You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Our 7 Favorite West Coast Jazz Musicians - #170

Episode Date: August 2, 2018

Today, Peter, Adam, and LA drummer, Dave Johnstone, sit down to list their 7 favorite west-coast musicians. See acast.com/privacy for privacy and opt-out information.

I'm Adam Mness and I'm Peter Martin. And you're listening to the You'll Hear Podcast. Daily Jazz Advice coming at you. That's right. And it's a special day to day because we have a guest in the studio. I thought I saw someone else, hey, what are you doing here? I mean, it's a pretty big place, but it's hard to lose. Right.

There was an extra microphone. Whole human being, yeah. That was my first clue. And then there was a human sitting in front of it. Yeah, no, we have a drummer extraordinaire, Mr. Dave Johnstone. What's up, guys? What's up, Dave? Dave is originally from St. Louis, makes us home in L.A. now.

Great drummer. We grew up playing jazz together. here in St. Louis and lots of omelets. Lots of omelets. We were joking the other day. The first gig, I mean, I was like 16, you were 16. We had a weekly brunch gig at the Double Tree Hotel. Nice. And I mean, we probably both gained like 20 pounds in that gig because there was an omelette station. We got free food. We just kept hitting the omelette station like only a 16 year old boy could. Why does the band take such long breaks? Because we're stuff in our faces with omelets. Do you have your cholesterol checked in the last couple of years? Actually, we probably both

like way healthier now than we're sure yeah definitely but we thought it'd be fun to have Dave come in and because he is an LA musician to do our seven favorite West Coast jazz musicians I like it seems appropriate I like it

I love the geographical specificity that this music can can harbor at times it's not always there but the West Coast the left coast as we lovingly call it has well we're going to get into hopefully answer the question

certainly it had its own sound and does it still have its own sound. So how are we going to structure this? We're going to do seven. Seven. Why? Well, okay. I mean, it's not something we normally do. That's right.

But we will do seven today. And we're just going to have Dave kind of lead the way, although we will input, I think I have some ideas here on my favorites. Okay. Dave, start us off. What's number one here, top of our list? My number one is Chet Baker. I've heard of him. Chet Baker, yeah.

Yeah, no, that's a good place to start. start because I think he kind of epitomizes the the vibe and the cool LA thing you know he definitely you know when you think of West Coast jazz that's one of the first people to come up for sure yeah I mean I was thinking Ryan Gosling but that might be okay sorry sorry I guess that's modern number two yeah I always think about you know you think about Ted Baker sings but he made more than just those like early 60s singing albums though too right he did yeah yeah we were talking earlier the uh there were a couple albums that came out i believe in 1977 uh one's called the best thing for you and one's called you can't go home again and uh these albums had tony williams on drums had ron carter john scofield paul desmond and michael brecker wow okay i got i'm gonna they are killing that's my favorite chet baker stuff have you heard those no but that's that's an amazing lineup yep what is it called again? One of them is called

The Best Thing for You. The Best Thing for You. And one of them is called You Can't Go Home Again. Can't go home again. Okay. Yeah. I'm going to check with that. Would this be an instance of shame on us? It's definitely a shame on us. I mean, this is why we have the L.A. Cat. Exactly. We can learn a little something, too. Now, interesting little fact to it, I was trying to remember for some reason. I was thinking Kansas, but I just looked it up, Chet Baker's from Yale, Oklahoma.

That's right. Which is interesting because, although not left coast on the way, I mean, certainly, you know, A lot of actually great musicians that we forget about from Oklahoma, but certainly from St. Louis on that wagon trail. Am I taking it too far back, maybe? On that wagon trail. I'm not gone when you first went out. I wasn't in my jazz history class.

Anyway, there you go. That's great first one. What are you after number two? And when do we get to jump in later, right? You guys jump right in. No, no, but we're not official left close. So number two, we have a man named Dave Bruback. You might have heard of him?

Oh, yeah. Yeah, had a couple of hit records in the 60s. Actually, did you ever meet Dave, Rebecca? I did. He was a super nice guy. I mean, like, one of the nicest guy, I mean, embarrassingly nice. Embarrassingly nice. And his boys are like that.

I actually saw one of his sons recently. I'm blanking on his name, the bass player, great bass player. Nice. Yeah, I mean, his whole family, just the sweet. I mean, Dave was, like, when I first met him, I was just a young punk pianist. Wait, I still am. Oh, I'm a middle-aged punk pianist now. But he was super kind and like, oh, you're Peter Martin, right?

I was like, how that? I was like, do I owe him money? Do I, yeah, I owe him a lot. But it's such a great musician. Definitely, I guess West Coast Sound too. I mean, he really epitomized it, I guess, a little before Chet Baker, right? And I would say, but brought in, like, because he had the bebop elements, and he was so well-versed with what's more associated with the East Coast.

Kind of brought it all together, I would say. Yeah, incredible musician. Incredible composer, incredible band leader, great guy. I remember, like, being young, and, you know, my dad had timeout on vinyl. So that was, like, actually one of my first jazz records I was exposed to when I was a kid. And then, you know, you go through, like, a phase where you're like, ah, that's, you know, commercial or whatever. And then, like, now I love all of Rubeck's stuff.

