pattern throughout gives resonances of old-time blues piano. The two guitar lines criss cross in places, one in the front of the mix sounding almost like a harmolodic B.B. King – Ulmer -and Vernon Reid way back in the recording offering a separation in acoustic space as well stylistically. For a simple song, this is quite a dense arrangement - a swirling high organ line and flute-like sound (organ again?) (shades of 'Blonde on Blonde') emerge in places as well as other scattered keyboard obbligatos. The 'Bitches Brew/Prime Time templates crossed and homaged? (Via Ronald Shannon Jackson whom Reid worked with in the harmolodic extravaganza of Decoding Society?) Of course, given modern techniques, these additions don't crash the mix out into the distorted levels found in earlier times such as on the Larry Young track or...
... where much of this started. To end - a track from the seminal 'Bitches Brew' (1969) – 'Spanish Key.' Chopping guitar reminiscent of Steve Cropper over at Stax in Memphis as well as James Brown's rhythm section, driving drums, bass ostinatos, three electric pianos playing tag, Miles flying over it all beautifully. McLaughlin throwing in longer splintered lines as the track progresses. Soprano wailings as cymbals hiss and spit. Deep dark bass clarinet. The recording sound is bursting at the seams with the inter-locking activities and clashing timbres of this band – it must have been hell to mike up, but the raw freshness slaps out at you. Collective improvisation that reflects so much of what had gone before, was happening then – and what was to come... singing the body electric...
One final thought: the extent to which the electric guitar influenced jazz from the sixties onwards is enormous. Beyond the instrument's deployment in whatever purely instrumental context, its timbral qualities and possibilities for higher volume levels were even more important. Listen to many of the keyboard sounds on the Larry Young and the Miles tracks – they sound guitar-like, distorted by overdriven amps and wah wah pedals. Miles of course plugged his trumpet in and added effects to bend its sound even more into wild emulations of the electric fires that were started by Hendrix and continued by Sharrock and Ulmer... the relatively clean sound of earlier post-Charlie Christian jazz guitar had been left in the dust... for a while...
Larry Young
(Larry Young: org, bongos, voc;Charles Magee:tp; Dennis Mourouse:sax; Pharoah Sanders:sax, voc;Cedric Lawson: el-p; Poppy La Boy, Armen Halburian, Jumma Santos:perc; Abdul Shahid, Howard T.King, James Flores:dr;Stacey Edwards,
Umar Abdul Muizz:congas; Don Pate, uni Booth: b;James Ulmer:g;Diedre Johnson:c; Art Gore: el-p, dr; Abdul Hakim:bongos).
Download
Khalid of space
Buy
Sonny Sharrock
(Sonny Sharrock: electric guitar; Linda Sharrock: vocals; Dave Burrell: piano; bass: Norris Jones; drums: Milford Graves).
Download
Peanut
Buy
James Blood Ulmer
(Personnel for album - James Blood Ulmer:guitars, vocals; Vernon Reid: guitars, electric sitar; Banjo; Leon Grunbaum: keyboards; Charlie Burnham: fiddle, mandolin; David Barnes: harmonica; Mark Peterson: bass; Aurbry Dayle: drums; Queen Ester: vocals; Olu Dara: pocket trumpet).
Download
Trouble in Mind
Buy
Miles Davis
Download
Spanish Key
Buy
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
10 comments:
This was very interesting Rod. I am particularly drawn to that Ayler quote. I think sometimes that with music you can reach a point where it moves beyond the physical act of playing music into something completely 'Other' to lose yourself in the music is an amazing feeling and it doesn't happen always...but by God...when it does it is amazing. I think you've captured that in this peace. Interesting choices of music and great writing as always.
I wonder if you ever find that with playing with Murray...do you ever feel that it goes somewhere that you don't expect it to? Do you ever stop and think 'wow'...this is really special. Like writing...which you are extremely good at...there is a point where you think: YES! Like an epiphany.
I think they throw the kitchen sink plus all the plumbing with it on the Larry Young track - which is no bad thing. I like that sound where there's a big cast getting involved - as you say, very post-Bitches Brew'.
