Remember those 80's cop shows or movies like Hill Street Blues or Beverly Hills Cop that always had that funky electric jazz in the background? Well that's what this next selection reminds me of.Layered with electronic handclaps, synthesized melodies, and some horns, the 1984 release from John Scofield is great representation of where jazz was in the mid-80's.
Electric Outlet fuses together things I love about jazz and things that I could do without. First off, I admire anything that Scofield puts his hands on. For those not familiar with his work he his hands down one of the greatest jazz guitarists alive today. He has collaborated with greats like Miles Davis, Pat Metheny, Bill Frisell, Mavis Staples, Phil Lesh, Medeski, Martin, & Wood, and Charles Mingus; just to name a few. His work has spanned over 30 years and includes almost 40 albums. Yes sometimes 2 albums a year; and that's not even counting the side projects!
Scofield was originally introduced to me via an old Miles Davis disc I have that will eventually end up on this blog. His smooth licks and annotative expressions are very 'clean cut' in my opinion and I appreciate his overall sound. Like most artists I enjoy I had to get my mitts on everything I could after I heard what this guy could do. Of course like many I know, Scofield's meeting on the 1998 release A Go-Go with MMW catapulted my urge for this six string virtuoso.
So in my addictive CD buying nature, I picked up this disc to add to my collection probably around 2002 or so. I bought it just for the sake of owning another Scofield disc. I can honestly say that it's not my favorite of John's just from the electronic 80's style of it. When it comes to jazz I appreciate the randomness, the improv, and expressionism of it, but I don't care for the "Night Court" TV show theme-esque of it all. http://youtu.be/WVg2FXmz4Vs. The Night Court bit on Family Guy was pretty hilarious though. All in all, electronic hand-claps don't belong here in my opinion. However there are still some great tracks to be had.
"Pick Hits" has a funky bass groove that I appreciate, but as it turns out Scofield played both the six string and the bass on this album, which to me looses some of the flavor when it comes to improv.
"Filibuster" is a pretty upbeat track driven by Steve Jordan's licks and keeps the momentum going in the middle of the album.
"King For A Day" is actually a pretty standard blue tune that could easily be thrown into a B.B. King line-up; hence the title I suppose.
Other than that, the album is pretty full of slow numbers and that don't give me goosebumps like some of Scofield's other releases. As much as I hate to say this about one of my favorite guitar players; this one's going to iTunes.
“It's easy to talk about it in the abstract, but the devil's always in the details.”
John Scofield
***So I was thinking about keeping a tally at the end of each post of what I have reviewed thus far:
5 CDs Reviewed
3 going digital
That's pretty good shrinkage right?
I tunes. Agreed.
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