Legends Of Acid Jazz : Tennor Titans (EU) (Remaster)

1980年後半に、ロンドンを起点に生まれたACID JAZZムーヴメント。そんなACID JAZZシーンでも伝説とされたアーティストたちの音源をまとめた、1980年代にリリースされたヒット・コンピレーション"LEGENDS OF ACID JAZZ"シリーズが多くの需要にこたえて新たにデジパックで再発。こちらは、ソニー・スティット等、テナー・サックスのソウルフルな名演が聴ける楽曲をコンパイル。

This 11-song compilation of material from the Prestige vaults, recorded between 1969 and 1974, captures the time at which soul-jazz was turning into funk-jazz and fusion, emphasizing the role of tenor saxophonists. Some of these players are quite well known (Gene Ammons, Sonny Stitt, Rusty Bryant); some famous tenors, like David "Fathead" Newman, Grover Washington, Jr., and Joe Henderson, are heard as sidemen to leaders; and others, be they the saxophonists (Wilton Felder, Eddie Pazant, Jerome Richardson) or their non-sax-playing leaders (Pucho & the Latin Soul Brothers, Boogaloo Joe Jones, Billy Butler) are more in the cult or relatively unknown category. Whether or not you're a tenor sax specialist, if you're into soul-jazz this is a fine anthology of the music as it entered its late phase, clocking in at a generous 78 minutes and yielding a good amount of variety within the genre. Sometimes it gets close to psychedelic funk (Funk Inc.'s cover of Curtis Mayfield's "Give Me Your Love"), sometimes to more traditional soul-jazz-with-organ (Charles Kynard's "Slow Burn," Sonny Stitt's "Them Funky Changes"), sometimes to fusion (Patrice Rushen's "How Right Now"), sometimes to James Brown-ish boogaloo (Pucho & the Latin Soul Brothers' cover of "Cloud Nine"). ~ Richie Unterberger|