Miles Davis Quintet
Workin' With the Miles Davis Quintet
(Prestige/Craft Recordings)
Thelonious Monk
With John Coltrane
(Jazzland/Craft Recordings) craftrecordings.com
The Original Jazz Classics (OJC) series that Fantasy Records first launched in the 1980s served as the perfect primer for someone like this then-teenage jazz fan, who was discovering classic music via community radio DJs who still owned original copies of these albums. OJCs culled releases from the Fantasy back catalog as well as labels like Prestige, Debut, Riverside, Contemporary and several others.
Not only did the series recreate the albums' original cover art (something that is NOT being done with a lot of reissues I see regularly in stores, which makes me wonder about the legality of the actual issues, not to mention, what the hell?) and liner notes, thereby taking you back to the period when the album first hit the streets. Many albums back then weren't concerned with offering recording dates or even mentioning the year of release. However, to make up for those informational shortcomings, OJCs came packaged with an OBI strip, much like Japanese reissues, that added some contextual information about where the album landed in the historical landscape. It often ended with a few critical ratings from magazines like downbeat. The back of the strip (which was later reduced to a sticker on the shrink wrap, also listed the myriad other releases in the OJC series, so you kept wanting more.
Since it was the early '80s and CDs were a bit in the offing, OJCs were extremely affordable. I believe they listed for a mere $4.99 each. The Record Recycler, the mostly used/somewhat new shop where I first discovered them, might have even sold them for $3.99. If that's revisionism and a foggy memory, I can say with authority that they didn't go higher than $5.99, which was typically the going rate for a new album at the time.
And the titles! It was the best place to learn about Thelonious Monk since his Riverside years were his most fruitful in terms of quantity and new material. OJCs put the mandatory Iazz At Massey Hall back into circulation, so one didn't have to simply read about the Bird/Diz/Bud/Mingus/Max concert that was billed as The Greatest Jazz Concert Ever in an out-of-print reissue. Sure, one could find plenty of Miles Davis albums on Columbia brand new, but what of Miles Davis and Horns, an album that a cover drawn by Don Martin of Mad Magazine? These records took listeners back to a time when the concept of a long playing album was relatively new, as was the necessity for artwork that, presumably, would motivate people to lift it off the rack at the record store, examine it and take it home. If the OJC list on those OBIs could be believed, there were hundreds of albums competing for the consumer's attention.
It goes without saying at this point that the original pressings of albums from the '50s and '60s are now highly priced, highly coveted items, even when the condition is less than stellar. But what is also surprising is that OJCs now fetch a handsome price on the used market too. About a year ago, I passed on a mint copy of Cookin' With the Miles Davis Quintet because $30 just seemed a tad too steep, especially at a brick and mortar store. Surprisingly, a quick check of Discogs indicated that $30 is a pretty good deal for such an item. Of course, I snoozed and lost.
That being said, Craft Recordings is in the process of bringing back the OJCs, retaining the original artwork, housing them in heavier , tip-on covers that ought to hold up better than the copies of the '80s, which first came in cardboard-backed sleeve and later thinner printed covers, both of which were susceptible to seam wear and ring wear, as my shelf will concur. The vinyl itself has been cut from the original master tapes and has pressed in 180-gram vinyl. Finally, they also arrive with an OBI strip, threaded on the cover beneath the shrink wrap. In theory, the cost of a first run OJC could cost about as much as a one of these new copies. If all this wasn't enticing enough, the look of the dark vinyl radiating through the Craft clear, anti-static inner sleeve looks pretty breathtaking too. Much like Blue Note's Tone Poet Series, Craft is making these albums extremely appealing.
It's hard to write about either of these classics without it feeling like a pile of recycled thoughts taken from myriad other write-ups of them. Of course, a little context is necessary. Workin' With the Miles Davis Quintet comes from a few marathon sessions for Prestige Records in 1956, recorded to fulfill the trumpeter's contract with the label and allow him to sign with Columbia. Along with Davis, the band includes John Coltrane, Red Garland, Paul Chambers and Philly Joe Jones, his first great quintet. The recording sessions were approached like a live set, which partially explains why both sides of Workin' feature "The Theme," the end-of-the-set tag.
