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From '50s NYC clubland, a Yma Sumac-inspired version of "Babalu" by jazz/calypso singer Phyllis Branch.
Category Archives: Jazz Obscura
Cinema funky
Just as its antecedents in the mid-‘60s had their sitar interludes and fuzztone atmospherics, the hipper cinema of the late ‘60s and early ‘70s oozed with wah-wah guitars, jazz basslines and funky backbeats. And why not? Whatever Tinseltown’s machinations, film … Continue reading
2007/09/24
Posted in Exotica/Space-Age, Jazz Obscura, Latin, Miscellaneous Flotsam, Now Sound, Soul
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Roscoe Weathers, pt. 2
(Ed. note: This is part two of a post about the great ‘60s West Coast jazz and Latin jazz musician Roscoe Weathers. Weathers is a recurring source of fascination for me. Various bits, sub-factoids and dead end details have trickled … Continue reading
1968: The R&B instrumental
It could be a jazz organist angling for a catchy original number to climb the R&B; charts. It could be a young six-piece combo who played together in their high school band and who were now letting loose with a … Continue reading
The Varitone Saxophone
History has not been kind to the dreaded Varitone saxophone. What is the Varitone? It’s an electric saxophone, simply put, part of a broader post-War trend of oddball, electrified instruments and effects. Except for a control box with visible knobs … Continue reading
Latin funk
Funk and salsa, as musical forms, were both ascendant in the late ‘60s and early ‘70s. They were forms that were nourished within culturally aware, politically mobilized communities. According to the tradition that America will always co-opt its most disenfranchised, … Continue reading
Office Naps Middle Eastern Mix
The third installment of the Office Naps mix, and it’s all over the place. From Turkish wah-wah guitars and ’60s garage ragas to Yusef Lateef’s Mecca-wise wail, it’s Middle Eastern only in the loosest possible sense of the term. If … Continue reading
Struck wordless
You’ll hear them sometimes on easy-listening records of the ‘50s and ‘60s, theremin-throated songbirds, their voices swooning, wailing and wordlessly calling in a celestial llllaaaahhhhhhhhs. Jungle exotica, easy-listening themes for outer space, atmospheric soundtrack pieces, and lush orchestral confections: these … Continue reading
Watermelon Man
A young Herbie Hancock – all of twenty-two years old and fresh from Takin’ Off, his debut album on Blue Note Records – introduced his “Watermelon Man” (hear excerpt here) to the Cuban-born conguero and bandleader Mongo Santamaria one slow, … Continue reading
