Liquid Soul is Back and Boy, Do We Need This Band.

 

Liquid Soul is a Chicago-based ensemble that was launched around 1993 - they are approaching the 30th anniversary of the group's birth. The picture above captures a fraction of the group - the horn section, which includes Mars Williams on saxophones, John Janowiak on trombone and Ron Haynes on trumpet.  This has always been a large ensemble - guitar, bass, drums, turntablist and two rappers/singers backed the horns on June 9, 2022 when the group played at SPACE in my hometown of Evanston IL.  I was there and it was an uplifting event, ice water breaking the long dry spell created by this pandemic.

Mars Williams and DJ Jesse De La Pena formed Liquid Soul after meeting up at the Elbo Room in the early 1990's. They gathered up some other musicians and hip hop artists and started playing as Liquid Soul on Sunday nights. Word of the group's unique make-up and sound spread quickly, and Liquid Soul had to move to a larger venue (the Double Door in the Wicker Park neighborhood in Chicago).  The Liquid Soul smash-up of hard bop, free jazz, jazz fusion, funk, R&B,  and hip hop was labeled as acid jazz, which launched in London during the 1980's. British DJ's were adding beats and electronics to classic jazz tunes from the 1950's and 1960's, and these very danceable grooves became popular in the dance clubs of London. The acid jazz "movement" didn't hit the U.S. until the early 1990's, and Liquid Soul caught the wave. They band almost made it into the mainstream. The group released its first album in 1996, and Liquid Soul's second record, "Here's the Deal,"  was nominated for a Grammy as "Best Contemporary Jazz Album: in 2001. They opened for Sting at Central Park in New York. They played the Newport Jazz Festival. 

In the late 1990's, Liquid Soul was everywhere in Chicago. They attracted a huge following at Elbo Room and Double Door - the professional athletes (Bears & Bulls) liked to hang out when they were playing. They played at Dennis Rodman's birthday party.  It was Camelot from a musical perspective. Liquid Soul was the Midwest version of acid jazz/hip hop - unique, extremely musical, danceable, crazy creative and improvisational!!!!

The band flirted with a breakthrough, but Mars Williams got a gig with Psychedelic Furs around 2003. Liquid Soul was a huge ensemble, it was expensive to tour and the music did not attract a massive following - the acid jazz/jam band folks loved it, but that isn't a huge audience. The band broke up for a while and re-formed. It has performed sporadically over the past 15 years or so. They have come out of the Covid pandemic slowdown and are playing gigs again around the Chicago area. 

They band was great on June 9, but OMG they were LOUD!! SPACE is a small room. I turned on my sound meter app on my phone and the levels hit 115 decibels!!  That is almost as loud as a chainsaw at close range. I blame the sound man at SPACE for this. Liquid Soul is not really a super loud band, but a huge sound system in a small room leads to hearing damage. I had to wear earplugs, which messed up the sound of the band.

I was delighted that they played their hip-hop version of Salt Peanuts on June 9. Here is the video of that tune, featuring Kurt Elling at the beginning.

This group is still totally relevant, and I hope they have great success.

Time to talk music -Vulfpeck

I guess I learned about Vulfpeck about three or four years ago.  This group has attracted quite a bit of attention, and there are some great articles about the fellas.  The origin story is appealing - a group of killer musicians met in Ann Arbor while studying at the University of Michigan, started playing together and dialed into the tightest funk groove I have ever heard. 

Vulfpeck was launched in 2011 sort of by accident, I guess.  It is a DIY effort - no manager, no record deal,  all millenial viral internet genius at work that led to a sold out gig at Madison Square Garden on September 29, 2019.  They are really the gold standard of the funk genre now, and many awesome artists have sat in with the group - vocalist Antwan Stanley, guitarist Cory Wong, trombonist Melissa Gardiner and saxophonist Joey Dosik collaberate regularly.  So does MacArthur Genius Grant mandolinist and NPR star, Chris Thiele.

