You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - 7 Jazz Albums That Changed Our Lives - #9

Episode Date: February 8, 2018

Here ya go.....1) Crescent (John Coltrane)2) Giant Steps (John Coltrane)3) Black Codes from the Underground (Wynton Marsalis)4) Beyond (Joshua Redman)5) Solo Monk (Thelonius Monk)6) Thrust (Herbie Hancock)7) Kind of Blue (Miles Davis) See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I'm Peter Martin. And I'm Adam Anus. Welcome to the You'll Hear It Podcast. Today we're going to talk about seven jazz albums that changed our lives. I'm going to kick it off if that's cool with one. Yeah, only seven? I know, only seven. Well, you know, we're on this seven thing and we're trying to fit into it.

So let's see where it goes. All right. Okay, number one for me is John Coltrane Crescent. It's a great album. It's a great album. And it's, you know, it's interesting because it's kind of ebbs and flows in terms of awareness. When I was 14, 15, 16 years old, there was a lot of talk about that record. It was like super available.

Everybody knew what it was. Now with the young ins, when I kind of mention it, sometimes they're like, oh, let me write that down. Is that on YouTube? Is that on Spotify? Which I'm always surprised. But it was a very influential record and definitely changed my life, mainly because of McCoy Tyner. I mean, you know, Elvin Jones, Jimmy Garrison, John Coltrane, incredible. And the ensemble playing, the compositions on there, I think it's an amazing album for

beginning to end because the pieces fit together so well. It's like a complete work. Absolutely. But to me it was like what really changed my life was McCoy Tyner. You know, I learned his solo on a couple of tunes and in particular on Lonnie's Lament. That solo is something that probably a day since then. So if I was like 14 years old when I learned that like, what is that five years ago now, something like that. A day hasn't gone by that I haven't thought about that solo in some way, either in a dream or during the day. Incredible. I feel like that was a definitely a high point in that band's development, that record. I mean, that was just, they were all so popping right now. Right. All right. What's number two for you? I mean, for me, I'm also going to go

with Coltrane, but for me, an eye-opening record as far as what jazz could be was Giant Steps. Everybody knows the famous Giant Steps and his, you know, amazing harmonic concept that he kind of threw with the band on the session, those poor guys, but that he had been shedding for a while, and he just is crushing it. And I always describe it as this like angular sound. To me, that whole record sounds like it has these really great angles on it. It still feels like a blues record in some regards. You know what I mean?

There's still that like feeling of the blues. It still grooves like crazy. But it has this undeniable modernity to it. And it was so far ahead of this day. It still sounds relevant now. I mean, I just love every track on it, every ballad, every blues. Of course, all the stuff that moves around in the tonal centers is great. So you're saying not only did it change your life, but you like it.

You love it perhaps. I do kind of like it. I like it a lot. Nice. Okay. So next, I'm going to go with Winton Marsalis, Black Codes from the Underground. And in fact, in some ways, this, because of the timing of when I heard that record and that I went and picked it up at Streetside Records in St. Louis, Missouri, on the day

that it was released. you know, in 1985. Like that record was very, very influential to me. Again, because of the pianist, but really all the solos, I mean, Jeff Watts, his concept of interaction on there has, like, kind of shaped my whole concept for playing within a rhythm section since then. I was like 14, 15 years old when that record came out, I guess 15.

And I had just heard that band live with Kenny Kirkland, Bramford Marcellas, Witton, Marsalis, Jeff Watts, Charnett-Moffett on bass. And you've got a chance to be. meet Kenny Kirkland and he gave me some tips and some words of encouragement. So that record just totally blew me away and changed everything. I just wanted to be Kenny Kirkland. I wanted to comp like him.

I wanted to, you know, really just approach music the way he did. So I really got into sort of the concept of how he was playing on that record in terms of comping, soloing, his ballad playing. Plus, I just, I love that record. I love the way it sounds. I mean, some people hear it now and think it sounds very 80s in terms. of like how it's EQ and stuff and it is. But that was kind of my first real interaction with a modern jazz record in real time with a

band that I heard live with a new record as it came out. That's a really cool experience. And you know what? I'm going to switch it up then too. And I'm going to go for a more modern record that I have the same experience with. And that's Josh Redmond's Beyond record. You remember that one? 99 or 2000 right around there.

I saw them live here. in St. Louis and I was a teenager and Aaron Goldberg on piano where I later studied with. It's great, great pianist, great guy, your friend Rubin Rogers, Greg Hutchinson in that band. Unbelievable compositions, a great original sound. And I think it's Joshua Redmond's best recording for me as far as just how understated he is in his playing and how genuinely sophisticated the sound of that album is. I think it's fantastic. Absolutely. Well, let's see. Where are we at now? That's like four, right? So we're getting close to seven. Now I'm getting nervous because we've got a lot of choices. I think next I'm going to go, you know, because we're talking about, remember, this is tough because we're going to start talking about our favorites or the greatest, but we really said seven jazz albums that changed our lives. So that actually gives it a nice little focus. I'm going to go with Thelonious Monk solo monk on Columbia. And that record, again, because of sort of the timing of when I heard it, you know, really changed everything for me.

