Last Flight Essence

I came across a very, very interesting album today. I am a HUGE Jaco P fan, as most of you who know me will have found out fairly quickly, if you discuss music taste with me. I was on Amazon, just looking through some Jaco albums for a bargain, and I came across one that I'd never heard before. This album, Last Flight Essence, was right at the end of the search, and I'm surprised I haven't heard it before.

You can download it here, I'm not so sure how legal it is, but hey... -> Download

The album consists of 3 quite long tracks, and if you've got a short attention span, I advise against listening to this. It appears to just be a 1-off jam between a few friends around the mid 1980s, who just wanted to lay down a few tracks. Listening through the entire album non-stop today, I found it absolutely breath-taking. You can tell it's Jaco playing fairly quickly, as he lays down some well known funky grooves, from Reza to an extract of Three Views, which Jaco fans will know inside-out. I seriously recommend just having a listen, and getting lost in it. Put the biggest pair of headphones you have on, and just lie-down and listen to this. If it's too heavy, go and buy (or listen to it on Spotify here, but the idiots who put the Jaco tracks have gotten some of them mixed up with the recordings from the Birthday Concert...) 'Word of Mouth' by Jaco, and give it a try.

Right, that's enough brown-nosing of my hero.

'til next time...

Thanks ~ The Jazzbone

Sweeney Todd

I almost forgot to say! I'll be playing in a production of Sweeney Todd, the musical, next month in King David's High School, on Seymour Road in Manchester. It's being directed by Trevor Siemens, a very talented young composer and musician. The musical itself is fantastic, the music is very interesting and quite funny, if not lacking in trombone moments...

Here's a link to the Facebook page with some more details :)

'til next time...

Thanks ~ The Jazzbone

Scream Machine

I do apologise for my lack of updates recently, it's been a tough month! Coming back to college after Christmas has been a bit of an ordeal, and not as easy as I was expecting it to be... We have technical assessments coming up, and my teacher is trying to get me through the material for those as well as keeping up the technique and fundamental stuff. It's pretty intense at the minute.

But anyway.

Back to jazz. I bought an album off of iTunes the other day, purely because I love the guy, and his albums aren't that widely available. Any brass player who has a real love of jam hot brass playing will have hopefully heard of 2 artists; Mnozil Brass and James Morrison. I won't be talking about Mnozil this time, because they aren't jazz in the slightest, but they are as jam hot as you can get. James Morrison however, I could talk about this cat all day. If you're a fan of Black Dyke Brass Band, you will have definitely heard of this guy. Just check this out -> YouTube. That's James performing "Things Just Ain't What They Used To Be", that old Ellington standard. I couldn't tell you the amount of times I've watched that video, and how many times I've watched that DVD... But anyway.

He's released some phenom albums through the years, the only problem being that he's an Australian artist, and his albums aren't released here except online through iTunes, which is a real shame. Here's the album I bought though -> iTunes. And just listen to some of those samples... Jam hot, yes? Thankfully, he does have an album on Spotify, hidden away under the gay James Morrison... but srsly, listen to this ASAP -> Spotify.

It's been a tough month or so for trombone playing, I've had to re-think my practise schedule entirely. But, you'll be glad to hear, I've actually been doing some Aebersold work! All in preparation for Jiggs Whigham's return next month!

I will try to be more active with my posts guys, I promise!

'til next time...

Thanks ~ The Jazzbone