Twang, Tiggerlion, Mike_H and El Hombre Malo convene in the pod to discuss the work of jazz colossus John Coltrane. From sheets of sound, Coltrane changes and the spiritual dimension to heroin and being scared to go beyond certain points in the man’s canon, much ground is covered. Tig has to admit there is an album even he doesn’t think he could improve with a spot of re-sequencing and Twang forgets to mention the Mighty Tull (whoops). A Spotify playlist of the panel’s recommended listening is in the comments.
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Twang says
Suggested listening…
Tiggerlion says
Great work, Twang. Pity I say ‘erm’ so much! And creak.
Twang says
I deleted a lot of creaking. Couldn’t get all of it! Your splendid contributions made up for it!
Tiggerlion says
The quality of the guests’ contributions depend entirely on the geniality of the host.
Moose the Mooche says
Creak? Cod liver oil is your friend.
Bartleby says
Great playlist. Might i also suggest this, my favourite JC interlude:
Twang says
You may indeed Bart. Great track – added to list.
Tiggerlion says
I played Ballads a lot since the cast. Listening to it reminds me of an Athena poster in the nineties of a shirtless, muscle bound man, cradling a baby. Just one squeeze and that baby would be crushed, yet you feel that there is no safer place for it in the whole world. That’s how the quartet handle those delicate tunes.
minibreakfast says
“Just one squeeze and that baby would be crushed”?
Crikey, Tigs. We each took something very different away from that poster!
Tiggerlion says
Aren’t you too young to remember it?
minibreakfast says
No. It was from 1987, so I’d have been a hormonal 12-going-on-13 year old.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/L%27Enfant_(poster)
Tiggerlion says
Just shows what the memory does. I thought he was bigger, possibly tattooed, and the baby was much smaller.
In 1987, I was a fully grown man trying to be metrosexual to pull the girls, as was the fashion. I see the model concerned got a result. The poster enabled him to sleep with over 3,000 women (it says here)!!
Moose the Mooche says
By “result” do you mean “negative result at the clinic?” ?
Tiggerlion says
Every week.
Moose the Mooche says
Interesting contrast though in it? The poster says, ‘I will protect our child while you sleep”. The man in it says, “I will dump you while you sleep. Our child? Your child, dumbass!”
Twang says
Being slightly older I was a Tennis Girl guy, and try as I might I can’t make a connection to Coltrane other than they both made me come over all funny in completely different ways.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tennis_Girl
Moose the Mooche says
The tennis girl has also misled us. She spent the rest of her life wearing huge grey M &S Y-fronts.
Junglejim says
Sterling work, chaps (or should I say Cats?) – insightful & passionate & a worthy follow on from the earlier Jazzcast.
Trane looms ever larger in my musical world – I can have successive days when I listen to almost nothing else & loved your efforts to articulate how his music ‘gets’ you. Always mighy hard, especially with challenging music to avoid Pseud’ s Corner, but you took a really good swing, & connected.
I’m not sure if its’ ‘spiritual’ to me, but I find it immensely uplifting & often feel just a little bit ‘improved’ as a human being after a musical immersion. No other artist works on me quite like that.
Congratulations on a terrific 57 mins.
Twang says
Cheers Jim, you’re dead right, it’s very hard to talk about music meaningfully in any sense, and as you say if you get all passionate you sound like a pseudo. But hey, WTF.
ganglesprocket says
Surely Naima needs to be there? One of his most beautiful…
Moose the Mooche says
Alabama on Live at Birdland – sorrow, rage, exultation, rapture even – it’s all there. Where music meets the failure of language .
Tiggerlion says
See. You’d be great on these podcasts.
Moose the Mooche says
It took me half an hour to write that post. You’re an amateur when it comes to “erming” my friend. And as for creaking…
duco01 says
When it comes to mellow Coltrane, I’m a fan of “Wise One”, off “Crescent”
Twang says
New suggestions added to the playlist – thanks all!
Tiggerlion says
As for a good biography, Lewis Porter is a jazz scholar and John Coltrane: His Life and Music is meant to be really good, especially for a musician like you, @Twang.
NB. I haven’t actually read it.
Ainsley says
Great tip about the Pharoe Sanders “Black Unity” album – 79p on Amazon!
Ainsley says
Although, admittedly, you do need to be prepared to put up with a 256k Mp3. You could always get the reasonably priced vinyl copy at £79.99, mind you.
Tiggerlion says
I think that vinyl would also cut the track in half.
el hombre malo says
yep – that’s why I had to battle through the CD when I bought it, I had heard side one or side two many times from friends who had the LP – but it is a different beast, more relentless, when it is ALL IN THE ONE SLAB OF SONIC FEROCIOUSNESS
once I overcame my fear, I loved it to bits
Tiggerlion says
Vinyl is for wimps!
Black Unity at least has a rhythmic groove about it. Ascension is a different beast altogether. There is no rhythm, just a percussive environmental soup where everybody seems to play something different. Apparently, Trane handed out sheet music for the ensemble parts, but you wouldn’t know that from listening to it. Ascension is more easily consumed on vinyl.
Moose the Mooche says
I can’t stick Ascension… in fact I’m something of a wuss when it comes to later JC.
If I can’t hear the steam rising from Elvin Jones’s bonce then count me out.
(unless it’s the album JC did with Duke Ellington… one of the best records by either of them…. OOAA)
Tiggerlion says
£20 for a box set of his Atlantic albums, lovingly remastered, is a pretty good starting point for anyone interested.