My old bandmate, the late, great guitarist Osee Anderson, used to tell me, "Look for the pocket masters."   The guys in Vulfpecks are  the Jedi Knights of the pocket.  Joe Dart's bass lines are absolutely ridiculous - funk bass is really tough to play well, I think. The band can also lay down some heartbreaking R&B - check this out.

So if you love funk and high-skill  R&B, get deep into Vulfpeck.

Fear and Loathing

I grew up in a segregated suburb in Northern California.  It was mostly white, with a smattering of Hispanic and Asian folks.  There was not one black person in town - they all lived over the city's border in Oakland.  My father was notoriously cheap, so we would drive to downtown Oakland to the Oakland Barber College to get our haircuts every three weeks or so (haircuts for 10 cents provided by student barbers - quality was inconsistent, but the price was right).  We went from a lilly-white environment to a mostly African American environment.  I can remember my seven-year old self feeling disoriented and fearful around these people that were different from me.  My dad's Tennessee bigotry and racist narrative about black people during these trips added to my unease.

Well, life unfolded and I grew up.  In high school, I fell in love with jazz, blues, soul and funk music. If I loved the music, I had to love the people that invented and performed it.  My heroes were Charlie Parker, Count Basie, James Brown, Miles Davis, Al Green, John Coltrane, J.J. Johnson, Roland Kirk, Otis Redding, Thelonius Monk.  I got out of the "white ghetto" and moved to Berkeley, went to Cal.  I actually got to meet and hang out with Real Black People!  I was thrilled.   The fearfulness of my childhood experiences in downtown Oakland became a faded memory.

So here is the obvious truth - fear and loathing springs from isolation and separation.  The cure to fear and loathing is to live with the people you find frightening.  Guess what?  Most of them are regular folks.  Just because our social infrastructure accommodates prejudiced thinking doesn't mean we have no choice regarding  how we behave towards people that come from backgrounds different from our own.  The other obvious truth - it is wrong to generalize about a large group based on misinformation or the actions of a tiny minority within that group.

The typical power move by authoritarian individuals or groups is to create fear and loathing.  This increases separation and inspires hatred. The authoritarians then promise to protect the fearful people from the hated ones, and to deliver retribution.   When people are gripped by fear and loathing, they can do some truly awful stuff - oppression, terrorist acts, all-out war, genocide, and miscellaneous depravity.   They also hand over their personal agency to the authoritarians that generate the depraved plan of action.

We are seeing this play out right now, of course.   The so-called Islamic State extremists are using the old fear and loathing playbook, and it is working like a charm. The terrorists unleash mayhem against defenseless people, creating fear and loathing. Some politicians in the West  inject bigotry into the mainstream,which increases fear and loathing.  The stated goal of the Islamic State is to attract Western armies to the Middle East for the Islamic Apocalypse (that is why they are doing awful shit - to provoke a military response).  There are politicians in the United States that seem ready to fulfill this grand ISIS goal.  It seems pretty obvious and basic, but lots of people are stepping right into the trap.

It is always easier to destroy and cause misery than to cultivate and cause happiness.  People are lazy and opt for the easy path, in spite of its horrible costs.  And let's not forget the "other guy" dilemma - it makes no sense to be a pacifist if the other guy is a warlord.

Steven Pinker wrote a great book four years ago called "The Better Angels of Our Nature."  It is about the decline of violence throughout human history.  I wonder what Mr. Pinker would say about recent events.  Is it a bump in the road or a shift in direction?

Good bye, George Duke - and thank you, thank you very much

Today I got the news - George Duke died at the age or 67, which is too young, too young.  George Duke changed me.  Here is the story.

