In July 1973, New York's
Blue Note Records
assembled an artists showcase for Switzerland's Montreux Jazz Festival. The performers included
Bobbi Humphrey
,
Bobby Hutcherson
Ronnie Foster
Marlena Shaw
, and
Donald Byrd
. Following the gigs, the label released a series of albums from them with the same title:
Live: Cookin' with Blue Note at Montreux
.
Byrd
's performance was shelved, perhaps because
Black Byrd
, his collaboration with
Larry
and
Fonce Mizell
, became a crossover R&B hit and was still on the charts. The tapes sat for decades until
Gilles Peterson
mentioned them to label boss
Don Was
in 2013 after
died.
Was
heard the 2" master tapes and was blown away.
Blue Note
finally releases the album in commemoration of his 90th birthday.
's ten-piece Montreux band included
Fonce
on trumpet,
on synths, saxophonists
Nathan Davis
Allan Barnes
, electric pianist
Kevin Toney
, guitarist
Barney Perry
, electric bassist
Henry Franklin
, drummer
Keith Killgo
, and conguero/percussionist
Ray Armando
.
This impeccably recorded set contains five tunes (three appear only here), lasting just over 45 minutes. The gig opened with "Black Byrd." Synth, hi-hat, and percussion introduce the jam's iconic vamp as
Killgo
chant. This version contains a massive, incessant groove, framing
Davis
' soaring tenor solo, and interplay between drummer and percussionist; it's hypnotic and utterly danceable.
and company throw the crowd a curve by covering
Stevie Wonder
's "You've Got It Bad Girl." The silky soul ballad is articulated by the rhythm section before the drummers deliver a Latin funk vamp. The tempo increases as
deliver killer modal solos atop
Franklin
's roiling bassline, spiky guitar, synth, and piano. They briefly return to the melody, but then move into denser exploration. "The East" is introduced by a funk riff before the trumpeters fall in; they play together, then dovetail wonderfully in gorgeous harmonic interplay. A simple, circular wah-wah guitar riff signals the band, and they cut loose with overdriven funk and ride it hard for another seven minutes. Longest track "Kwame" begins in spacey abstraction as soprano sax and synth offer drones before electric piano, drums, guitar, and bass fall in with a dark,
Weather Report
-esque vamp, which gathers force and melodic intensity until it explodes in a collision of modal jazz, bluesy funk, and proto-Afrobeat, with all four horns burning in unison before
Barnes
delivers a smoking tenor break. Closer "Poco-Mania" is a burner played at furious bebop tempo; the head -- again played by all horns -- is knotty, driving, and unrelenting in its tension and intensity.
takes the first solo and charges into the rhythm section's maelstrom.
deliver powerful solos before
initiates an even faster tempo, and the band accelerates until they suddenly quit in dramatic fashion.
Live: Cookin' with Blue Note at Montreux, July 5, 1973
is not only an astonishing, unearthed treasure for
's fans on his birthday, it's also more than that -- it's a bona fide '70s jazz-funk classic. ~ Thom Jurek