Next up is the curiously titled "Fatha" Blows Best. Since we all know that Earl Hines was a pianist, I am not exactly sure what he blows...I will leave that up for you guys to figure out.
Title aside, this is another hard swingin winner. The group are all veterans of jazz, and it shows on the album. This quintet doesn't rush much of anything as they cook their way through ballads and mid tempo numbers.
Thinking Of You raises the fever, but only for a couple minutes. Infact most of the tunes don't exceed 3 minutes with the exception of Shine On Harvest Moon. On that tune, the group must have really been feelin it as it almost triples any other song on the album in length.
Hines mostly comps for his front line although he does throw in a pinch of hot pepper every now and again. Budd Johnson is excellent here, and fans will want to hear him tear through these numbers on both tenor and soprano. Infact his soprano work is excellent and it adds a nice dimension to the recording, expanding the realm of possibility and keeping things interesting. Buck Clayton was also having a fine day and compliments his partner well. Pemberton and Jackson mostly just keep things swingin for the group, which is fine by me.
This session could easily have appeared as a Swingville or Moodville side. The overall vibe gives me a visual of a hot southern day. This group had been together for some time, with the exception of Clayton, and clearly knew how to use their rapport to paint a picture.
This minty LP was ripped at 24/44.1 wav and dithered to 16/44.1 FLAC. A wonderfully swingin album...enjoy!!
Decca (DL75048) Mar. 8/11, 1968 NYC
Earl "Fatha" Hines - piano and vocal; Budd Johnson - soprano/tenor sax; Buck Clayton - trumpet; Bill Pemberton - bass; Oliver Jackson - drums
https://mega.nz/#!dwoHTRiT!uj6vqE70A--HCNI8k5ooSyzPvdg7Lbzyu-iXIQ-1LNQ
ReplyDeleteMany thanks for this rarity. Always love Hines, Budd, Buck.
ReplyDeleteDrRay3
Wow...
ReplyDeleteMany thanks, poppachubby!
Thanks PC, for another great post, glad to see you 'blow' back in and drop some classic sides again.
ReplyDeleteGreat swing. Many thanks poppachubby
ReplyDeleteNIce! Thank you poppa. There is a jazz slang page somewhere and "blow" is used to compliment etc on someones musical ability. It doesn't have to pertain to horns etc but to any instrument. ( Blow --- A jazzman's term for playing any instrument.
ReplyDelete"That European guy, Django Reinhardt, can really "blow.")
Delightful LP! Thanks for reposting, poppachubby.
ReplyDelete-peacenik
Thanks poppachubby, Earl Hines is amazing!
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ReplyDeleteDeGallo's right on the money and uses the example for the use of the verb blow provided by The-Jazz-Cat.com's jazz dictionary. Likewise the Gay Nineties at the end of the nineteenth century in the United States did not mean that a large group of individuals in the United States decided to reorient themselves sexually or come out to friends and family.
ReplyDeleteHine's album title parodies the title of the popular radio and television "Father Knows Best." In both shows, Robert Young played the thoughtful and wonderfully wise patriarch of the Anderson family living somewhere in the Midwest. Like "Leave It To Beaver", "Father Knows Best" was very popular and ran for years in reruns. Also, like "Leave It To Beaver", it portrayed an idealized and sanitized (propagandized) view of life in the United State as being lived by an upper middle-class mainstream Protestant white family during the 1950s. Unlike "Leave It To Beaver," “Father Knows Best” featured no Eddie Haskell, a cunning wise-guy who was always disingenuously polite to Mr. and Mrs. Cleaver, to be secretly admired by us younger viewers as a teenage rebel. Just thinking about the show brings back memories of my father coming home in his green work uniform from his long day as a dockworker on the loading platform and delivery man at a welder's supply company and donning his best suit to complement my mother's wearing her finest dress and pearls, just like the Anderson and class Cleaver parents, when we ate dinner in our project apartment. How bizarre that the majority of television fathers in that era usually wore suits at home and especially during mealtime, and never appeared to be tired from work. They apparently had good salaries on which they could, as sole breadwinner, provide a comfortable and easy life for their families.
