In
Unreleased Art, Vol. 3
of the Unreleased Art series,
Laurie Pepper
unearths yet another unreleased tape of a late-period
Art Pepper
performance -- this time courtesy of an obsessive fan who had access to prime-sounding material. This double-CD set takes in a full concert from
Pepper
's working band of 1981, caught while on an exhausting tour of Europe and the U.K. -- 18 dates in 21 days. By this time, after two years on the road, the team of
, pianist
Milcho Leviev
-- who from the testimony of
's notes evidently had a tempestuous working relationship with the alto saxophonist -- bassist
Bob Magnusson
and drummer
Carl Burnett
had the mutual ESP going good and hard.
Art
the populist is in supreme jazz-funk form in Disc One, opening with an earthy blues for his pet cat,
"Blues for Blanche,"
sounding like an alto
Eddie Harris
on
"Ophelia,"
and working out the Latin soul groove in
"Mambo de la Pinta."
Disc Two spotlights
the eclectic, jumping into the straight bebop with
"Cherokee"
at a runaway tempo, occasionally venturing on the outside. Collectors' alert:
"Dedicated"
appears to be a one-of-a-kind track -- debuted by
in Croydon but never played again -- a thoughtful,
Coltrane
-esque, minor-key blues waltz.
"Make a List (Make a Wish)"
finishes the concert in a
Les McCann
-like groove that drives on for over 20 minutes and doesn't wear out its welcome. This set makes the case more extensively than most posthumous releases that
was an underrated jazz funkster as well as a passionate
-influenced mainstreamer. The excellent sound quality -- with an exceptionally good pickup of
Magnusson
's bass -- leads one to speculate that this baby came off the soundboard. ~ Richard S. Ginell