You'll Hear It: Full Album Deep Dives with Jazz Musicians - Time Out Is Way Weirder Than You Think

Episode Date: June 20, 2024

Time out! The album we all know but maybe haven't truly dived into. Well leave THAT to the YHI team this time because, in this episode, we plan to dive in deep and find out what truly makes this album great. Check the full albumUnlock your FREE Open Studio trial to become a better player today.Have a question for us? Leave us a SpeakPipeCheckout courses from Adam, Peter and more at Open Studio🎹 Head over to our YouTube channel for a better look 👀.Follow us on Instagram

Hey, Peter. Hey. Today we are listening to one of the most popular jazz albums of all time. Oh, no, we did that a couple weeks ago. It's not that one. What? No, but then the other one a couple weeks before that. It's not that one either.

Really? No. It's this one. That's right. That's right. That a good way to conduct you? I'm Adam Manus. And I'm Peter Mark.

And you're listening to the You'll Hear at Podcast. Music, Explored. Explored. It's brought to you today by Open Studio. Go to Open StudioJazz.com for, oh, you. Jazz Listen needs Peter. And your free trial. And your free trial.

If it's still happening. It is still happening. It's not going to go on forever. It won't. It's putting that out there. But yeah, check out OpenSudioJazz.com. So Peter, today's the day, man. Here we are.

We're sitting on... It's recording day. It's you'll hear a recording day. We're going to be listening to an album that we've had a lot of requests for. This is an album that I grew up with. My dad was a big fan of this album. Yeah. And had it on vinyl, had it on CD.

I'm pretty sure had it on cassette. Nice. Maybe eight track, I don't know. Multi-formatted. Multi-formatted. It is, of course... Laser disc, perhaps? No.

Beta Max? The making of... No, that's a video. Okay. Medium. No, this is, of course, Dave Rubex's 1959 masterpiece, time out. Yes.

This is, of course, one of the most popular best-selling jazz albums of all time. It was a cultural phenomenon at its time. And, Peter, we're going to put it through our... What Makes This album... great rating system. Now our... The Matrix.

What makes this album great Matrix? It's really, it's a gauntlet. If an album can make it through there, then it's really... No, we've patented this list, so it is really... We've tested it. We've had engineers from Red Bull Racing

and take a look at it and really put it through the ringer as far as like... Top scientists from MIT. That's right. Check our math. Yeah, that's right. I don't know why scientists would check math. No, no, because it is very important

that this list is preserved and that it is effective. Right. So we're going to be putting time out through here. Now, this is not an album. I think that a lot of modern jazz musicians refer to as, like, pretty influential on them. You never hear it talked about.

We don't really talk about it. The jazz police are so against this album, I think. It's true. They don't even arrest it. And maybe we could talk about that. It's outside of its jurisdiction. Yeah, we could talk about that as we listen to it. I'm actually kind of stoked to listen to this.

Yeah. Because I haven't heard it. Really giving it. like a nice, pure listen in a while. Do you know what I mean? I don't know that I've ever listened to this whole album. I'm ashamed to say. I think that I was influenced by the jazz police growing up.

I must have at some point. Because like I said, my dad loves this album. But I really don't, I never really checked it out on my own time. Because I think it has this reputation as being like, it's a poppy jazz album. You know what I mean? It's in like Lexus commercials, that kind of thing. You know what I know. Yeah.

So, and of course it features what you were just playing, Dave Bruback's most famous composition. Take five. Right. Which is not Dave Bruback's most famous composition, actually. Oh, it's not what is? It's not written by Dave Bruback. It's right.

It's Paul Desmond. Yeah. That's our first little controversy there, right? You know, there's a couple Earthwind and Fire tunes that also are not written by... They're rid by Paul Desmond, right? Saxophoneist Paul Desmond, who sounded and flavors all over this record.

What a sound. Yeah. This whole album, actually, what a sound. Yeah. 1959, man, something. There was something magical going on in those councils on that year. Right. Yeah, kind of blue.

You got this. And we'll maybe talk about that a little bit more because I think I have a little bit of insider information. Yeah. Well, not really. Well, I think another reason why this album is kind of, is not a popular one for jazz musicians is if you've ever played a bunch of jazz gigs or background music gigs or anything.

Right. It's like it's take five. Play take five. Yeah. It's play take five. It's play Linus and Lucy. from Peanuts, right? It's play any kind of like, quote unquote,

jazzy popular cultural reference, we get called like every gig. And it can get very annoying, frankly. And so this is one that it's like, nobody really ever calls it on their own because people are going to shout it out, like people shout out, you know, play Freebird at rock concerts. Yeah.

So it's kind of one of those cult, I mean, it's kind of suffers from its own popularity. Right, right. But this is interesting that this record was so popular. We were looking up, it's at least $2 million sold, probably $3 million by now. It was certified double platinum, but back in 2011. Crazy.