And I really appreciate it. The older I get, the arranging, the sound of it is so good in the band. all of it playing. Yeah, and I mean, you know, I learned a lot about Dave Rubeck when I got a chance to perform the Real Ambassadors, which was a musical that he wrote that was kind of shelved for some interesting reasons. We could do a whole episode on that.

But I got to perform it and actually was MD of a kind of revival of it at Jazz and Lincoln Center a few years ago. And so got to meet a lot of the... That's when I met a lot of the family. Dave had already passed away. But he wrote this incredible musical, and it featured, they recorded the album, but it never really made it to Broadway. But it was, you know, Lewis Armstrong and Carmen McRae. And it was just a wonderful thing with some great music in it.

Nice. Yeah. So that was a lot of fun. All right. So number three on our list, Dave, you have Jeff Hamilton, drummer Jeff Hamilton. Jeff Hamilton. It's a great drummer right there. Wine connoisseur.

You have a particular recording or album that we should check out? There's the Jeff Hamilton Trio Live I really like, and then a lot of the Ray Brown stuff that he was on. Bass Face is one of my favorite records, which I believe is Benny Green too. You guys probably know. Yeah, I love that record. The trio when it was Ray Brown, Gene Harris, and Jeff. I think that's the first time I heard of it. I was just like, man, what a tasty trio drummer.

I just know about his big band drumming at that, you know. And then he's done so much great studio jazz studio stuff. Like that live at the Lola, I think it's called? That trio that you're talking about, the Eugene Harris. Yeah. That's awesome. That's a killer record. And someone who, like, really successfully can take the big band approach into the trio.

You know, like, with, like, more heavily arranged things, but, like, very tasteful and great playing. I think that's why you're so great with, you know, with Ray Brown, is that a lot of his Ray Brown trio, he kind of hears it real orchestrally as really, like, a bigger thing than the trio. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, he did that great. So, quick, a little funny story about Jeff Hamilton. I played with him just a couple times, but one time was on a good night, good luck, soundtrack, and movie. And, you know, everybody knows, you know, Jeff's always had, like, this gray beard, like, even before it was hip.

And then when it was hip, and then when it wasn't, he had it through it, he had it through all those periods. I had never seen him without it. I thought he was bored with it. You know, a little baby picture of Jeff with the beard, you know. But he, when we did the good night, good luck, because there was a chance we were going to be in the film, you know, on camera, we had to look like, it was a little. little bit, I mean, it was based upon a historical thing that happened in a specific time, kind of docu drama like we're talking about. And so they said everyone had to be clean shaving because they were like whenever musicians were on like CBS network at that time. I mean,

that was just like a thing because you were considered like a drug addict hippie. Otherwise, I'm like, well, exactly. So let's go in like drug addict hippies like we are. So they said everybody, I think I had this little bit like just a little bit of a beer, but I remember they sent an email right before we were going out there. Everyone needs to be clean shaving and short hair. I was like, well, I got the short hair for sure, No problem. But I was like, you know what? I don't think it's going to be a big deal about the beard or whatever.

They don't shave it. So I didn't shave it off. And we get there and there's this drummer there like sort of setting up the drums and the piano's there. And this is like Warner Brothers back lot. It's all I'm all excited. And I'm like, man, who's that almost be like Jeff Hamilton's guy? You know, like his drum tech.

That's so cool. I was like, wow, man, he's shaped like Jeff Hamilton. He kind of looks like, but it's definitely not Jeff because he doesn't have a beard. It's like this. And so I was like, wow, that's Jeff. He had shaved his beard off. Totally different, right? Totally different.

Man, so I've had a beer now for over 10 years, and I occasionally will cut it way back, and my kids freak out. Like, they won't look at me. Oh, I freaked out, remember? Yeah, you wouldn't talk to me for two days until I grew something. It was weird, man. It was weird when you're known for that beard look. But when we got in there, and then he saw mine, he's like, oh, you're supposed to shave it.

I said, well, I was like, I'll shave it off if I need to, but I figure they're not going to. He's like, no, they're pretty serious. I was like, oh, once they see you without the beer that. But then, you know, George Clooney's directed. He kind of came in and said, like, somebody asked, do we need to look? He's like, ah, it doesn't matter, man, no worry. And I looked over at Jeff. Jeff kind of vibes.

He's pissed. He's clued me bad. I did this for nothing. And, like, he had research. He had, like, the perfect, like, Gretsch set from 1957 that would have been used. Everything was historically accurate. And then I'm up there with this little beard and, like, a brand new modern Steinway piano. He's like, man, this dude is not historically accurate at all.

I was like, hey, whatever. All right. Who's number four? Number four. Can I throw someone in here? Love you, Jeff. I want to throw in Ornette Coleman Oh, I'm just going to throw him in there

Yeah, I mean, I know he made his name in New York But he came from L.A. This is the story, right? The story to history of Ornette is that that band Kind of formed in L.A. Right. And developed that sound and brought it to New York And, you know, the history from there. But Ornette Coleman is from Texas, I believe.

