[engl] This is the third album in a row that has been released on Phillips Records back in 1965 after “Pastel blues” featuring the raging and lengthy “Sinner man” and “Let it all out” where she tried out Bob Dylan's “Hollis brown” as her signature tune and let it rule supreme. Now we got “I put a spell on you” of which original copies fetch prices up to 200,00 Euros if seen in good condition. Thank goodness there is this excellent reissue now so the kids can take a listen to the real thing. I was up to consider it one rather dark and mellow album but it is not, in fact it is a typical effort for Mrs. Simone in that era who is at home in so many genres giving all songs - self penned or cover tunes - a piece of her own due to her distinctive voice and the way she performs. Whatever she sings is more than just a song, it becomes a statement. In this case the title track originally recorded by the incredible blues man Screamin' Jay Hawkins and the longing blues ballad “Feeling good” were the ones I already knew in other versions. Nina smokes on both tunes and nails them down thoughtfully but with a burning desire within her heart. Amazing. The rest ranges from blues to lush ballads to melancholic French chanson to singer / songwriter stuff to hot blooded soul and again she comes as an emotional thunderstorm even in the most gentle moments. Nina Simone changes her face with every tune played here and still the whole album has a homogeneous feel. Her performance on the piano by the way burns as much as her vocals. She runs over the keys as if there was no tomorrow then takes out the pace and makes every note be meaningful and even the pauses in between. Drifting around upon big arrangements is the same for her as reducing the tunes down to the bare skeleton. Whatever she does here, it feels good, it feels right, man it feels. If you want to be enchanted by some utterly soulful music beyond the barriers of the pop, blues, soul and jazz genres, this is yours. Lovely Nina, we miss you like mad.

[engl] On this superb 1965 album O.V. Wright combines his gospel background with influences from, soul, blues, rock'n'roll, pop and even beat. The result is a truly unique album, featuring haunting vocals, spooky Farfisa organs and an overall erotic approach!

[engl] The Empty Foxhole is an album by the American jazz saxophonist and composer Ornette Coleman released on the Blue Note label in 1966. The album features Coleman's untutored violin and trumpet as well as performing on his usual instrument, the alto saxophone, and marks the recording debut of his drummer son Denardo Coleman, who was ten years of age at the time.

[engl] A more of world music, a more of ethno and definitely a more of progressive fusion rock approach is what marks „Masterless Samurai“, the second album by Japanese prog warrior Osamu Kitajima. He takes his vision of his country's traditional music being merged with the progressive rock and jazz music of the west even one step further, than he did with his previous albums. Excessive flute lines of Eastern origin, funky intricate grooves and fiery synthesizer eruptions are the basic ingredients for most of these impressive instrumental downhill. The fusion share in this sound is strong and still all the exotic elements from Japanese classic music pull each song far out of the mass of similar acts emerging in the late 70s. Now we leave behind the PINK FLOYD comparison and go for the Canterbury jazzrock scene with CARAVAN and SOFT MACHINE as leading figures and Osamu Kitajima definitely fit in between these giants due to his creativity and manifesting vision of a progressive world rock music. Don't take the rock element as utterly physical heaviness. The album rocks but in a more delicate way. The sparkling lines of the electric piano can tell where this record goes. And even a rather gentle tune like the instrumental ballad „Floating garden“ shows a wicked and progressive edge with expressive sax runs, cool twists and turns despite the all in all relaxed atmosphere.