According to my insider sources at Wikipedia in Berlin. But the record starts, and I don't know what you were planning on playing first, but we could start at the beginning. It's a very unique, I mean, it's a very melodic record, very interesting rhythms on it. So I understand why it was popular. It's a very beautiful sounding.

record. Great playing and stuff. But it's got some tricky time signatures that one would not normally associate with a big hit record beyond the jazz world. So it's a little bit of a weird dichotomy or like we're saying the snobs, although we don't have to officially we don't have the snob a meter anymore, but we can still talk about jazz snobbery. We have the stank face of meter. Right. Well, let's go through our categories really quick because we're going to start listening to this record and we need to start paying attention to the categories. So we have 10 categories. Each one is worth 10 points and at the end of this episode, we will add up the points. Right.

And see what we have. We should score each other on our addition. Like how we should give each other a score on how well we add up our own score. And that could be the 11 category of the bonus. Yeah. So we'll have stank phasometer. Okay. So category number one is the playing.

Literally how good is the playing. How good is the improvisation? Category number two is the vibe. And that's like the overall vibe of the record of I think the feeling that it gets you, right? Does it have a good, does it leave you with a good vibe? Category number three are compositions. Category number four is sound.

Category number five is sequence, as in the order of the tracks on the album. Is it effective? Category number six is cover art. Category number seven is title. Category number eight is lore. Category number nine used to be the snobometer, but we're now we've replaced that with the same.

stank face ometer. I love the way you're saying just so seriously. The stank face ometer. Like I said, Adrian Newee from Red Bull Racing is going to check these, so I have to be very accurate with my speech. Stank face ometer, which is going to be registering how crooked up do our faces get as we listen to this. And then category number 10 is, is it better than kind of blue?

Now, someone in the comments pointed out that about four of our categories really are just... It's the same thing. How good is this album? Well, but that's, that's, these are all the elements that come together to give a rating. You know what I mean? Like, you could put vibe and stank face-on-meter and is it better than kind of blue and playing as how good is, that's just the rating the album?

Now, those people are wrong because we take these very seriously. There are subtle nuances that your average listener might not be catching. Exactly. Yeah. It's all here for good fun. And look, several folks have been commenting that, first of all, thank you for the comments on the YouTube, even if you're listening to us on the audio pot. OG listeners, we love you.

We love you very much. They're our favorites. Keep on listening. But maybe if you want to make a comment or participate in the discourse and converse with other lovers of jazz and you'll hear a podcast, come on over to the YouTube and just search for us. But we're on Open Studio channel now, which may or may not be keeping going. Anyway, side note.

But I'm saying like several people have... Are we scrolling our way through this? No, several people have mentioned that it's ridiculous to... to score it like it's an athletic event. And those people are correct. Oh, okay. It is ridiculous. But it's fun.

But we're doing it anyway. We're doing it anyway. Well, let's jump into it. Let's start with the first track, Peter. This is Blue Rondo Al-The Turk. Written by Dave Brubach. Written by whom? Dave Bruback.

Never heard of him. 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2, 1, 2. Do you ever played this? I had to play this a few times. I think so. It's hard. Yeah. That's some nice inner voice movement there.

It's a little tune. It's really enjoyable. Nice way to start an album, too. An epic arc to the melody, too. Personnel on this, too, by the way, we have, of course, Dave Rubeck on piano, Paul Desmond on the alto saxophone, Eugene Wright on the bass, and the great Joe Morello on dramas. Nice little rhythm section there.

So you probably couldn't tell on the melody. This is a blues. Yeah, for real. The sound is incredible. Base up front. Reubeck is strolling here. There's no... There's no piano it comes in at all.

Sounds pretty bad, actually. That's crazy to this record. Was this on the pop album charts? So it's number two on the pop charts. On the pop charts. Like, this is some extended, like, just balloons. A seven-minute blues, yeah, I know, I know. Well, it starts in 9-8.

The rhythm section sounds good. Also, like, the solo was over there, right? Is this an ad hoc? You know, Brubeck's playing has always been a mystery to me. I don't really get it. And maybe it's me, but I don't understand. Thank you for saying that. I agree.

Do you agree? Like, it's not, I know, I mean, he's not really talked about as, like, a great jazz pianist. He's talked about with these great records that he made. But like what he's playing here is really good. Well, on like a phrase by phrase. Phrase by phrase that as a whole, it's kind of, yeah. There's something missing in our composition-wise. I think it's incredible. How do you like that juxtaposition between the it's okay. Yeah. The whole thing feels a little and this is I think what it's meant to feel. Disjoin it. A little bit. Yeah. Maybe a little bit like from that time.

Like not timeless. A little dated, maybe? A little dated for sure, because it feels a little like, even the, okay. So I think it's like, it's like music school of the time. Classical music school meets jazz, right? Like it's a little bit of hints into the Far East a little bit. Yeah, exactly. Even the title, Blue Rondo a Tirk sounds like something that is, you know, blue.

And then Rondo, which is classical, a Tirk is like, it's very mid-century for how to think about. Right. music, and I think the music is as well. Yeah. It's got a vibe for sure. There's no doubt about it. Like the composition is incredibly enjoyable, especially in the beginning there.

