Blue Note 50th Anniversary Collection: Volume 3

I have to presume that most people who know anything about records know that old Blue Note LPs are collectable and worth money. Their striking cover designs mean they'd be hard to overlook. I don't think I've ever seen a '50s or '60s Blue Note album in a charity shop, and if I have happened to catch sight of the odd one anywhere else, a glance at the asking price has sufficed to make me forget it existed.

In the '80s there were a few stabs at cashing in on the Blue Note brand, among them a series of 50th Anniversary Collection double compilation albums (released in '89), one of which, Vol. 3 - 'Funk & Blues' - I was lucky enough to spot in the wild. Also in the series were 'From Boogie to Bop' (Vol. 1); 'The Jazz Message' (Vol. 2); 'Outside In' (Vol. 4) and 'Lighting the Fuse' (Vol. 5). Of those, the track-listings on Vols. 2 & 3 are most to my taste, so it worked out well I found one of those two.

The compilation includes only nine tracks across its four sides, about a CD's-worth of music in all. Included are some numbers that were already firm favourites of mine ('Moanin'' by Art Blakey et al; Jimmy Smith's 'Back at the Chiecken Shack'; Horace Silver's 'Song for my Father'; and 'The Sidewinder' by Lee Morgan), & it was a delight to hear those on vinyl for a change. And there are also some tunes I hadn't encountered before, of which I liked Donald Byrd's 'Cristo Redentor' and 'Alligator Boogaloo' by Lou Donaldson the best.

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All Wrapped Up

Here's another of the compilation cassettes I bought this summer, having taken home a Denon twin-deck hi-fi cassette player from the local charity shop. All Wrapped Up is a 1983 compilation of singles by The Undertones, with Side One filled with A-sides, and B-sides on Side Two. A cassette must be the least desirable medium for such an arrangement, with a long rewind required if one just wants to hear the hits repeatedly. The Undertones were unapologetically provincial and anti-fashionable, with their songs sharply-written slices of life that pointedly avoided any mention of politics, or of the then-continuing violence in their native Derry. My favourite tracks are the obvious choices: 'Teenage Kicks', 'Jimmy Jimmy', 'Here Comes the Summer', 'My Perfect Cousin' & 'Wednesday Week'. Their later singles showed increased sophistication but lack the some of the straightforward charm of their earlier work. The B-sides, not unexpectedly, are mo...

In Heat

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Bananas Are Not Created Equal

I knew Jay Berliner's name from his contributions to Van Morrison's Astral Weeks and Charles Mingus' The Black Saint and the Sinner Lady , so when I saw this curiously-titled LP at the local charity shop I was intrigued, and bought it even though I had no idea what kind of music it might contain. This was after the days when one could still buy records there for a pound apiece, but I don't think I paid more than a fiver for it. The music turned out to be an all-instrumental blend of funk, soul & jazz. Berliner's virtuoso lead guitar is only one of many attractions here. The band of first-rate session musicians behind him are all uniformly excellent too, and, crucially, sound like they're having a blast. Cornell Dupree's supporting guitar work, while less showy than Berliner's, is beautifully-judged, and the rhythm section is terrific. Arranger/conductor Wade Marcus was no slouch either, judging from the way everything comes together. Two of the funk...

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