Yeah, I was about to say he's not from L.A., but he was known for that West Coast sound. Yeah, yeah. I mean, I consider that band kind of a West Coast band. They have some of that in there, even though it's really... And I mean, Texas is like the gateway to the west. Totally. It's more west than it is East Coast. That's right. Yeah, yeah. Cool. Peter, why don't you do one? We got number five here.

Oh, well, let me see what my choice is. Oh, Billy Childs. Billy Childs. Yeah, so now we're bringing it up to current time. And I remember meeting Billy Childs. Actually, in L.A., one of the first times I went out there. And I was like, wow, this is like a West Coast dude, but I sort of knew about his playing because I'd heard him play with Freddie Hubbard in like the late 80s or something. And I didn't know he was from L.A. And then I remember doing a gig out there early 90s. And he came to the gig and I met him and he was like, hey, man, what's up?

I'm Billy, you know. And I live in Pasadena. And, you know, he's been such a force on the West Coast jazz scene with his own bands and his own projects and everything and really holding it down for, I mean, I mean, he's a great straight ahead player, and he's sort of been associated with it for me from that time, but he's done all these other great things and a lot of kind of, you know, chamber jazz, that project,

and great arranger. Great arranger. But, I mean, really, in terms of integrity for, like, the jazz scene, I think that, you know, for whatever 30 years plus now, he's been, and then he's, you know, he's won Grammys, and I think he went, like, an Academy Award for some film scoring stuff or something. He's won some, you know, he started to really get his due as a writer and producer,

seriously talented musician, for sure. All right. So for number six, you know, here at the You'll Hearer Podcasts, we do these lists of seven, but they're almost never seven. So for this, we're going to group three West Coast drummers in, in honor of our West Coast drummer guests. That's right. So number six, we have Billy Higgins, Joe LaBarbara, and Mel Lewis. Yep. Dave, these are your picks, you know, talk about if you want those three drummers, what they mean to you.

Well, Joe, for one, I mean, he's still out, you know, playing all the time. I go see him whenever I can, and he's just such a sweet guy and such a great. unique player, all the stuff he did with Bill Evans. I'm sure you guys know. Does he have a regular gig in L.A.? Or is he just out? Just out and about. Nothing steady.

But yeah, it's easy to see him fairly often. That's awesome. And he's just a great dude and great player. That's cool. Mel Lewis, you know, definitely kind of from the Hamilton vibe as well in terms of big band. And just the real relaxed, chill, L.A. thing, you know. That's awesome. And Peter, did you play with Billy Hanks?

I didn't, but I got to hear him play live a few times, and I know some of those younger, I'm trying to remember, is it Willie Jones? I want to say he's from L.A. and came up, but I know like Billy Higgins had that Drum Academy for a while. Oh, yeah, yeah. The kids, I know he was like a big force out there doing that. And I always thought about, like, him really sculpting that Ornette Coleman kind of sound during that period, too. And I don't know. That's cool. I was associated it there. Okay, so for the true number. number seven. We're going to go with... Ryan Gosley.

No, we're going to do a little left turn here. So, Dave, you've been on the road the last, I mean, I don't know how long you've been in this band, but this is a really talented young trombonist and vocalist named Aubrey Logan. Yep. She's pretty ridiculously good, actually. Ridiculously good. Yeah, yeah. And so how long have you been in her band? I've been with her actually for six years now. Oh, wow. Since she very first moved to L.A. Nice.

But it's gotten the touring and all that has gotten heavier in this past year. That's awesome. Yeah, she's being a lot of more attention. She's on the road now with... She's on the road now with Dave Cos for the summer. Yeah, that's cool. And then we're going back out in the fall, doing her stuff. That's awesome. East Coast tour.

Cool. So if you're on the East Coast this fall, check out Aubrey Logan. Give a shout out to Dave. You'll hear it podcast guests back there on the kit. That's right. That's right. And as always, you can go to you'll hear at.com.

If you want to ask a question, let us know who your favorite West Coast jazz musicians are. We left off, you know, Jerry Mulligan and the poll. A bunch of a couple of guys. They probably deserve to be on the list. And then, you know, ratings and reviews. We like seven stars. It is impossible on most outlets.

So do what you can. But you know what people have been figuring out how to do that? You just, you write it in. That's right. You give us five. Yeah, you talk about it. And then you just say seven stars. You guys should do a podcast, the seven best stars we've gotten in a review.

Yeah, that'll be seven times seven. Seven of our best. 49. 49 best stars. And then Dave has some great blogs on, we should give a shout out to That's right. Yeah, yeah. The blog has been getting a lot of love,

and Dave has been a big part about it. Part of that from the drum standpoint. So you can check that out at openstudionetwork.com. Yeah, slash blogging. You can see a couple of Dave's blogs, or at least one of Dave's blogs up, more coming, hopefully more in the future. Yeah, you're a blogger.

Borger. Borgher. That's right. You're a blogger. Are you a blogger? I just like saying that word. Yeah, I know. Yeah.

But you are a bluer. I've tried to get it out of you for the last two years. Man, it's worked. I forgot them about blogging. Great. So yeah, if you go to you'll hear it.com, you'll hear it.