Like the blues in the middle, Paul Desmond... That's a killing solo. Killing solo. Yeah. I think Brubeck coming after that it maybe seemed even a little weaker because it was coming after a really strong solo. Yeah, and you know, just...

I'm not dogging Brubeck. I think he was a very talented musician who could really make these incredible records and put together these bands. But he's not talked about amongst pianists is like a very influential figure. Yeah. And I think it's because he doesn't have like a very,

he doesn't have a very copyable voice. Like it's not a voice that I think it's because it's this mix of classical. You know that Bruback thing there? Yeah, it's not like, well, what is that? It's like this mix of classical into jazz. But his soloing itself is like, it sounds almost like he's trying to get to some kind of Oscar Petersonness at some points, but it just doesn't have the same.

like fifth gear that Oscar has. And there was even a little bit on that blues, like almost trying to be like a monk, like a minimalist monk kind of thing, but also it just doesn't have the sort of swing that monk might have. Yeah. As far as like just this like real command

of the language that he's attempting. Not, I mean, again, I think what he does, what he's good at, he's really, really good at. But yeah, so for me, man, playing on this, by the way, rhythm section, Eugene Wright and Joe Morales swinging. That was great.

And then like able to handle those odd meters too. I'm going to go playing on this whole album. Well, I'm going to save it. I'm going to save it. I tell you what, though, for vibe, as far as the overall vibe,

I'm going nine. I'm going to put that right out there. And then compositions, I'm going to go, well, I'm going to this thing. I don't know this record well enough to kind of like start.

Are we prejudging it? Let's check out the next track, Strange Metal Lark. Again, everything sounds amazing, but the piano. Also, we are having our piano. on tune to the next room.

Yeah. We can kind of hear it. It's so funny. That's good playing. Yeah. He was a great pianist. I got to hear him live. I actually opened up a concert for him twice.

And apparently nothing but I've never met him. I know you've met him. But I've met so many people that have spent time with him and like one of the great, all-time great human beings. Great teacher, great, just ambassador of the music. For sure. And I have had to play Blue Rondo Aal-Turk in like Kathy. wallets on a couple and everybody's jumping and that shit's hard to play yeah what he wrote is really hard to

play before minor ashton it's a good tune this reminds me some of the stuff he wrote you know he wrote a broadway musical called the real ambassadors yeah yeah that was a really important work but it was for some reasons not i don't think because of the artistic vitality of it uh it never took off it was some purely business reasons is this one of his strange metal lark yeah i think everything on here except for Take Fire is. Sorry, I cut you off. I interrupted you. My back.

No, but this reminds me of some of his writing. I got a chance to, I actually music directed a revival of it at Jazz, like, in Center a few years ago. Paul Desmond,

it's an interesting kind of, definitely that kind of like West Coast, art pepper. For sure, yeah. But he's got the Lee Kohnitz. Yeah. Got some cannonball.

Shout out to the reverb on this record, too. I know. Wow. Thank you. 30th Street, Columbia recording studio in the chamber,

the church. Yeah, it's a beautiful composition. Was this popular because people would get it, put it on their LP, and then drink their Mai Ties, in their mid-century modern, you know. It's got a madman vibe. Yeah. It is a vibe.

But this wasn't the first record that had this kind of time. And again, check out. Rubik strolling that whole first part. Actually, he was playing just a little bit real quietly. Oh, yeah. Yeah. I mean, very quiet Nice

Would he Was he influenced by Bill Evans Or were they influenced by the same people, would you say? That's a good question I don't know I don't know I mean he would have been About the same age maybe

I'm okay with that Yeah no he was Way older than Bill Evans Oh There you go Is it a compelling soul? No again it's not It's nice and relaxed

And it sounds good But it's there's nothing Yeah. It's not like the... There's not a lot of meat on the... Yeah, not like the Paul Desmond solo where you were like, whoa, you know, there's stank-faced moments, there's things going on.

But again, maybe it's that, you know, this, again, one of the best-selling jazz albums of all the time, maybe it's that light touch, that sort of like not trying to do too much vibe that has made it so universally loved by people who aren't necessarily hardcore jazz fans. Like, they're not out there trying to listen to Cecil Taylor. Maybe. Maybe it's just because of the next tune that we're going to listen to.

100%. Maybe that was such a big hit. You are 100%. Because this is not even particularly, you can't even say like, oh, people like this because they can put it on in the background, which you kind of could. You could. But there's enough, like, changes, like, some solo piano open to, like, it's not like just undercurrent, like, background music. Well, I don't know. It might be.

Really? Yeah. I mean, Blue Rondola Turk is not, like, that's kind of in your face a little bit. That's true. That's true. But this? Yeah. People like this.

