Back in the 1970s, everyone was plugging in and mixing musical styles like no other time. Soul, jazz, pop and funk all melded together and influenced each other, as these two recent vinyl reissues from Craft Recordings attest.
While not a household world, David Axelrod (1931-2017) was best known as a studio master, best known for producing albums such as Cannonball Adderley’s hit album Mercy, Mercy, Mercy. Adderley returned the favor by producing Axelrod’s 1974 album Heavy Axe, a star-studded affair that has a large orchestra including Oscar Brashear/tp, Snooky Young/tp, Jackie Kelso/wwinds, Ja Miglori/wwinds Johnny “Guitar” Watson/g, Roy McCurdy/dr and a bus load of horns, strings and singers. Axelrode conducts and arranges the pieces, which include soundtrackish versions of Vince Guaraldi’s “Cast Your Fat To The Wind” and a Carly Simon’s “You’re So Vain”. There’s some heavy wacka wooka on his own ‘It Ain’t For You” and the team digs in deep on the uptempo “Mucho Chupar”, with Cannonball’s own “Get Up Off Your Knees” a gospel drenched delight. An album focused on arrangements, and not on soloists, made for background music for a movie to be named later.
One of the truly legendary drummers, Bernard Purdie is on countless sessions (including The Beatles when Ringo wasn’t around), rarely leading his own band, making this 1971 debut a rare treat. Purdie keeps a steady and tasty beat all through, getting poppish on “Montego Bay” and getting into a funk fest on “Purdie Good” and “Wasteland”. The plugged in team includes two tenor saxists in Warren Daniels and Charlie Brown, who go at it on the calypso’d read of “Everybody’s Talkin’” , and the rhythm team of Harold Wheeler/p, Gordon Edwards/b and Norman Pride/perc simmer on “Wasteland” while the sole ballad “You Turn Me On” is lilting and sublime. The team has a gas of a time with James Brown’s “Cold Sweat”, delivering the entire album in workmanlike precision and style. Didn’t I see this band at The Baked Potato?