Dexter Gordon: Blue Note Recordings

Download "Doin' Allright" & "Dexter Calling"

Download "Go" & "A Swingin' Affair"

Download "Our Man In Paris", "One Flight Up" & "Gettin' Around"

Kelan Phil Cohran And Legacy: African Skies

Captcha Records is proud to announce the arrival of “African Skies”, the most recently recorded album from the visionary Brother Kelan Philip Cohran and his band Legacy. This record was influenced and realized in 1993, shortly after the passing of Brother Phil’s friend, mentor and band mate, Herman Blount (better known as Sun Ra). It was heard publicly for the first and only time at the Adler Planetarium in Chicago, Illinois that same year. By channeling the energy of Sun Ra, Brother Phil brings us closer to enlightenment, closer to the cosmos with melodies that are as ancient as time itself. Sun Ra believed that music is the voice of the spirit, the energy we want to live within. In the aftermath of his death, Brother Phil drew upon his mentor’s cosmic perspective to produce an elegiac album that is utopian in spirit: a vessel brim-full of primordial vibes and a memo from some higher astral plane. In the words of its maker, “African Skies” is a “nourishing and inspirational” document - a nuanced portrait of one of the most visionary musicians of our time in his prime. (Jazz Times)

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Carla Bley: Dinner Music

After the enormous and layered ESCALATOR OVER THE HILL and a further collaboration with lyricist Paul Haines, Carla Bley simplified things on the glorious DINNER MUSIC. Her studio players--Richard Tee, Eric Gale, Gordon Edwards, and Steve Gadd--recorded under the name of Stuff. Bley amended the ensemble with four of her regular horn players, who appear in gorgeous configurations underscoring the humor ("Funnybird Song") and beauty ("A New Hymn") of her compositions.

They also revisit "Ida Lupino," first recorded by Bley's then-husband, Paul Bley, in the early '60s. The song was later given lyrics and recorded by NRBQ on their late '60s debut. Bley is that rare composer whose writing is genuinely good humored music referencing anything outside the scope of music. Since humor is a key in getting to know anyone, all that wish to become acquainted with Bley's music are advised to begin with this album. (AMG)

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O'Jays: Ship Ahoy

The "other" O'Jays album masterpiece, Ship Ahoy combined shattering message tracks and stunning love songs in a fashion matched only by Curtis Mayfield's finest material. From the album cover showing a slave ship to the memorable title song and incredible "For the Love of Money," Gamble and Huff addressed every social ill from envy to racism and greed. Eddie Levert's leads were consistently magnificent, as were the harmonies, production and arrangements. "Put Your Hands Together" and "You Got Your Hooks In Me" would be good album cuts, but on Ship Ahoy they were merely icing on the cake.

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Herbie Hancock & Jaco Pastorius: Live Voyage

Recorded Live at the Ivanhoe Theater in Chicago on February 16, 1977.

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Michael Weiss: Soul Journey

Pianist and composer Michael Weiss believes that the future of jazz lies in a closer integration of composition and improvisation. He puts that hypothesis to work on his fourth album as a leader, on which he takes a high-powered septet through an all-original program of nine compositions, all of them relatively straightforward in general structure and tone, but harmonically forward-looking at the same time. This kind of balance between innovation and accessibility is unusual in jazz, and it makes for an extremely interesting and enjoyable listening experience. The album's centerpiece is a tune titled "El Camino," which combines a sweetly melodic theme, lush written parts for the front line of alto sax, trumpet, and trombone, and gentle but complex Latin percussion to create a performance that is as dense and beautiful as a jungle. Other highlights include the more harmonically challenging "Orient Express" and the swinging, bluesy "Cheshire Cat," which also features more of Weiss' exceptional horn arrangements. It is hard to imagine any serious jazz lover not being captivated by this album. Highly recommended. (AMG)


Link removed by request of the copyright owner but it's a great album so I do recommend you buy it.

Moondog: The Viking Of Sixth Avenue

While many modern music fans have heard of Moondog—his counterculture reputation and musical achievements have been celebrated by hipster and conservatoire musicians alike for over fifty years—relatively few have actually heard his music. Acquainted with and endorsed by Charlie Parker, Lester Young, Igor Stravinsky, and Artur Rodzinski in New York in the late '40s and '50s, and by Janis Joplin, Frank Zappa, Steve Reich, and Philip Glass in the '60s and '70s, his most recent high-profile champion has been Elvis Costello, who booked him for London's Meltdown Festival in '95.
Moondog lost his sight in an accident at age sixteen, and his musical development was accelerated at various schools for the blind. He moved to New York in '44 and took the name Moondog (he was born Louis Thomas Hardin) in '47. Around this time he also adopted full-on Viking dress—to disassociate himself from Christianity, he explained—and began playing his tunes on the streets of New York. The streets remained his preferred performance platform throughout his life.
Moondog's music is simple and almost childlike—in the best sense of the word, naive. Most of these tracks, melodically attractive and rhythmically virile, last little more than two minutes, providing brief expositions of rhythmic or textural ideas. Having put an idea forward, Moondog rarely shows any interest in developing it, preferring to move on to another thought. Even the closing "Invocation," at ten minutes by far the longest track on the album, recorded at the Meltdown gig and featuring a full-blown symphony orchestra, is a sixteen-part canon which simply repeats the same low A throughout. Apart from "Invocation," "Lament 1 - Bird's Lament," and "All Is Loneliness," most of the tracks are overdubbed, with Moondog playing all the instruments.
This wonderful anthology, packed with rare-as-hens'-teeth recordings, spans Moondog's output from '49 to '95, focusing primarily on his prolific '50s output. Several labels are sourced, including Moondog's own eponymous imprint and Woody Herman's Mars, as well as Brunswick, Prestige, and Folkways. Two tracks come from his '70 Columbia album (he'd been signed at Janis Joplin's urging): the madrigal "All Is Loneliness," which had been covered by Big Brother & The Holding Company on their debut album; and "Lament 1 - Bird's Lament," composed in memory of Charlie Parker and one of Moondog's signature tunes.
Moondog's period in the counterculture spotlight in the early '70s brought him a brief taste of fame, but no fortune. He remained true to his roots and his principles, and celebrated his newfound status as a Columbia recording artist by moving his street pitch to the pavement opposite the label's plush Manhattan headquarters.
In the mid '70s, Moondog moved to Germany, where he continued playing and composing up until his death in '99. The world is a better place for his music, and if you haven't heard any of it yet, this rich and beautiful collection is the perfect place to start. (AAJ)

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