I like it. Come to Infinity's Memorial Day sale today. Seale. Lexus or Infinity? Make it to be mine. Sail in July 6th. I think the sound and the mix on this and the composition

and the light touch. It's a 10 on his head. The vibe on this is 10. Yeah, they nailed the vibe on this too. The vibe is there. Compositionally, this is a very well-balanced too. Paul Desmond Crush. Not offensive, but that's a lot.

Some bluesy, you know. Like, this is kind of the epitome of what I think most people feel is West Coast. For sure. Precursor to smooth jazz. For sure. What do they call it, cool jazz? Minimalist. Nothing extra.

Ah. You know what's very different. This and a love supreme. This is very different from a love supreme. Yes. This has a bit of like jazz goes to college kind of flavor, you know? Yeah. I mean, this is almost more modal in a way than like the way he's playing.

This straight Dorian, right? But you don't think of this, this is mobile jazz. It is, technically, right? It's just one chord. Two chords, I guess it's a B-flap minor, but it's all relatively E-flat-minorish. Yeah. It's a vamp. There's a lot of nothing happening for being a hit.

It's a vibe. It's like a strong melody and then a vibe. Like a nice solo, melodic solo. It's a drum solo. It's a kind of a drum solo. It's a kind of a weird arc to it, though, wasn't it this solo? It does have a bit of a weird. That's him.

That is, no, yeah, that's iconic. Listen to the reverb on those drums. The whole thing is, surprised this is such a hit. It's got a lot of things that would be going against it being a big hit. Yeah, like a three-minute drum soul. Yeah, a three-minute drum soul over a vamp with really hip playing, but not really that cohesive, in my opinion. Like, that's not a storytelling kind of story.

solo, is it? It's almost like a drummer's solo, like. That was kind of a weird transition, too, wasn't it? I have to say, though, as we're now, as we're three songs in, it's a fairly original record. Yeah. You know what I mean? It's kind of weird. It's kind of strange. Like, if it wasn't so universally popular, I'd be like, I think I'd be more like, wow, this is, like, like brave almost. Yeah. It's weird.

It's a weird record. It's weird. It's kind of unique. And like who else is making a record like this at this time? Right. You know what I mean? Yeah. I mean, the things that they...

Peter, do we like time out? No, you know what to tell you the truth? I'm not sure I like this that much. No. No, I mean, because I love weird stuff. It's not traditionally swinging at all. No, but there is, I mean, they are swinging on it. Yeah.

Like, that was a really good drum song. Like, there was so many cool things. that happened in it, but it wasn't like, it wasn't a compelling soul to me. But, and look, I hate, I would hate for somebody to sit there and pick apart one of my soul. Absolutely.

Yeah, I know. It's a weird, I'm not, like, it's, it's great playing. I don't think there's anything on here. All four of these players are obviously masters at what they do. And we're not just saying that because we're supposed to say that. You can hear that.

It's, it's evidence. Yeah. So, I mean, come on. Yeah. Yeah. And, I mean, there was almost like some kind of insider stuff, wink, wink, that he did in that drum soul,

that only drummers. or rhythm section players would really appreciate, which is just what's weird about that is that it's such a big hit. Yeah. You know, I like it. I mean, I like that kind of thing, and not every solo has to be an epic, like, have the directionality of, like, you know,

an Elvin Jones, you know, incredible thing. There's something about that Joe Morello solo, though. There's something, even though it's weird. Yeah. A.F. I thought it was killing. I just think it was, it was a meandering? Would that be the wrong word to say?

Yeah. I'm going to give it a floor run and see if I can play that out there. Maybe. Maybe a little. Maybe it was just a little too long. But it's also over a vamp and the length of it. It's kind of like solo. We need a couple more minutes, you know.

Yeah. It would be, yeah. Yeah. But I would say that the power of a beautiful melody, you know, that's got the little blues inflection, kind of little pentatonic, like a really great melody with like great sound, a fabulous drum groove that introduces it. And then, you know. Great. bridge. Maybe we'll play the recording.

We just did. Exactly. Yeah. It's a weird record, especially the way I play. It's really weird. No, but I mean, a beautiful melody, a beautifully balanced composition. Totally. Beautifully played. I mean, Paul Desmond's like phrasing his ribotto, I mean, his vibrato going in and out. And like, their attention to detail on that and the discipline. Should I do it? Yeah, I mean, just playing triad.

Just sticking in that. See how I was trying to mess it up with the seventh and stuff? Like, they're just the facts, ma'am. But that's exactly what this takes. Like, that makes sense to me why this is a hit. It's like when great jazz musicians play a beautiful original composition, even if it's in five that's well balanced, it can be a hit. What surprises me upon listening to this record again is how weird some of the soloing is, you know?

Not all of it. And there's nothing on there that's like, oh, that's horrible. That's he's messing up. Well, let's get, I think we've heard enough now that we can, we can comment on the solo and the play. We've heard enough now that we can judge this record. So I have for the playing, I'm going to go kind of low here because I have a real,

I'm just not getting what Rubeck is trying to do. And some of the stuff is meandering that we've heard so far. The playing of the heads is phenomenal, but the improvisation, except for, to me, Paul Desmond is like kind of carrying everything. Yeah. I'm putting a six, man. I could go seven.