I was 13 years old, in eighth grade at John Muir Junior High School in San Leandro, California.  George was about 22 years old at that time, one year out of college,  with some great gigs under his belt (Don Ellis Orchestra, Carmen McCrae, Jon Hendricks, Anita O'Day, Bud Shanks, Clark Terry, and on and on).  I was a mediocre trombone player who was recruited to be in the junior high jazz band - a world was opening to me (Charles Mingus, Don Ellis, Miles Davis, Count Basie, Duke Ellington, J.J Johnson and many more), but my interest was mild at best.  In late 1967, I learned that the George Duke Trio was going to play a free concert at my junior high school after the new year.  And, sure enough, on Saturday, January 13. 1968, George Duke and his two colleagues showed up in the multi-purpose room at my junior high.  I was front and center.  After 15 minutes, I was amazed, eyes as big as pie plates, jaw hanging open.  The talent and stunning beauty of the music created by these three young adults shook and changed me.  George was still playing quite a bit of mainstream jazz back then, but he did drop a couple of contemporary tunes on us ("Last Train to Clarksdale" was one of the funkier tunes he did that night, I think).  I resolved that night to practice my trombone every day (fat lot of good it did me).  More importantly, George Duke's performance that night caused me to love jazz, blues, R&B and funk - that love has sustained me through my life's turbulence.

George grew up in Marin City, the one poor, black town in ritzy Marin County California.  His mom took him to see Duke Ellington when he was four years old, and he demanded to play piano and he started lessons.  He went to high school in Mill Valley - Mount Tamalpais High School - one of the few black kids there.  He played many instruments, including trombone (he majored in trombone performance in college). 

George went on to be a founding member of the funk fraternity.  Check out "Dukey Stick" from 1978!! He tapped the deep soul of the African American musical tradition by playing piano in gospel churches. He toured with the jazz-rock violinist, Jean-Luc Ponty, in 1969.  George joined the Frank Zappa band in the early 1970's.  He was tapped by Cannonball Adderly in 1971 to fill the keyboard chair in the that pioneering soul/jazz group. In the mid-70's, George launched his solo career in earnest, but  he still played on Michael Jackson and Phil Collins  records, and also worked with Quincy Jones. George was a major factor in the development of jazz fusion, playing with bassist Stanley Clarke and drummer  Billy Cobham.  He played with Miles Davis!  He loved Brazilian music and played with Airto Moreira and Flora Purim. He became a much sought-after record producer.  He was frequently sampled by the current generation of musical artists, including Kanye West, Common, Ice Cube,  Daft Punk and even Vanilla Ice!

So, good bye George, and thank you for making me a better person.

Donaldson Toussaint L’Ouverture Byrd II (aka Donald Byrd) - we lose another great one

Donald Byrd was an extremely great hard bop trumpeter.  A brilliant man, he studied hard to become a professor and taught jazz at major universities.  He wrote and performed Cristo Redentor, a jazz standard that has been covered by dozens of great artists, including blues harmonica player Charlie Musselwhite. But he really grabbed me when he "crossed over" to funk in the 1970's and launched the Blackbyrds with a bunch of youngsters.  "Do It, Fluid" was my favorite party tune when I was a young man. I remember that LP well - there was a reproduction of Van Gogh's "Wheatfield with Crows" on the cover.  I wore that damn record out.

Donald Byrd changed the game and he is revered by many people (including quite a few hip hop artists, who have sampled the hell out of his music).  Here is the New York Times obit.

The giants fall.  Will others fill the void?

RIP, Sugarfoot

You can learn a lot from studying the masters, and today's music is built on the foundations of the past.  Real funk fans are still studying the output of key groups from the 1970's - Kool and the Gang, Tower of Power, Parliament/Funkadelic, Earth Wind & Fire and, of course, the Ohio Players.  When I was playing trombone in the Mystic Knights band during my college years, "Skin Tight" by the Ohio Players was one tune we covered on every gig.  It always got the crowd dancing.  And "Funky Worm," with its totally weird Moog synthesizer licks, is still being sampled by heaps of hip-hop artists.  The Ohio Players hit the airwaves with "Fire," "Love Rollercoaster" and "O-H-I-O,"  all crazed funk explosions.  I loved the fact that these fellas were from Dayton OH, not generally thought of as a hot-bed of acid funk.  The OPs could play!