[engl] This is the third album by Osamu Kitajima, one of Japan's most prolific artists from the ethno rock, world music and progressive department. You can certainly not divide all the mentioned stylistic aspects from each other for they were all incorporated in a homogenious sound and complex arrangements. It is the same with his other albums like „Benzaiten“ and or his fourth „Masterless Samurai“; traditional Japanese music meets Western jazzrock and progressive sounds to form a new style unheard by most people in Western countries at the time. Osamu Kitajima easily plays with elements of reggae and funk, fusion jazz and colorful pop while staying true to his Japanese roots with bits and pieces of traditional melodies and the use of old Asiatic instruments. The Japanese influence makes this music uniqe and still it gets as close to Western rock and pop sounds as it could. An adventurous journey through the world from East Asia to West Africa and to the steaming metropolises of the UK and USA is your reward when you put this perfectly produced album onto your turntable. The former PINK FLOYD comparison coming with „Benzaiten“ is not totally out of place with this selftitled 1977 album here but there is much more latitude in the allover style. Osamu Kitajima gathers a few well talented musicians around him on this record despite playing and arranging most of the instrumental passages himself. He, the multi instrumentalist who discovered progressive rock music in the early 70s during a stay in London where he released a first album under the monicker „Justin Heathcliff“ before moving to California around the mid 70s. And this group of musicians creates something special that sticks out of the mass of similar art pop and fusion bands in the late 70s. Osamu Kitajima is something like the Japanese answer to Mike Oldfield, and others equal in vision and output!

[engl] First-time vinyl release. Old-style gatefold LP with liner notes by Kahimi Karie, Otomo Yoshihide & Tonoyama Taiji. Eric Dolphy's final studio album is hailed as one of the finest examples of mid-'60s post bop. Its reputation is purely one of backwards significance. Dolphy, having recorded the album in February 1964, was in Europe less than six weeks later and his all-too-brief life ended less than two months after that. Though likely he never held a copy in his hands or heard any critical opinion of it, it marked his last flurry of original compositions and is considered his apex. It is fascinating to consider whether he would had moved past or away from the album in 1965, had he lived. Though Dolphy should not be considered an avant-garde musician by the term's most common definitions, most interpretations of Out To Lunch have been done by players working squarely in that area. So it is with this album, the most ambitious in its recreation of the five-tune disc (with one original added to the final "Straight Up and Down, extending the piece to almost thirty minutes). All five compositions from the original quintet LP are revisited in the same order, the record sleeve even duplicates the old album jacket, down to the typeface and black-and-blue color scheme, although a photo taken by Daid? Moriyama inside Tokyo's massive (and massively busy) Shinjuku railway station replaces the Dolphy's album's enigmatic "Will Be Back" sign, whose clock hands indicated no conventional time of expected return. Otomo Yoshihide first came to international prominence in the 1990s as the leader of the experimental rock group Ground Zero, and has since worked in a variety of contexts, ranging from free improvisation to noise, jazz, avant-garde and contemporary classical. The always surprising and sometimes confounding turntablist, sound artist, onkyo improviser and now avant jazzer heading up a 15-piece aggregation of Japanese and European experimentalists. Who better to grapple with Dolphy's legacy -- so idiosyncratic in its day and yet so influential to creative improvisers who followed -- than a musician with his own singular take on how sounds can be organized in the jazz realm over 40 years later and half a world away? In other words don't expect the conventional from Otomo any more than you would from Dolphy himself. That's not to say that recognizable themes ("Hat and Beard," "Out to Lunch," "Straight Up and Down") don't appear, or that individual players -- including Alfred Harth on bass clarinet bursting into the mix and leaping across the instrument's tonal range in a way that recalls the master himself -- don't carry forward echoes from the past in the spirit of a sincere and heartfelt homage. However, a good deal of the time all bets are off; in addition to the usual brass, reeds, bass, and drums (and of course a bit of vibraphone, here played by Takara Kumiko in far less prominent role than that of Bobby Hutcherson) are such sonic paraphernalia as sine waves, contact mike, no-input mixing board, and, of course, "computer." (Otomo himself plays skronky electric guitar.) From composition to composition and even during episodes within compositions, the band takes radically different approaches. There are blasts of free jazz energy not too far removed from the Peter Brötzmann Tentet, an impression reinforced by the presence of spluttering wildman Mats Gustafsson on baritone sax. Not surprisingly and often in contrast with the Dolphy original, the music is dense and filled to overflowing with sounds -- sometimes due to fundamental reworkings in structure rather than just the larger size of the ensemble. The middle section of "Something Sweet, Something Tender" somewhat belies the original's title with elongated howls and cries from the horns over slo-mo bass, drums, and electronic noise poised somewhere between dirge and drone, and the sudden explosion of punk-ish rock energy in the following "Gazzelloni" is a startling contrast. At times, the feeling is that of listening to the original Out To Lunch while a séance is going on to contact Dolphy's ghost, with supernatural sounds swirling around the stereo. The effect is disconcerting, as is the post-apocalyptic cloud hanging over the arrangements, but it makes the effort more than an unnecessary tribute album. Instead, Dolphy is transported into the 21st Century and allowed to romp through modern developments in music. An inspiring concept and an album that will stretch the boundaries of anyone who comes into contact with it.