I think because of how clean all the playing is in the heads. I went seven. I went seven. I don't know exactly what that means, but I felt like that was, for similar reasons in terms of like, there's some really, really good playing.

I haven't heard anything that it's just like flooring me. Yeah. Yeah. But there's been nothing bad. So it's just, you know. But maybe we're underrating a little bit just for everybody, the rhythm section and the melody on a great hit tune like that, just executing just the head.

Yeah, I'm gonna, you know, I'll give it a seven. I'm gonna go up to a seven because of, you can't argue with how impactful the, this is, how many people this has reached and it is pretty incredible sounding. So that's why for vibe, I have a nine, because the vibe is strong on this album, whole way through. That reverb alone is like,

and I know that's part of sound, but I've got a nine for the vibe because I think whatever they were going for, they hit it. They hit it out of the park, like with the vibe. And I am kind of digging how, friggin weird the whole record is. Like compared to other things that were happening in

1959. 59 was kind of weird though, I think. What's that? Wasn't that a weird year though? I mean, just in the world? Kind of, but this is really its own this thing. This is a really kind of out there. I think it's kind of more out there, even though it's obviously extremely palatable. Yeah. It's unique. So I'm going to give it a

nine for that. I'm going to eight on vibe. Okay. Just because I think it is a great vibe, but like the piano sound and condition of it kind of kills the vibe for me a little bit. Just the the intonation of the instrument and the way it's recorded. Actually, the way every, well, we'll talk about, I know that's sound,

but to me, sound has an outsized impact on what the vibe is. Now, what pushes it over the edge is like Paul Desmond's tone and phrasing, Joe Morello's, Joe Morello's setting up, take five. Eugene, right? You know, his playing is just exemplary on here.

I mean, and in record is a vibe. The sound of the bass, the sound of the bass, the sound of the saxophone are world-class, like 10 out of 10. And Blue Rondo-A-Turk, Like to start a record like that, that's a vibe. Agreed.

Agreed. Let's check out three to get ready. Let's keep it on here. Oh, yeah. That's a good drum sound. Yeah, that's nice. And good playing. What's what I'm saying, man.

Some kind of cheeky about Joe Morello. You know what I mean? Some kind of winky. It's winked. It's probably like, why you keep giving me these weird solos? Why are you forcing me into weird playing? Ooh. Psychedelics involved with the making of this record?

Yeah. LSD much? You get the bass player some. I like the way Paul Desmond's coming through with some of those blues line. It's like a, it'd be like a, be like a white dude with like a Brooks Brothers T-shirt on, the blonde hair, you know, blue blood, walking to a jazz come, Oh, hello there, shit and do my head out.

A little bit. Just grab my career, thanks. You know what I? This is, this is both hard to do. I've written stuff like this before. You're going from three to four. especially walking, but what they're doing right on here is pulling it off to not make it feel disjointed. Yeah.

One, two, three, four, one, two, three, one, two. And swinging throughout it. That's not easy to do. I don't know that it's always needed to be done. I was going to say it's not easy, but it might not be necessary at this point in the song. I know. Yeah, it might be getting a little redundant. Just keeping that same clave going, you know, that same rhythmic pattern.

it just becomes a little predictable, I think. Right. Is this a solo that you would transcribe? No, but it's, like, what he's playing is really good. But the way it's put together is weird, right? Like, but if you were to transcribe a phrase, you'd be like, that's a nice phrase I want to use. What do what Miles thought of this record?

Surely he was asked about it all the time. Right. Because they would be in direct competition. Yeah, but, well, then they're same studio, same label. but Miles was very influenced by this I don't know the whole history of West Coast jazz and cool jazz but Miles loved this sound maybe not this like going back and forth in meters and stuff

but like the general vibe like this is kind of almost theatrical the way he's playing but that's hip right now like this is like incidental music in a play you know like as they're changing the set like this would fit really good with that yeah this is why so I'm

I want to talk compositions. Like Shakespeare in the park set in 1959, you know. I had eight originally, but I bumped it down to seven because there are, I mean, obviously there's some iconic compositions, Lurando A LaTurk and Take Five, but like this has sort of that repetitive nature to it. And there's just some, yeah, it's just like, that's nice. That's really nice. Like, they're all really solidly written.

They're all really well-constructed and well-crafted. Woo. Yeah, I played this one before. This is a tough one. Surprisingly. So I've got seven for competition. What do you got? I've got nine.

Nice. Actually, just, I mean, I was thinking the same thing, bump it down a little because it's, but to me, Blue Romo-a-a-Turk, although it's not a tune that I'm necessarily thinking of. I remember transcribing this early, or like trying to learn it from the record.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. And like, it was that captivating to me when I was younger. And take five. I mean, it's kind of, to me, it's like take the A-Train. Yeah. It's like, oh. But it's also like, it's actually really great, simple, deceptively simple.