Well, the leader of the wild and crazy OPs has shuffled off this mortal coil.  Leroy "Sugarfoot" Bonner sported a massive 'fro back in the mid-70's (you couldn't even see his eyes through the 'doo).  He was fond of  the double-necked electric guitar. He could sing his ass off.   I think Sugarfoot ranks with George Clinton; maybe they came from a different planet.

Sugar was 69 years old and lost his battle with cancer.  We won't see the likes of him again. Rest in peace, man.

Sharon Jones Will Save Us All

Sharon Jones is not a kid.  She is a full-grown woman, a Baby Boomer born in Augusta GA but raised in the Apple, New Yawk New Yawk. As a young person, she was obsessed with her fellow Augusta native, James Brown. She is all of five foot tall, and she is not slender, oh no.  She is a powerful small package - she blasts out the deepest soul and funk.  Her live performances are astonishing displays of energy and charisma, not to mention fabulous musicianship and professionalism.  Sharon achieves this with an instrument that isn't as polished as some soul singers - she doesn't have startling range and prettiness; just power and authenticity, which are vastly more important.  She is a legend now, but she has taken a very long road to get there.  She used to be a prison guard - Riker's Island, no less.  She also was an armored car guard for Wells Fargo Security Services.  She spent many long years trying to gain musical recognition and did sing back-up on a number of records.  It wasn't until the late 1990's that her talent and ability to front a band became apparent to the soul/funk music revival community.  Sharon's first record with the Dap-Kings was released  ten years ago. While Sharon Jones is a legend, she isn't famous.  She is known and loved by a decent fan base, but she hasn't hit the mass market.  She hasn't achieved Adele's disgusting ubiquity on the soundtrack of our popular culture, and she never will.

Now here is the thing.  For me, and I suspect for others, hearing Sharon singing over the tight, multi-racial Dap-Kings ensemble is a transforming experience.  She makes me feel that my problems can be overcome, that the unattainable is obtainable, that there will be a brighter day. This sounds ridiculous, but I feel that this type of music can save us all from the depressing aspects of human existence.   Even when Sharon is singing songs of pain and loss, I feel uplifted. Talking and writing about her music is a futile exercise; you have to hear it to understand. Just click here and listen to Sharon lay it down at this year's Bonnaroo festival..http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eLpJBTgbgqs

This late 1960's/early 1970's soul/funk revival makes me happy.  I was seriously imprinted with this sound and the emotions that went into it when I was just coming into adulthood.  Tower of Power, Kool & the Gang, Sly and the Family Stone, Rufus, Cold Blood, Parliament/Funkadelic and of course the fabulous James Brown were all on my soundtrack.  They still are.  The success of Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings makes me feel hopeful that this music will live on and remain fresh.

Trombone Shorty and All That N.O. Funk

First of all, I am dedicating this post to my old Cal roommate. Tyler was my "trombone brother" in those carefree college days. He is back in the woodshed, working his on his trombone chops, after a successful business career. Tyler is a huge fan of Trombone Shorty; I think they have even hung out on occassion.

Yes, yes - Trombone Shorty, aka Troy Anderson. He is only 25 years old. He plays both trumpet and trombone like a man with hundreds of years of study under his belt. TS grew up in the Treme' neighborhood of New Orleans. He is a stone N.O. guy, a grad of the New Orleans Center for the Creative Arts. He has been playing in bands since he was six years old.

TS came to Chicago last Wednesday night. Tyler flew in for the event; a group of us gathered. The Park West was full and the decible level was very high. There are six players in Shorty's band - baritone sax, tenor sax, guitar, bass and two percussionists. This band had the polish and precision that comes from playing 250 gigs a year. They provided a flawless foundation for Trombone Shorty's wild improvisations. The band also pulled a stunt durng their encore that we used to call "the Big Switch" - all the players picked up different instruments and played (Shorty on drums, the drummer on guitar, the bass player on trumpet. etc.). These guys are professionals.