[engl] 1964 seemed to be a great year for jazz music in general and this special piece from a quartet led by the great tenor saxophonist Paul Gonsalves who was a long time member of the Duke Ellington Orchestra confirms this once more in an astonishing way. This record is a typical instrumental post bop album still not on the verge of progressive and free jazz filled to the max with memorable yet steaming compositions. Gonsalves nails it as a saxophone player and his backing crew consisting of piano, stand up bass and drums joins in to create a stream of sound that drags your soul away directly when you put the needle in the groove. The playing feels easy with sweet but rather melancholic melody lines from piano and sax. It seems like they were singing love songs to each other while the rhythm section lays down the beat both lead instruments dance to. The swinging sleaziness of the one or another passage heats up your blood to a simmering level. As if you were swallowed into a scene of Jack Kerouac’s “On the road”, where a sax player goes wild in a small and dusty club somewhere at the West Coast. Paul Gonsalves and his guys take their listener onto a journey due to these very expressive and strong melodies. This should have been a shining crown jewel of jazz where swing benignly turns into bop. The new and often more radical streams within the genre just oppressed this development and “Boom-Jackie-Boom-Chick” whose title was inspired by the name of Mr. Gonsalves’ regular heroin dealer became an underground classic for those who like to dig deeper into a genre to discover the real treasures. This is pure magic put into music!

[engl] A compelling slice of Canadian funk from the late 70s – a group and album who were inspired by the righteous power of James Brown's famous Payback album – but who come across here with a warmer, clubbier feel overall! There's a nice degree of boogie in the mix, but the overall approach is definitely funk – with bumping basslines underneath tight horns, including plenty of sweet Fred Wesley-styled trombone. Yet other club elements come into the mix too – keyboards and a bit of strings at times, which warm things up nicely alongside the tighter bottom rhythms – but always in a way that's still relatively funky overall. Most cuts have an instrumental focus – but there's also female chorus vocals on a number of tracks too.

[engl] Spanish jazz–funk / prog–psych holy grail from 1976 featuring the crème de la crème of Spain’s session musicians of the time. Pepe Sánchez is a real legend when talking about drumming in Spain. From his beginnings in the 60s jamming with Pedro Iturralde, Tete Montoliu and Vlady Bas at the influential Whisky Jazz Club in Madrid, to recording in Miami with Diana Ross or Barbra Streisand; from working under the wings of Rafael Trabucchelli, Waldo de los Ríos, Augusto Algueró and Mancini to playing live with Barry White?Not forgetting his incursions in progressive rock with Araxes or doing session work for seminal Spanish albums like "Gipsy Rock" by Las Grecas among others. Pepe and his group of friends (Manuel Gas, Juan Carlos Calderón, Pepe Ébano, Tito Duarte, Juan Cano?) were the most requested Spanish session musicians of the time, appearing in countless recordings. In the mid–70s, he was approached by the Marfer label: the idea was to create an instrumental album based on Flamenco music and Spanish folklore but with a modern approach, adding electric guitars, electric bass, drums?Pepe recruited some his friends, all of them top session musicians with a jazz / pop background and the result was "Regresión", his first solo album, released in 1976. It’s an incredible fusion of jazz, funk, rock, flamenco and psychedelic / progressive sounds highlighted by the powerful drumming of Pepe, the wicked fuzz–wah guitar of Carlos Villa (Vainica Doble, Las Grecas), the sax / flute of jazz giant Pedro Iturralde and Manolo Morales (Jayme Marques, Bebu Silvetti?), the piano of Eddy Guerin (Tete Montoliu, Santisteban, Jayme Marques, Manuel Gas?), the trumpet of Juan Cano (Vlady Bass, Juan Carlos Calderón?) and José Luis Medrano (Dolores, Márquez?), the percussion of Pepe Ébano (Elkin & Nelson, Manuel Gas, Camarón, Max B, Santisteban)? Includes the monster rare groove /funk track "Sentimiento" and more!