One of the things with all of Rubex tunes and with Take 5 Paul Desmond's tune is the melodies are incredibly strong. Yeah. Incredibly memorable, singable, well-written, crafty. I think it's just the other accoutrements going around. Yeah. Around them. Like you were saying there's some kind of funky moments or awkward moments. Yes, there's some awkwardness.

In the forms a little bit. Yeah. But then the playing's really good throughout it. Yeah. The rhythm section holds it together. I mean, obviously, this is a band that played a lot together, too. I'm going to go eight for the composition. Cool.

Because I feel like nine is not, like, you got to really love, it's got to be like killing it all throughout. And I think for a lot of people, this is, this is pleasant sounding. The weird part to me is all the stuff that is actually more interesting where it's like, is it meandering? Where are they going back and forth that I would think would be off-putting to your typical less snobbish kind of listener. Yeah, we're definitely snobbing out.

here a little bit. To me, like, Paul Desmond is, like, kind of... So good. And he's so consistent with his sound. Yeah. Like, he's the one, not holding it together, but, like, he's the thread that's sort of the constant. He's the most exciting part.

Yeah. Of the whole thing, yeah. The rhythm section could have been, but because of the way the tunes are and stuff, it's not the biggest challenges. Can you go back? A lot of brushes, and then a lot of just keeping, like, a form that's very rigid with, like... Having said that, I couldn't imagine being played what they have to play on this. I couldn't imagine it being any better.

No, but like this is, Kathy's Wall is a great example here. They just let it go to three for a while. Yeah. And just hang out here. And this is a very nice part. Yeah. And maybe this is what they were trying to avoid because this would have been very atypical of the time. Yeah.

To just let it open up or whatever. Yeah. But this is nice. Joe Morella, Caleb, producer Caleb's saying Joe Morel is still swinging in four, which is a great catch. Very interesting. That's what I'm saying. It's a weird record, man. That, the tuning is weird.

The tuning of the piano is very weird. Lack of team. Well, that brings us to sound, Peter. I've got eight here, and I could take that down a little bit because of the piano, but... Well, I don't think that would go under sound. The overall sound is pretty incredible.

I've got seven. I think it's uneven. Yeah. Like the piano, not only the intonation, I'm not crazy about the actual sound, although it's always hard to tell. It doesn't... It doesn't pop this piano in this...

I love the drums. Drums based in saxophone sound incredible. Yeah, but I think that the reverb, which I would have thought... thought was in the room. I mean, that was an old church, the 30th Street Columbia studio, I believe, should have been more even, like it's uneven between the instruments to me. So it does have, to me, it has more of a vibe than it has really great sound. Yeah, yeah, yeah. The bass is great. The bass might be the best.

The bass sounds amazing. The bass sounds amazing. And the drums, the drums are maybe a little heavy reverb, but if that was, if that was the room, you know, it just, it sounds like the drums and the bass aren't in the same place. And I know. they were, you know, which is weird. I mean, this is great playing. Yeah, this is a good solo. But coming where it does in what's happened before this,

that's kind of weird that it gets to that at that point. But it's good. I mean, it's really good. We can have to call our friends down in South Louisiana to have some qualifiers for this review of this record. I feel like we're doing a, if I could review our own review here, I feel like we're doing a pretty good job of trying to be honest,

but also trying to be fair. It's a tough call, man. Like any of these huge records that are like millions of sellers, that's good. That's a little stank face, but more because of the out of tune. Right. A sequence, I'm going 10. I actually have liked the sequence.

I thought it's been perfect so far for me. You don't agree. I went seven. Just because I'm like, it's fine, but there's no like brilliant segways or anything. I mean, I might, I could maybe be convinced to go eight just because starting with blue Rondola Turk. That's great. Like, that's a really interesting thing.

Oh, you know what? This was a real ambassadors. Everybody's jumping. This is a great tune. This is tough. Yeah. Then it goes 60s. He just hangs here for a while.

I didn't shed this when I played it like for a week. Yeah. To build up the stamina to do that. Yeah. I played it. just remembering a great Montez Coleman moment playing this tune. I'll tell you about later. This is killing.

What a great melody. Yeah. See, I want composition. Now I'm feeling good about that. Yeah, you're crushing it, crushing it. Cover art, Peter. I've got a 10 out of 10 on that. I got a 10 on 10 on that.

I love it. That's a beautiful. I love the cover. Can we put the cover up? Gorgeous. Yeah, it is really nice. Look at that. Yeah, beautiful.

The artist is S. Neal Fujita. not only the art if that's not a martini and a cigarette after a long day on Madison Avenue and a couple of much funny rushrooms not only the artwork but the typography do you call it the fonts and the fact that they've got

featuring take five and blue rondo I guess they already knew those were going to be the hits they knew from jump yeah the title is great I think oh we have to get to that there title I mean look at the balance The balance of the Dave Blueback Quartet, the way that's the spacing on that, there's a lot goes into that. For the title, I've got a seven for the title.