Young Troy is a phenom. He is built like a welterweight boxer and dances with a boxer's masculine grace. Since I am an old trombone player, I have a deep appreciation of Shorty's towering mastery of a balky horn. Some of his excursions had me howling in amazement. His trumpet work is equally stunning - he has speed, range and power, and he also can use circular breathing to play continuously for long periods of time - a very flashy, crowd-pleasing technique. I can't think of anyone else that has conquered those two instruments so completely. I was flooded by the flow of his musical ideas.

TS is a great singer, too. His tribute to James Brown was a real eye-opener.

My main beef about the show at the Park West was the sound mix. The bass was way too heavy and devolved into an indistinct rumble that muddied up the sound of the band. Of course, I miss the days when musicians played with dynamics. The relentless volume is near-deafening and becomes stupifying after a while. And the crowd was as loud as the band.

I sound like a grumpy old man. As the t-shirt says, "If its too loud, you are too old."

I don't know if a talent like Trombone Shorty will ever cross over into the mainstream popular culture. He is certainly striving to get there.

An Instrument I Wish I Could Play

While in high school and college, I spent quite a bit of time sitting in the trombone section of the jazz band, honking on the bass trombone. It was quite satisfying to blow low tones and anchor the brass section. And I had several opportunities to play in unison with my brother low-register specialist, the baritone saxophonist. This is how I fell in love with the bari sax.

A good bari player can really throw down a bass line. He/she can make it pop in the low register, rumble and growl, adding bottom to jazz, funk and rock music. A virtuoso baritone saxophonist can blow like Coltrane and Bird, but in the bass tone zone. There is a soulfullness to the sound of a bari - gruff, yet warm and it grabs me every damn time I hear it. And bari sax players tend to be a tad on the geeky side, which I really like. They aren't the movie stars of the music world.

I have a list of bari players that just knock me out -

• Gerry Mulligan: Gerry left us in 1996, and he was one of the greatest bari players in history. His tone was different - lighter and cooler than the typical rollicking baritone sax sound. He was bari guy on the Miles Davis "Birth of Cool" record. He played with Duke, Monk, Louis Armstrong, Chet Baker and Dave Brubeck. He put the bari in the jazz spotlight. Here is a clip of Gerry playing a wonderful old standard, "Satin Doll."


• Harry Carney: Mr. Carney was probably the first major performer on the baritone sax. He played Conn saxophones with a very large-chambered mouthpiece, which produced a huge, rich tone that most bari players try to replicate to this day. Carney ran away from home at the age of 17 to join Duke Ellington's orchestra! Wow! And he was one of the first practicioners of "circular breathing," a technique that allows a hornplayer to hold a note indefinitely. Check out this youtube clip and you will hear Harry's artistry and experience the incredible tension and release that the cicular breathing technique can create.


• Pepper Adams: Pepper was the "anti-Mulligan." Gerry was light and cool; Pepper was sharp and hot. They used to call him "the Knife" in honor of his attack and cutting tone. Pepper was a "hard bopper" and recorded with Mingus, Coltrane, Donald Byrd and a long list of other greats. He died of lung cancer at the age of 56 (which happens to be my age....). He played with a joyous ferocity that few musicians have ever attained. Here is a clip - wonderful stuff!


• Ronnie Cuber: This guy is still alive and kicking ass! He can do it all - harp bop, soul, funk and every damn thing. In addition to playing with stars like Joey DeFrancesco (Hammond B3 organ superstar), Randy Brecker, Maynard Ferguson, and Lee Konitz, Ronnie has also played with a bunch of pop stars seeking that magical bari sound, including Paul Simon and Chaka Khan. I love this guy - he looks like a paunchy accountant, but he is one of the funkiest horn men alive today! Check out this clip...
  
  
• Stephen (the Funky Doctor) Kupka: Doc has anchored the Tower of Power horn section for almost four decades! Imagine that! He introduced an entire generation to the robust bass honk af a well-played bari sax. He was a soulful, nerdy white kid back inthe 1970's; he is a distinguished-looking senior playa now. I still can't get enough of this guy - he has anchored TOP and defined its sound since its inception. Doc is a section player - not a soloist. And that is cool - here he is with TOP on the Letterman show some time back.
  
