"For the Second Time" In More Ways Than One!

first time in stereo

David Bowie recorded Station to Station—one of his greatest records IMO—at Cherokee Studios sometime in 1975 the same year as this Basie, Bellson, Brown album was put to tape in the same place. Bowie was in mid-career greatness, the jazz masters were clearly playing prime time but not at peak musical creativity, nor, to be honest, were most jazz fanatics paying much attention. Norman Granz started the label to give these greats an outlet, almost as a tribute space. We're lucky he did because decades later having these superb sounding documents is a bridge to their earlier work and well worth celebrating.

There's nothing here but the pure joy of playing and listening as these greats dig into well-worn musical grooves. It's the Kansas City 3's second time together in the studio, hence the album title. Basie was seventy one, the big band peak days over, Bellson (Luigi Paolino Alfredo Francesco Antonio Balassoni) though only fifty one when this album was recorded, was also a product of the big band era and Brown, the youngster of the three was a shade under fifty. Brown, as everyone reading this knows, was best known for being part of the Oscar Peterson Trio from 1951 to 1965 after which he did a great deal of studio work, was part of The L.A. Four, discovered pre-singing Diana Krall and well, so much more before his untimely passing at age seventy five. His later work for Concord is was in a similar main stream vein as this tuneful, joyfully performed album.

Incredibly, this is the albums stereo premier! When the original master tape arrived in Salina, KS for disc cutting, Matthew Lutthans discovered the tape was in mono. The record had only been released in mono but surely a 1975 recorded had been produced in stereo. After a bit of "crate digging" of the master tape kind, a 4 track unmixed master was located and sent to Salina, where Lutthans "live mixed" the three tracks and cut the lacquers.

It has Basie on the left channel, Brown in the center and Bellson on the right, all pretty much pleasingly in your lap, with the three joyfully romping through a set of Basie/Brown originals and a few standards. The playing is fast-paced and vital as the three try to put some rock'n'roll energy into their old school jazz. Meanwhile, the kids into jazz were listening to far more "out there" jazz, which left this at the time with not much of an audience, other than the "oldsters" who didn't understand where jazz had gone.

The sound is just insane. As in insanely great. Super-dynamic, timbrally honest, brash, subtle and believably "real". Benny Green's notes sum it up well: "For the Second Time"....renews the ear's confidence in traditional methods; it is a reminder that there was once a time when jazz recordings did not require program notes to justify them; it is an underlining of the fact that jazz of this kind, classically austere in its harmonic basis, ravishingly romantic in its rhythmic excitement, has never really died out, but has only suffered spells of being unfashionable."

This set like much Pablo fare, has gotten so out, it's back in! These Pablo releases are like Pringles. Once you taste one, it's difficult to stop consuming them. Acoustic Sounds produced Pablo releases twice before but I bet they are now selling better than ever. They are suffering a spell of being quite fashionable, thank you Norman Granz! And Thanks Chad for again making these available, or in this case, making it available in stereo for the first time.