I always like Sonny Sharrocks work - a lot of guitar work in the jazz/improv field can be a bit tasteful, thank God Sharrock turns up the volume and attacks his instrument. If people like Ayler could let fly on their horns, why not the guitarists? Yes, I wonder what would have happened had Hendrix lived - could he and Miles have got on together? Could Miles' ego have taken it?
Did Old Sonny take stick for letting his old lady grab the mike? Similar to Albert, then.
Ulmer back with the blues - Vernon Reid's production is great here. I always liked Reid's playing, though not necessarily the groups he chose to highlight it in ... Living Colour could have done so much more (though perhaps that speaks more for the conservatism and bigotry of the music industry ... including the audience).
But this is good stuff, a lot going on.
And what can you say about Miles? A hugely influental album, and a great track. Davis' take closer to electric forms such as rock than anything Ornette did but marvelous for all that (not to sound like a jazz snob ... I think I prefer the Sharrock approach to guitar precisely because I grew up listening to avant rock rather than avant jazz).
Interesting what you say about Vernon Reid - I first heard him with Ronald Shannon Jackson's Decoding Society and liked his playing - but similarly didn't like Living Colour that much - the reasons you put forward may well explain why. I'll post a couple more of his tracks with Ulmer. As for Sharrock - its interesting to speculate - as I glanced at - how much back influence he exerted on Miles. A lot of his work was pretty much uncredited for years - 'Jack Johnson' especially - and McLaughlin was always seen as the main man re guitar in those sessions. Mind you, he was good - played much rawer then... By one of those synchronicities, last night I was listening to a Nurse with Wound album with a couple of long tracks - and I suddenly saw how this music may well have been influenced by Miles in some way, when -played back to back with Bitches Brew...
Now that takes me back - Nurse With Wound - one of the soundtracks to a mispent youth.
Yes, I did like Decoding Society (and what a pedigree Ronald Shannon Jackson boasts)and think Vernon Reid's an interesting bloke ... just didn't think Living Colour quite made it. I remember a lot of press at the time making a big deal about an all-black rock group - as if someone like Reid or Sharrock couldn't have wiped the floor with any amount of white rock guitar heroes.
Reid played much harder with Jackson. I suspect the difference is the inspiration of Jackson's astoundingly powerful drumming.
Sometimes the intonation bums me out on those Jackson records, as well as the quality of some of the horn players like Zane Massey. I've long been curious about the early stuff with (the much better) Byard Lancaster. The amazon samples sound much more Prime Time-ish. Anybody have/heard it?
thanks for those! coincidentally blood ulmer and vernon reid were on jazz on 3 on friday night (with ronald shannon jackson, joe bowie and melvin gibbs). i should imagine it's all a bit embarassing like these things often are but you can listen online here.
i always liked sharrock when he played sweet ('guitar', 'ask the ages'). shame he never did more with miles...
Oh yes, Reid and co were over here with a 'Punk-Funk All-Stars'. Quite a line-up, though it would have been nice to drag poor old James Chance over here. He was probably the first to approach this music from the punk end , rather than bonafide jazz musicians including funk or rock tropes in their music. The arena he played in was overwhelmingly white ( and there were more than a few closet-racists floating about), and I always think it was an act of courage to present a band explicitly influenced by jazz and funk, and to introduce a multi-ethnic, multi-gender ensemble ... ironically the very things David Byrne was lionised for when he put an expanded Talking Heads on the road a few years later.
and just to follow up the miles thing - there's some mp3s of corea, mclaughlin, holland and dejohnette in 1969 (?) getting (ahem) down 'n' dirty. track 3 is pretty fierce. they're here...
yeah, james chance. them were the days...
I was hoping to get to the punk funk extravaganza but my health is not so great at the moment and also jammed up with the aftermath of moving house! Meaning to catch the rerun in the week...
...and, Peter - thanks for the link - just rolled over there to check it out - looks interesting...
Post a Comment