[engl] 1965 funky Instro-Soul album from Chicago that originally came out on Mercury. It deals with new interpretations of James Bond themes and own Bond inspired compositions. Feat. Studiomusic Clarence Perry (tenor), Richard McCrea (organ) and Ed Townsend (Piano).

[engl] 2018 REPRESS! Popular and increasingly in demand, IZIPHO ZAM (my gifts) falls into the ?rare? category among record collectors and is a gift to fans of master Pharoah Sanders. This demand is partially galvanized by the fact that ?Prince Of Peace? has become an inspirational mine to Hip Hop artists and is much loved by samplers. Izipho Zam is Pharoah Sander?s 3rd album, initially recorded in january 1969, it was originally released on the Strata-East label in 1973. On Izipho Zam Sanders and his band take you on a journey into another world providing an amazing experience! Passionate, intense and free, Sanders saxophone especially, is exquisite, pouring out its soul telling a story of its own. Hailed by peers as the best tenor saxophonist in the world, Pharoah Sanders is a legend in Jazz music. He is regarded as one of the pioneers of free jazz and is the mentor of jazz giant, saxophonist Robert Stewart. Born in 1940 into a musical family as Farell Sanders in Arkansas, he first played the clarinet before switching to tenor saxophone in High school. After High school he moved to California to study music and art. In 1961 Sanders moved to New York where he often played gigs with a number of free jazz dignitaries including Billy Higgins, Sun Ra and Don Cherry. His name ?Pharoah? was given to him by Sun Ra, who was his bandleader then. It was during one of these gigs that he met John Coltrane who became his mentor. While playing with Coltrane, Sanders inevitably rose to prominence due to his very distinctive tenor saxophone sound. - Rachel Kinoti, www.everland-music.com > Licensed by Strata East Records, Inc.

[engl] his album is one of a surprisingly large number of deeply funky releases that appeared in the late 60s and throughout the 70s by older players - usually associated with either blues or rock'n'roll. On the Modern group of labels alone there were albums by Joe Houston, Johnny Otis and an unreleased gem by Pee Wee Crayton. For years these albums have been treated with disdain by those who collect the artists as commercial sell-outs and were so obscure that they were unknown to funk fans. This has started to change as funk collectors dig deeper - and they have been schooled by years of digging out oddities with an open mind. No frontiers. An original copy of Omaha Bar-B-Q now sells for over ¬£60 in this country. Preston Love was not a straight R&B player-.-having been born in 1921 he came up playing his alto saxophone in the big bands during the latter part of the swing era. In his local area he played in bands led by Lloyd Hunter and Nat Towles and in September 1943 he replaced Earl Warren for six weeks in the Count Basie Band. He then rejoined Hunter and then began working with both Lucky Millinder and Harlan Leonard, before becoming a full time member of the Basie band between 1945-47. The swing era was well and truly over by that stage and so, after leaving Count Basie, he formed his own R&B band and made several recordings for various labels, including Federal. He carried on working in the R&B field and hooked up with Johnny Otis in the early 60s. They worked together regularly for the next two decades, and from the early 70s onwards switched between contemporary black music and the rock'n'roll revival. This album was recorded in 1969 by Johnny's regular band, which by this time included the blistering guitar playing of his 14 year old son, Shuggie. Shuggie's playing had first been heard on the album Cold Shot, notably on the single Signifying Monkey. Shuggie was only months away from the start of a solo recording career with Epic, which culminated in some beautiful Sly Stone-influenced music such as Inspiration Information and the original version of Strawberry Letter 23 that was a big international hit for the Brothers Johnson on A&M. This album and the rare single, first released on the tiny LA-based Hudson label, Cissy Popcorn, (not heard here) are proof positive that Love's blues-drenched soul alto is the perfect vehicle for a funk record. Pot Likker and Chili Mac are liable to keep you dancing with their tight funky grooves. The personnel on this LP comprise pretty much the band (augmented by horns) that played the 1970 Monterey Pop Festival. What a sight that must have been!