Granted on "Father Knows Best", Robert Young was allegedly an insurance agent but, like Ward Cleaver, he was at home for long periods and always present whenever an urgent crisis, such as an argument between the the Beav' and Wally about what t buy June for Mother's Day, arose. Of course, when the boys got in trouble, Ward, like Robert Young as Jim Anderson with his two television children, would reluctantly muster up a scowl and speak firmly, but neither one of them yelled or uttered words in real anger. Equally important, their words were always advisory and sage. If you were to look up the words ”temperance” and “equanimity” in the dictionary, you would most likely see a photo of one or both television fathers to minimize the need for written definitions.
ReplyDeleteIn contrast, if you look up the word “blow”, I am fairly certain you will not find a photo of a jazz musician or, more specifically, Earl ‘Fatha” Hines. As for the television fathers, whenever an admonition or disciplinary restriction was warranted, Margaret Anderson and June Cleaver always deferred to their spouses, the fathers, and, on those rare occasions when their spouses weren’t really available, forewarned their children to wait until their respective fathers got home. At such times, despite their fatigue from an arduous day spent baking cookies and cleaning their respective homes while dressed in their best dress and pearls, both Margaret Anderson, the mother in "Father Knows Best" and June Cleaver could caution their truly wonderful spouses to go easy with the boys or, in the case of "Father Knows Best", boy and/or girl. I wonder if, whenever Hines was absent from a rehearsal, his bandmates forewarned one another that they had to wait until their “Fatha” got there to address any problems or conflicts.
It almost goes without saying that in the 1950s' situation comedies on U. S. television and, more specifically, in both “father Knows Best” and “Leave It To Beaver”, there was certainly no one who remotely looked like Earl "Fatha" Hines living in the Andersons' and Cleavers' neighborhoods. The only male sit-com character I can recall talking at length about, complaining about, or being fatigued from, his job was Ralph Kramden, the bus driver, as played by Jackie Gleason, on “The Honeymooners”, and Kramden and his television wife were working-class, lived in a city apartment, and had no children. I occasionally suspect the lack of children was deliberate because the producer and writer did not want to present an image of a working class stiff successfully raising children.
Sadly by the 1980s, the country’s favorite television father, an obstetrician, could no longer support his family well on a single salary and his wife had to work as an attorney. On his doctor’s salary, he couldn’t even afford to buy a suit to wear at the dinner table and, instead, wore sweaters, a poor substitute, in lieu of the proper attire. However, like the paternal Anderson and Cleaver, the good doctor was always hanging around the house and available to the kids whenever they needed his sage advice or well-informed guidance. I wonder whatever happened to the actor that played Dr. Huxtable, the perfect father, and loving faithful husband.
ReplyDeleteMore to the point than comments about the term "blow" when used by jazz musicians to describe a fellow musician playing his or her instrument or Hine's engagement in wordplay by using a title that reminds one of the sit-com about the Anderson family, thanks for making this a great Fatha’s day, Poppachubby. As usually your rip is excellent in quality. I have always enjoyed Hine’s music and Budd Johnson’s playing but I have never heard this one. I’m now listening to it and just chilling after having changed from the suit I wore tonight to have dinner with the family at the kitchen table. No doubt, after my wife clears the table and washes the dishes while wearing high heels, her best dress, and pearls, I’ll be providing eminently wise counsel to my eagerly attentive daughters to ensure that, like the Anderson, Cleaver, and Huxtable kids, they live lives in harmony and prosperity. I’ll also communicate the respect I have for Hines;’ music and the enjoyment I experience when listening to his and his band’s records. At a minimum, I hope to persuade the daughter who believes that Ellington and Armstrong surpass all others in the world of jazz. I’ll consider my mission accomplished if, in a few months or even years, they look back in Hinesight and agree that “Fatha” blows best. Unlike Jim Anderson the patriarch in “Father Knows Best”, I’ll be playing and listening to Earl Hines and his group blowing in the background while I speak with them. I may even resist the influence of the always well-attired Jim Anderson and Ward Cleaver, and go a little crazy tomorrow night and not wear a tie and suit at the dinner table. Huxtable’s outfit is more affordable so I’ll unpack the sweaters for the occasional chilliness of late September.
Thank you, PC! It is great to have you back and with such a fine offering.
ReplyDeleteExcellent share!! Thank you poppachubby!
ReplyDeleteThanks poppa!
ReplyDeleteMany thanks, Poppachubby.
ReplyDeletethanks very much!
ReplyDelete*Chet
ReplyDeleteThanks!
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