  
• Dana Colley: Dana is a bari guy that nearly achieved rock superstardom. He was a member of the odd-ball power trio, Morphine, in the 1989-1999 period. The instrumentation was electric bass, drums and baritone saxophone. This band was led and driven by the late, great Mark Sandman (bass and vocals); Mark died of a heart attack on stage in 1999. Dana played some amazing bari and opened a new frontier of the baritone sax as a frontline voice in a rock/pop context. The music was incedible, rumbling with funky darkness down in the bass register. Even Sandman's voice was a baritone-bass instrument. Here is a particularly mesmerizing tune by Morphine, recorded in a small club - wicked!!!

I could add many more names to this list. Here in Chicago, we have a few local Baritone Sax Studs - Bob Centano is the guy that leaps to mind immediately. Bob plays the entire range of woodwind instruments, but seems to spend most of his time on the bari. He is no spring chicken - well into his retirement years. Bob worked in the Federal courts - clerking for Federal judges was his "day job" for many years. He is back to being a full-time musician in retirement. He also leads a big band around the Chicago area, and it is an excellent ensemble. Bob's playing is deeply soulful and full of surprises.

I am always amazed when a talented musican plays a big, intimidating instrument like the baritone sax and generates such marvelous sounds. I wish I could play that damned bari sax!

Another Living Musician I Love- Shuggie Otis

Shuggie Otis is one of those musicians that other musicians know about. He hit the scene at fifteen years of age. His background was quite unusual. His father is Johnny Otis, a Greek-American musician who decided to live in the African-American community. Johnny made this decision in the 1940's when it was definitely an unusual path for a white guy to take - and he married a black woman (illegal in many states at that time). I can (and will) spill about Johnny Otis because his story is crazy and amazing. But let's stick to his boy, Shuggie, for now.

As a teenager, Shuggie was acknowledged as a guitar phenom, mentioned by some in the same breath as Jimi Hendrix and B.B. King. But he wasn't satisfied to be just a guitarist - he mastered bass, keyboards, drums and vibraphone. He also became a gifted writer and arranger. Shuggie started playing professionally at the age of 12, using disguises to appear older (phony beards & moustaches, dark glasses, hats, elevator shoes, etc.) so he could get into nightclubs. When he was 15, he was drafted by Al Kooper to be part of the second "Super Session" album (this was Kooper's project after he founded Blood Sweat & Tears and completed the first album). Shuggie released his first album as a leader in 1970, called Here Comes Shuggie Otis - he was around 17 at the time. In 1971, he released "Freedon Flight," an album that was way ahead of its time - and in 1974, he released "Inspiration Information," his masterpiece. And that was really it - he started to fade as a bandleader/solo artist and and basically disapeared by 1980. He is still alive and well, hip hop artists and others are covering his fanastic tunes (remember Strawberry Letter 23 by Brothers Johnson? That is Shuggie's tune).

Sly Stone, Stevie Wonder, Prince and other trippy/funky/soulful genre-mixers owe a lot to Shuggie Otis. I often think that Prince deliberately copped all of Shuggie's shit. The Rolling Stones tried to hire this guy in the mid-70's, but he said "no, thanks" because he figured he was going to rock the world on his own. Things didn't turn out that way, but his music stands the test of time - still sounding exciting and fresh 35 years after it was recorded. Shuggie used drum machines in the early 1970's; he played almost all of the instruments on his albums, he incorporated jazz, blues, rock and R&B. It still is wickedly great stuff.

I think Shuggie Otis is still living in Northern California. He records on occassion and has played a few concerts. While he missed stardom and celebrity, he also missed the drugged-out evil scene, so he is alive when many other pop stars died before they reached 50.

The Mystery Band CD Is Out!!!

It took 10 months, but the first CD by Mr. G and the Mystery Band is finished, packaged, manufactured and ready for consumption. It is on CD Baby - click here for the link. The CD will be available on iTunes in a couple of weeks or so.

All the tunes on this disc are originals so you can blame the whole thing on me. I have lots of copies of this CD in my basement, so help me clear them out.