 Lee Morgan Though he's not a household name in the way a Miles Davis or even a Chet Baker is nowadays, Lee Morgan was at one time a hugely popular artist, and his recorded legacy is far less spotty than most of the bigger name trumpeters you can come up with. His run of Blue Note albums in the 60s is mind-boggling in how good they are. Clean, crisp, intelligent hard bop with some real soul to it. Morgan's playing was improvisationally interesting and technically awesome. If anything proved a drawback to his longevity, it was success. His 1963 album The Sidewinder proved such a left-field smash that Blue Note kept looking to him to provide another one, and it never really came. If anything, his playing and songwriting got even better, though he'd never regain that commercial success that was his for a long stretch of '63. The Rumproller finds him in 1965 attempting to replicate the success of The Sidewinder, and I think it's an even better album, actually. Certainly it's "cooler" in that it's the less obvious Lee Morgan album to love. Beyond that, though, it's just an all-around good-feeling album, one that makes you dance and sing and shake your big fat fanny. The session teams Lee again with Joe Henderson on tenor sax and Billy Higgins on drums, with Victor Sproles on bass and Ronnie Matthews on piano. The songs are the opposite of intense, though the playing is pretty fiery in spots. It's really a somewhat rollicking album, from the tight, bluesy two-horn "Sidewinder" knockoff "The Rumproller" to the soul-jazz faux Carribbean jaunt "Eclipso" to the very Miles-ish "The Lady," which finds Morgan playing with mute and everything. "Desert Moonlight" has a faux-Eastern feel that sounds much like some of Morgan's tunesmithery from the early 60s Jazz Messengers. Two Wayne Shorter compositions appear: "Edda," which sounds kind of like a less brash take on "The Odd Couple Theme," and "Venus di Mildew," a strolling cool bop thing that was added to the CD version as a bonus track. None of the songs on this disc is amazing, but the whole atmosphere is so enjoyable and pure that it's really tough not to just keep listening to it over and over. It's like a big bowl of M&Ms and no one's around to comment on how much you're eatin'. Great stuff, classic 60s Blue Note. As with all the CDs issued in the Rudy Van Gelder remasters series, this one sounds fantastic and looks absolutely smashing. Great Reid Miles cover art as well, one of the best. This is an album that leaves you nodding your head in agreement even if you have no idea what was just said.
Review by Ol' German |