If the opening track of Workin' was the only good number on the album, it would still be a mandatory listen. "It Never Entered My Mind" stands with some of the most definitive recordings in his canon, setting a scene deeply rendered in romance and lyricism. Over Garland's cascading piano arpeggios, Davis plays the melody through his Harmon mute and time stands still. While the tone of the Harmon could often sound rough and sharp, here it feels smooth. Everything in the song fits tightly into place to create a mood. (The one exception is what sounds like Coltrane very softly playing two notes over the final chord, which sounds off key. That sound has always haunted me, especially since it never seems to be mentioned.)
But the rest of the album is equally stellar, making it arguably the strongest collection of the four Prestige albums (along with Cookin', Steamin' and Relaxin'). The upbeat "Four" comes next, followed by another Harmon-mute tune, this time Dave Brubeck's "In Your Own Sweet Way," which gets accented by Davis' legato delivery. The driving "Trane's Blues" and Garland's snaky run through "Ahmad's Blues" (penned by Mr. Jamal) are also mandatory listens.
Comparing the sound quality of new releases with previous ones usually makes my eyes roll when the topic shows up online. But I had the luck of finding an original, deep groove Prestige copy of Workin' years ago, so I had to do a comparison. I didn't do it track-by-track, preferring to listen to the new edition completely before dusting off my old copy. My ears might not be best for a detailed analysis about noise floors and the like but the comparison was favorable, perhaps leaning more towards Craft's work, which was mastered by Kevin Gray at Cohearant Audio.
The print of the front cover photo is another criteria that ranks highly in my book (hence the photo above). Although the new one has a slightly darker hue than the original blue-filtered cover, it doesn't look at all like a second or third generation print. (This benchmark came to me after coming across an original copy of Eric Dolphy's Far Cry whose cover shot looked like a crisp print, as compared to the slightly muddled shot on a 1989 OJC reissue.)
Craft was savvy in releasing Thelonious Monk With John Coltrane hot on the heels of Workin'. Coltrane's brief tenure with Monk came in 1957, between his stints in the Miles quintet, when he kicked his heroin habit and devoted himself fully to his music. The pianist apparently had a lot to do with that work ethic, helping Coltrane to develop his "sheets of sound" style of playing. A perfect example of that comes in "Trinkle Tinkle," a rapid-fire melody that Monk had originally recorded in a piano trio. Coltrane not only digs into the manic triplets, Monk lays out as the tenor player takes off in a solo that doesn't even need the pianist to keep him grounded. The same thing occurs in "Nutty," an upbeat, jagged number in which Coltrane soars beneath Wilbur Ware's solid walking bass line.
The album is a bit of a hodge-podge, since the quartet with Coltrane only got to record three songs in the studio. (Shadow Wilson completed the lineup.) The saxophonist was under contract to Prestige at the time and, according to the Monk biographer Robin D. G. Kelley, Prestige owner Bob Weinstock refused to let Coltrane appear on another label unless Monk reciprocated. Monk left Prestige acrimoniously so he refused to help out Weinstock.
To complete the record, it includes two alternate takes from Monk's Music, recorded a few months earlier with a band that included both Coltrane and Coleman Hawkins, as well as Gigi Gryce (alto saxophone) and Ray Copeland (trumpet), "Off Minor" and "Epistrophy." An alternate take of the solo piano blues, "Functional" completes the set. Rather than Riverside, Thelonious Monk With John Coltrane appeared on the off-shoot label Jazzland, and wasn't released until 1961, by which time Coltrane was recording for Impulse! and Monk was negotiating a contract with Columbia Records.
Hastily assembled or not, the album captures both artists at high water marks in their respective careers. (It also creates a desire to hear Monk's Music too, for what that's worth.) The sound on this album is equally as impeccable as Workin'. Don Schlitten's often reproduced photo of the quartet in action at the Five Spot is reproduced with great clarity, as is the front cover painting by Richard "Prophet" Jennings.
With both records, Craft also replicated the labels of the original pressings (seen below), with the slight addition of some of their own information. You have to love when a label keeps to such details.
The only question that remains: To remove the shrink wrap and the OBI, or leave both intact?
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