And I learned several of those tunes off of that recording, transcribing them, you know, both hands, solo piano. So, like, that kind of set up my solo piano concept, as it were. But it's also a record that I think, you know, like the sound of it, the concept of how Monk played his tunes and the standards that are on there is so just deeply interesting and conceptual that it just changed the way I looked at his music and all music. And again, I kind of think about it and hear it.

And every time I put that record on, it just puts a smile back on my face. I mean, it's such a deep record for pianists that the whole thing, his solo piano approach is so joyful. It's just amazing. I'm glad you chose that one. All right, I'm going to choose one that changed my life because the first time I heard this, it was a light bulb going off about the possibilities of what jazz could be. And that's Herbie Hancock's thrust. Nice.

I mean, this is the one with actual pre-examble. proof on it and spankalee and but I think butterflies from that is that right yeah I mean just amazing there's no doubt that it's a jazz record but it doesn't it's obviously not straight ahead I mean it's in that whole headhunters era right and I really realized that jazz it wasn't just straight ahead post bop whatever we you know we do it's it's anything that has this this feeling in this form and herbie is a master at changing styles and and remaining himself, and it's always jazz, and it's always him. But he can just kind of float into these different feelings, man.

It was a real eye-opening and a real inspirational record for me. Yep, yep. Okay, number seven, the final one. I'm going to go with a real safe choice here, but it's truly one that changed my life for sure, and that's Miles Davis kind of blue. I don't know that one. Which one is that?

It's kind of hard to find. It's kind of under the radar, you know. But I can say that when I did first hear this record, it was not like the multimillion. Actually, you know what it probably already was. It was. By the mid-80s, yeah, that's true. But I remember when this came out,

I think the first time I heard it was when it was released on CD, actually. Because I was sort of, like, as I was getting into listen to jazz, was right, the sort of switch over from LPs to CDs. So there was like some remastering dumb, but then I was still getting LPs, not because I was a young hipster, but because they were cheaper than CDs. I finally was able to get a CD player.

I did a gig and made enough money to get a CD player. But then the CD. were like 15 bucks and I could get the LPs for six bucks or seven dollars but this record you know and again it comes down to the pianist but it's also just the entire recording but that was really the first time I heard Winton Kelly and just was blown away by his phrasing and his swing and sort of I I kind of came to Winton Kelly backwards because I'd heard Herbie and it's interesting you're talking about thrust and stuff I've been listening to Herbie

I'd heard Rocket and that's all I knew about Herbie Hancock because it's a lot of people's It was like 82, 83. I saw it on MTV and it was on the radio. I was like, I love this. Yeah. And I had that record, the LP, and I actually tried to scratch with the Rocket record on my turn table.

It's Harvey, man. Yeah. And so my dad was like, who is that? I said, Herbie Hancock, he's like, oh, you know, he's played with Miles Davis. I'm like, who is that? Whatever, Dad, you know. And he went and showed me the, you know, My Funny Valentine. What do you know, Dad?

Yeah, yeah. Ooh, I should have maybe said my, we might have to add number eight, sorry. Okay, or even number nine. But anyway, because I listened to My Funny Valentine first, live in concert with Herbie Hancock with Miles and George Coleman, Tony Williams, Ron Carter. But kind of blue, you know, once I saw Herbie kind of talking about or maybe somebody mentioned, Winton Kelly, and I heard him playing on it. And just that one tune, Freddie Frewloader. Everything else is Bill Evans. Yeah, yeah, that just like changed my thing. And then it was also

Bill Evans my first time actually hearing him. And it's, you know, it's interesting. So Miles sort of being this conduit for introducing all these great, you know, musicians from Bill Evan, pianists especially, you know, Keith Jarrett, Chick-Corea, Herbie Hancock. I mean, it's quite a list, Red Garland. So I started getting into Miles and like just for all the different pianists that played with him. But that record, that solo, and then

you know, like the way that on flamenco sketches, the way Bill Evans played, I mean, just, it's a lifetime of study on that record. I mean, how genius is Miles that for that one track he puts on Winton? But I mean, the whole album isn't the same without Bill Evans on, like you said, on flamenco sketches

or blue and green, but it's not the same either if Witten Kelly's not on on for a freeloader. Yeah, yeah, it's just just a masterpiece. Well, we could go on forever. I know, we could do 97 albums. You know what, we're going to come back to a future episode for sure. All right, cool. All right, peace. That's it for today's episode of the You'll Hear a Podcast.

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