Michael Fremer

From the NAIM archives comes this triple LP/double CD set, originally issued as two, long out of print, individual CDs, featuring Charlie Haden’s Quartet West, featuring Saxophonist Ernie Watts, pianist Alan Broadbent and the late, great drummer Billy Higgins on one session and the great, not late Paul Motian on the other.

Let the Blue Note reissue riot continue! Fans of the cool, bluesy, gospely Blue Note sound can’t help but feel blessed at the output, whether from Classic in mono or from Analogue Productions and Music Matters in stereo.

John Cale's guitar-fueled, angry yet nostalgic first Island release from 1974 is easily his finest solo effort in my book. It's certainly his most consistently well written and performed record.

Dexter Calling , recorded May, 9th, 1961, just a few days after Gordon’s Blue Note debut session, opens with “Soul Sister,” a “chicken and biscuits” track the tenor saxophonist wrote for the West Coast edition of “The Connection,” which Freddie Redd had scored for the East Coast original. The tune’s slow, bluesy, Southern-tinged melody, played in ¾ waltz-time sounds like something Floridian Cannonball Adderley might have penned though Gordon grew up in Los Angeles, son of a prominent physician who tended to the likes of Duke Ellington and Lionel Hampton.