On Shuffle

Equipoise by Max Roach.

It seems to me that jazz musicians tend to die very early or live very long lives. Max Roach is in the latter category, living until 83. During his career he was one of the finest bebop, hardbop and modal drummers as well as dabbling in avant-garde/free jazz, the co-founder of Debut Records with Charles Mingus, founder of the percussion orchestra M'Boom and one of the first successful drummers to play solo concerts. Not that he was only a soloist, he recorded with pretty much every important jazz instrumentalist that was active during his lie with the exceptions of John Coltrane and Louis Armstrong. A short list of the musicians he's recorded with: Coleman Hawkins, Dizzy Gillespie, Charlie Parker, Miles Davis, Duke Ellington, Charles Mingus, Sonny Rollins, Clifford Brown, J.J. Johnson, Stan Getz, Bud Powell, Buddy Guy and Freddie Hubbard.

This track is from the 1968 album Members, Don't Git Weary which is a suberp modal recording that I highly recommend anyone with even a slight interest in post-bob jazz acquires. This track sounds not unlike a mournful adaptation of A Love Supreme Part 1: "Acknowledgement"

The musicians on this recording are:

Max Roach - Drums
Gary Bartz - Alto saxophone
Charles Tolliver - Trumpet
Stanley Cowell - Piano
Jymie Merritt - Bass.



Red Headed Girl (acoustic version) by The Soft Pack

To promote the release of the EP The Muslims two acoustic tracks were released, this is one of them. Their eponymous debut album would be one of my top albums of 2010, if I could motivate myself to make a list.



Blue Moon by Big Star

From the album Third/Sister Lovers which is my personal favourite of the Big Star albums. The album contains a cover of The Velvet Underground's Femme Fatale, which I left off the Covers For Sunday - Velvet Underground Edition in favour of a cover by Yo La Tengo and Alex Chilton.