All That Jazz ...

[Deleted member 15865]

If you like Diana, listen to this album - she is so more extroverted than usual. Also the band just excels.

If you don’t like Diana, give this album a try. You’d sample more of her prowess than in the studio recordings. Who knows, you may start liking her.

 

[coaltrain]

 

[Deleted member 38504]

I’m just dipping my toes into jazz. I had an old Carly Simon album and I fell in love with the recording and the music. Can someone suggest some artists like Carly Simon? Male and female. Just the feel of a 4 man band in a nightclub in the olden days kinda style. One singer, one drummer, one saxophone and a piano!

 

[moktan]

Perhaps you will like these ..

I’m just dipping my toes into jazz. I had an old Carly Simon album and I fell in love with the recording and the music. Can someone suggest some artists like Carly Simon? Male and female. Just the feel of a 4 man band in a nightclub in the olden days kinda style. One singer, one drummer, one saxophone and a piano!

 

[moktan]

Enjoy Wesseh Freeman and his DIY oil can guitar ...

 

[Deleted member 15865]

I’m just dipping my toes into jazz. I had an old Carly Simon album and I fell in love with the recording and the music. Can someone suggest some artists like Carly Simon? Male and female. Just the feel of a 4 man band in a nightclub in the olden days kinda style. One singer, one drummer, one saxophone and a piano!

Carly Simon would be more of a singer/songwriter (or soft rock) than jazz vocalist. Here’s what Allmusic throws up for ‘Similar to’ Carly Simon:

 

[jenson]

Hank Mobley - Soul Station
Patricia Barber - Smash

 

[coaltrain]

 

[coaltrain]

From the album:


Also check out:

 

[dazoy]

A question - will Aja by Steely Dan qualify as Jazz? Some songs use jazz chords, instruments and arrangements...

 

[moktan]

Great question. Guess they occupy the liminal zone between jazz and rock. Though some would say that their meticulously produced , ‘digitally lacquered’ , smooth ( ‘as a baby’s bum’ as one Pitchfork Media’s uncharitable review of their Two Against Nature put it) sound devoid of dissonance and subversiveness would not really qualify them as jazz. Labelling anything is a risky affair. I enjoy my Steely Dan now and then. Guess everyone transitioning from rock to jazz did have them in their listening repertoire at one time. Some grew out of them for musical reasons , others out of snobbishness (perhaps). But definitely a great act .
Too bad things are going very well for them at the moment , if one were to go by the media reports.

A question - will Aja by Steely Dan qualify as Jazz? Some songs use jazz chords, instruments and arrangements...

 

[coaltrain]

A question - will Aja by Steely Dan qualify as Jazz?

Nope; despite the fact that the title track has a saxophone solo by Wayne Shorter.
Fagen and Becker were huge jazz fans.
Just two examples - There’s a Duke Ellington cover on Pretzel Logic, and the recurring piano figure on Rikki Don’t Lose That Number is lifted straight from Horace Silver’s Song for my Father.
However, their music was not improvised; quite the opposite, in fact. Each track was carefully pieced together in the studio, often to the point of obsession.
I’ve been a massive Dan Fan since I was 14. Was heartbroken when Becker died last year.

 

[himadri]

Nope; despite the fact that the title track has a saxophone solo by Wayne Shorter.
Fagen and Becker were huge jazz fans.
Just two examples - There’s a Duke Ellington cover on Pretzel Logic, and the recurring piano figure on Rikki Don’t Lose That Number is lifted straight from Horace Silver’s Song for my Father.
However, their music was not improvised; quite the opposite, in fact. Each track was carefully pieced together in the studio, often to the point of obsession.
I’ve been a massive Dan Fan since I was 14. Was heartbroken when Becker died last year.

Structurally ,Steely Dan was always jazzier than most rock bands notwitstanding their studio recording excellence. This is surprising, since there is always an element of freshness in their songs even after repeated listenings which generally only jazz improvisation generates.
cheers

 

[jls001]

Wikipedia classifies this album as jazz rock. Hard to argue

 

[coaltrain]

Wikipedia classifies this album as jazz rock. Hard to argue

LoL! Yep, now there’s a source that’s slightly more reliable than trump
Here’s the story from the boys themselves. Not rock, not jazz, not blues... just Steely Dan.
RIP Walter Becker.

 

[Deleted member 15865]

This one isn’t strictly Jazz, but a fusion of Bluegrass and Indian Classical which most Jazz lovers would like! Exceptionally played by the masters (Bhatt on Mohan Veena and Douglas on Dobro guitar) and wonderfully recorded by Water Lily you could play this in the background or listen intently to it. In either cases you’d be on a musical treat par none. I actually prefer this over the more famous Meeting by the River with Ry Cooder. Douglas seems to contribute more than Cooder who was mostly supportive. Also Meyer on the bass keeps things tight. And the Indian tunes are more accessible on this one - not khyal bandishes, but melodious dhuns.


Warning: you won’t be able to stop it once you start, so budget a good three quarters of an hour for it. It is albums like these that prove music is an universal language.

P.S. Allmusic waxes eloquent over this one: “It's an oddly endearing Bengali-gone-bluegrass experiment in fusion few might expect to work, but once those lightning-fast fingers start blazing away on chord progressions that seem to originate in some strange universe halfway between Nashville and nirvana, all preconceptions are blown right out the window. Dizzying solos make this an imaginative masterpiece.”

 

[Nikhil]

LoL! Yep, now there’s a source that’s slightly more reliable than trump
Here’s the story from the boys themselves. Not rock, not jazz, not blues... just Steely Dan.
RIP Walter Becker.

Great share coaltrain!
Just viewed it from start to finish in one go!


.

 

[coaltrain]

Great share coaltrain!
Just viewed it from start to finish in one go!

Always happy to spread the gospel according to Dan
If I may be allowed one last off-topic transgression:
If you haven’t already, do check out Fagen’s last solo album ‘Sunken Condos’.
A witty, funky masterpiece that sinks its hooks deeper into you with every listen.
Bloody brilliant!

 

[jenson]

hairdo of the guy in center is hard to miss, u all know... This one's a jazz album for rockers... Too cool.

 

[moktan]