I've got a nine. You like a, you like a pun. Time out. Well, and there's a lot of mixed time signatures in this. I could actually go up on this a little bit because, you know, I love a simple title. Yeah. Time out. It's very simple.

It's two words, one syllable each. it's a pun on the fact that these the compositions are all mixed meters Is it a pun or is it more of an insider wink? Yeah, it's kind of a play on words We'll call it a play on words, right?

More than a pun, probably. It's a play on words. And that's the only thing dragging it down for me is the play on words. But I actually, it's not terrible. I'm going to put at eight. It's good. Eight.

I'm going to go up. I go nine. Bump it up, Dave. Yeah. LOR. LOR. I got a nine. For the lore?

Yeah. Yeah, buddy. We are so disconnected today. But no, but we have to define large. I think you're, well, tell me why, why are you going nine? I'm going nine because of the sheer, like, number two on the Billboard Pop charts. Amazing. Amazing.

Yeah. You know, the legacy of this album is so huge. Is legacy a part of lore? Things that happen after the record came out? I think so. I think so. Maybe not, though. I could be wrong about that. What do you think?

You think about the story behind the record. That's what I meant, like, the recording of it. I mean, I just don't know. I know that, you know, it was recorded at Columbia's 30th Street studio. And it was in, to me, the biggest lore is this 1959 this year that all these great records were made and came out. Kind of blue, of course, and others that I'm forgetting now. Nine Steps, I think. I don't know. To me, the lore of it is more like what happened after, you know.

Maybe it could be lore legacy. Yeah. I mean, it's been chosen to be in the Library of Congress. It's in the Grammy Hall of Fame. Okay. It's countless lists of... I'm going to eight. Fine. What did you have it as? I had an eight as well. No, I had a nine. Sorry, I had a nine.

Okay. Last track is pickup sticks. Would you like to make some adjustments, sir? Did you score it? Trying to figure this out. as it used to on the other tracks. Right? Your little drop off. Well, it's the last track.

I mean... Well, hold on. Let's... They definitely brought the fire early on this one. This is pre-loaded, pre-stacked album. That's fine. I'm just checking out the bass sound between the two. Back to pickup sticks.

About the same. I think we've dropped off, Caleb. So that's a weird line, though, too. I know. I think that's what's throwing me. It's like... So it's... two, three, four, five, six, one.

Yeah, it's in six. It feels like it's in some weird, I think. Yeah, it's very strange. It's cool. You know what it is? Can you pause? This track is really sum up the whole record. It's like, it sounds good.

It's a really cool idea. The melody is hip. What is happening with the form? Like, why are they doing it like this, you know? Is it weird about it? It's a real weird, unique album when it comes down to it. Right. But this is an awkward thing because he's going B flat down on the, um,

like on the A string, right? And then open D, like that. And then B natural. So he's going like two, what, like it's kind of a, you can tell it's an awkward fingering or something. It's kind of a half fingering somewhere. Yeah. Should have the piano play.

We always nail the intonation on that. Not on this piano. But I mean, intonation is good on it. It's just something weird about it. He's still playing it four, right? Yeah. The album's called Time Out.

So what can you think? It's like four plus two. But instead of... It's... They put all the Brubek's good solos towards the end of the record. Yeah. It's just weird...

It's like, it's kind of segmenting. Yeah. It's in a box. It's in a box. Then we go to this box. Cool stuff. I feel like that baseline's not put it in its best outfit. That baseline doesn't have a settled feeling to it.

I mean, it's settling. It's repeating. Vamp bunch. Let's put Joe Morello in another awkward position to pull off a solo. Okay, that's how they're ending the album. And we're out. I'm going to bump my sequence down from 9 to 8, I think. That's what I'm saying.

I had 7, man. I mean, that's nothing wrong with the actual sequencing of the tunes. There's maybe we're reacting a little bit to some vamps and meandering, which is kind of conceptually what the record's about. It obviously works for most listeners. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No hate there. And maybe we're trying to project more onto this than needs to be there.

But there are some awkward, weird moments. Actually, I would say more weird than awkward. I shouldn't say awkward. You know what? Weird can be good. I actually kind of liked the overall experience of listening to this more than I thought I would when coming into it because it is, you know, the super popular play take five kind of thing. Yeah.

Yeah. I like the weirdness. Yeah. I like that they, it's an awkward experience. It's kind of fun. Yeah, I don't know. I'm interested to see what our scores add up to here. Okay, stank face ometer.

I got a five. Not too many stank face moments. And I think it's because of the predictability of the arrangements and the forms. Yeah, it was a couple, but I, yeah. Like, you know, it had like, do do do do do do, do, do, do. To be fair, that was the closing track.

They put it at the end of the second album. Yeah, I hear you. Everyone was going to be high on psychedelics by that point. It sounds totally different to it. I think you're mixing up which era psychedelics happened in because this is 1950. And that wasn't happening yet? 60, 66, 67.

