download horace silver united states of mind for free

These are thoroughly electric records, they use distorted wah wah guitars, fuzzed up funk basses, they indulge and engage pop song forms with abandon and, while thoroughly being jazz records, they attempt to dissolve the artificial dividing line between genres. Total Response and All are another matter. One lone holdover, 'Peace' was given fresh treatment here with lyrics and a killer performance by Bey - Norah Jones later recorded this version for her Blue Note demo. That Healin' Feelin' is the 'straightest' of the bunch, it relies less on funk and more on jazz melodies and harmonies, and with Andy Bey's elegant singing holding forth with plenty of emotion and smooth soul as its starting point. And what's more, many of these tunes could have been played on the formatless FM radio at the time - and some indeed were. (And what a jazz band: Mickey Roker or Idris Muhammad on drums, saxophonists Houston Person, George Coleman, Harold Vick, bassists Bob Cranshaw or Jimmy Lewis, and trumpeters Cecil Bridgewater and Randy Brecker et all.) Thematically they discuss everything from cosmic consciousness to 'peace,' love, and understanding with breezy, optimistic melodies that reply on group execution rather than solo interplay. Elements of the signature Silver sound remain how could they not? The tunes are all tight, beautifully arranged and expertly played, but they sound like pop records being made by a jazz band. Next is Silver using an electric piano, electric bass, and on the latter two records, an electric guitar. For starters, there are vocals on all three albums by Andy or Salome Bey and Gail Nelson, Jackie Verdell, and even Silver himself, either individually or collectively. There was nothing in his catalog that prepared listeners for this adventurous undertaking that linked spiritual concepts and social consciousness to modern jazz as it encountered soul, funk, and pop at the dawn of a new decade. Silver had been one of Blue Note's most reliable and steady hard- and post-bop artists since the late 1950s.

To say that these albums were misunderstood is to understate the case. Released on CD as part of the limited-edition Blue Note Connoisseur series, United States of Mind represents pianist and composer Horace Silver's sprawling trilogy of thematically linked albums recorded between 1970 and '72: That Healin' Feelin', Total Response, and All.

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