Junior Wells says
thanks Hepcats -got a pproject around the house to do so I now have the soundtrack. Be interested if Ole gets a run.
Junior Wells says
Listened to this today and enjoyed the relaxed informative chat. I’m not a musician so some f the discussion was quite helpful as a lot of stuff I’ve read about Coltrane loses me. Re Ole – the twin bass work -one with a bow and the other plucking is just phenomenal. Ole or Dahomey dance merit inclusion on the playlist.
@Twang– re Santana and Abraxas, in his book claims to be completely besotted by the work of Coltrane, has a massive collection of his stuff including a lot of rarities and knows it backwards. As you probably know he did that album with Alice Coltrane and considered her a v close friend.
Baskerville Old Face says
Thanks for a terrific and informative podcast guys – I really enjoyed this.
bricameron says
Some contextual music clips throughout the program would have helped to illustrate, inform and entertain.
P.S. Tiggerlion sounds nothing like I imagined.
Moose the Mooche says
I don’t want to listen now.
Junior Wells says
Yeah agree with that and the comment re @Tiggerlion but the creak of his chair sounded just like I expected.
Twang says
I agree, sadly I was a bit under the cosh time wise and it takes much longer in the editing to splice in lots of clips, much as it’s better. Feedback appreciated!
BTW If you haven’t heard the Dancast, Tigger was on fire.
Tiggerlion says
What did you guys expect me to sound like? The king of the jungle or a cuddly toy?
Junior Wells says
editing in Coltrane tracks or parts thereof even harder.
What was I expecting Tigger ? Oh I dunno, Milhouse from the Simpsons perhaps 😉
Tiggerlion says
I wish I had his hair.
Moose the Mooche says
I have to say, Milhouse has always put me in mind of Devo.
Declan says
Ah, that’s better. The podcast sent me digging into my Trane LPs, so it’s been an intense and turbulent session here the last few hours. Started with the very decent Seattle set (the Quartet plus Sanders plus Garrett), then the Mastery album (Alice on piano, eventually just Trane and Rashid Ali duetting), now Om. Far out, man.
Keen on hearing Africa/Brass*, Kulu Se Mama, and the Tokyo set in the coming days. Clearly, I’m a final years man. The classic stuff is burnt into my brain by now, of course, but he’s at his most extraordinary, I think, from 1964 onwards. The lad could play a melody, to be sure, but when he puts his soul on the line and shrieks and screeches and rages, but you know he means it, all the while getting more and more abstract, well, greatness doesn’t begin to cover it, actually language is inadequate, period.
So thanks, guys, for a very informative podcast to nudge me in that direction and also remind me that it’s been rather too much football recently! Tig in particular was not only remarkably erudite, but also loves a bit of the late stuff. First got to know Trane through A Love Supreme, followed in short order by Village Vanguard and that Shepp one, Newport. Worked backwards from there. One of my great heroes and a highlight of western culture, y’know, ever.
*I know..
Tiggerlion says
No-one I know in real life appreciates the genius of Coltrane, let alone has heard any of his later material. Without the internet, I would never have connected with others who do.
You are right, words don’t do his music justice. You should come on the next Jazzcast, Declan, and help us find some words that come close.
Declan says
Love to, Tig, it’s a deal.
attackdog says
Agree with all of above. This sent me delving through my CD’s to find (astonishingly to me) I actually own four earlyish ‘Trane albums. Must have been stoned/pissed. But my God, what fabulous music – very blues based progressions.
Moose the Mooche says
He started off in R & B, which gave him a different generational experience from Miles or even Sonny Rollins. He’s really where modern jazz starts in the sense of choosing jazz as opposed to R & B or pop.
With typical perversity, the absolute bluesiest record Miles made was at the very end of his life – The Hot Spot, with John Lee Hooker et al.
Junior Wells says
That and Dingo
Tiggerlion says
You think I sound like Milhouse too, then, @attackdog?
attackdog says
When I wrote ‘I agree with all of the above’, what I meant was – oh never mind.
This cast was recorded on Sunday morning, right? I was impressed by the background sounds of what could only be you chopping and cutting up the veg for the Sunday lunch. Right or what? Multitasking a la Nigella? Coltrane and sautéed carrots? What a vision.
Tiggerlion says
But of course. 😉
el hombre malo says
This is a link I referred to : Alice Coltrane interview, full of joy and deep knowledge http://www.npr.org/2011/09/23/140743198/alice-coltrane-on-piano-jazz
Mohair-Sam says
Recommendations for an introduction to Coltrane? I bought A Love Supreme about 20 years ago but couldn’t get into it.
Tiggerlion says
The most gorgeous-on-the-ear albums are Blue Train, Ballads, and With Johnny Hartman. However, I think the Atlantic albums are more representative of what Coltrane was all about. Giant Steps, Coltrane Jazz, My Favorite Things and Olé are all jazz classics. They precede the great quartet and his flight into the far out and are collected into one box with all his other Atlantic releases. You can obtain the Heavyweight Champion box for just twenty odd quid.
Junior Wells says
Yeah that Atlantic set is a good place esp disc 6. Also the Spotify playlist posted above is good.
Mohair-Sam says
Found a use for the Christmas gift voucher and ordered it.
Junior Wells says
enjoying this this morning
Tiggerlion says
I hope you don’t just like it, Sam. I hope you fall in love with it.
el hombre malo says
Coltrane illustrates the relationships of music
http://www.openculture.com/2017/04/the-tone-circle-john-coltrane-drew-to-illustrate-the-theory-behind-his-most-famous-compositions-1967.html