Age of Aquarius? Yeah. Summer Love is 67. So, you know. Gotcha. Yeah. Okay. Is it better than K-O-B? No.

So, so interesting that this was recorded within a few months of Kahn-B in the same studio. So this can very much be on the same record label. And this was, well, this was produced by Teo Miserro. Kind of Blue actually was,

I think he was like a sister. on that. But it was, yeah, it was coming out of the same Columbia Jazz era. I mean, if you just take a second to compare what happens when you listen to Kind of Blue, when you compare, all of the moments, Miles Solos,

all of the transitions, the playing from Train and Cannonball and Bill Evans and Winton Kelly and of course, Paul Chambers and Jimmy Cobb, like, it's not, it's a tough measure. It's a tough measure for this one, I think. I think so, too. Having said that, the,

the actual playing, like the players on the two records, I think, are all in the same league. It's interesting, right? They're all MLB, you know what I'm saying? I wouldn't say that. I wouldn't say that, really? No, I'm not saying what they're on the MLB, that's true. I'm not saying they're not all, they're all A tier. Or what's the good tier?

S tier. S tier. I would say, I would say train is S tier. Miles is not? Miles is S tier for sure. Cannibal is S tier. Right. Yeah.

But you wouldn't say Paul Desmond. I wouldn't. I would say in terms of as a player, I think for whatever reason, and maybe we articulate some of these, maybe it's above our pay grade, on this record that it didn't become an S-tier thing to us. Yeah.

Right, the combination. He might be S-tier, actually. He's definitely A-tier. Yeah. Yeah, but S-tier is, when you put him next to Cannibal, that's tough. That's true.

I just meant they're all in the same. It's not like you're, like, I don't want to make it like, oh, this record is quality-wise, is such a downgrade from Kina-Blu. And this is where it really does become ridiculous. Is it better than care? One of the greatest records,

but we've had other records on that that we think compete with that, maybe even surpassed or in that range. To me, this record's not really in that range even, but the players on it are in that range. I kind of agree with that. I would say the weakest player on the album is actually Brebeck himself.

Perhaps, especially for this kind of writing. It is kind of right for the improvisation. I think the writing, his writing is what really carries. Yeah. And there's moments on there that, you know, probably more blue round to all that. Turk for me compositionally, but and take, I mean, there's, there's moments on there that, that are going to the mountaintop in terms of like jazz compositions and just moments and the sound

and, I mean, the rhythm section is killing. So like, this is, this is big league stuff, but it's not better than KOP. So what, so how do we score that again? KOB's a nine. Yeah. And so where does this rank in relation to that? And again, many people pointed out that we're just putting a score to the album. Yeah.

Yeah. That's literally what the score. So it's interesting, I have a six. Is it better than KOB? If KOB is a 9, this is a 6. Okay, I'm going to go six. I'm going to hide behind that six. I was thinking six to five,

anywhere from five to seven, so that's six. Good. You feel good about this? I actually do. I feel good. I feel good. I'm lovely to listen to it.

Like, if everything is better than KOB, then nothing's better than KOB. That's right. If everything's as good as KOB, that doesn't mean this is not, obviously, a great record to listen to. Millions of three million people have listened have bought this record and enjoyed it.

And when are we going to listen to it? It's kind of like KOB and like, I feel like I don't have to listen to it because I get to hear, I get to hear this plate everywhere. I know, I know. It's like you get to hear moments of like, even everybody's jumping or Kathy's Waltz

you'll hear in commercials, film, TV, all that stuff. Starbucks. But certainly Blue Rondo, DeLaturk and Take Five. Yeah, it's interesting. It's a fun record. Yeah. And it's weird.

Okay, but the boom. Ow. Jeez Louise. I feel like I got to circle mine because you circle it. Okay, what do you got here? What's your total score? My total score is 75.

My favorite track is Blue Rondo a Tirk. My total score is 77 and my favorite track is Blue Rondo A LaTurk. Oh, there we go. That's creepy. I think this is actually,

once again, I feel like this accurately reflects probably my feelings when I think about this album. And I think it's good. I mean, I'm a little surprised that we kind of, but I feel emboldened that we really both came right in the range

of our ridiculous scoring system. And we had an enjoyable, and I kind of had a little bit of a, it was a little bit of revelation, revelation, revelation. Yeah. I feel revelatory. Let's revel in our revelation about this record being kind of weird. I like that. I like it too. I like that we're like, because I always just considered

like very poppy or, you know, like easily digestible, but it's strange. It is strange. It is a little hard to digest. Cool. which is good. Yeah. And good for us. I think our scoring.

Flacks seeds are hard to digest, but they're good for you. What we're proving here is that... The flag seed of jazz albums. Sorry. Did I interrupt you? We got it. What we're proving here is that our scoring system

endorsed again by Red Bull Racing and injury. I don't know why I'm bringing in. I'm bringing in the best engineering team in the world. Verified by our account. Verified by MIT is accurate. Yes. Until next time. You'll hear it.

It's a little time outish, Peter. Right. Yeah, Judge.