Search - Eddie Jefferson :: Come Along With Me

Incredible Listening Experience - - A Historic Session !

Eddie Landsberg | Tokyo, Japan | 12/08/2000

(5 out of 5 stars)

"This is Eddie Jefferson at his funkiest and hardest swinging.I "rediscovered" this INCREDIBLE LP after a 14 year hiatus after a brief chat with Giacomo Gates, a great Eddie Jefferson influenced vocalist who's material can also be found at Amazon. I had stopped listening to it NOT because it wore out (fat chance !) but because I had converted a lot of tunes to tape and a lot of them were on the now out of print THERE I GO, THERE I GO Prestige compilation. Eventually the album got burried deep down in the stack and today, I was determined to relive it !Release on the tail of his highly acclaimed "BODY AND SOUL" LP, Eddie was clearly energized by his newfound fame. Though he'd been in the game tap dancing and vocalizing on the side for almost thirty years by then, he spent the previous six in virtual obscurity working a day job... by the time Come Along With Me Came out, clearly he was in good spirits... and eager to embrace not only his roots in bop and swing, but the mergence of rock and soul in that fall of 1969... what you hear then is an all star session that at times swings hard (check out Yardbird Sweet, Dexter Digs In, When You're Smiling, and Its Only A Paper Moon, which he reworked as Come Along With Me) and at other times gets quite funky, from the gospelly Son of a Preacher Man, to his funky Soul Jazz renditions of Please Leave Me Alone and The Preacher... and of course, his mastery of ballads. Overall, this is an energizing listening experience lead by Eddie's brilliant and imaginative storytelling abilities as a vocalist and an all star ensemble including a whirling Charles McPherson on alto sax, Barry Harris on Piano, a screaming Bill Hardman on drumpet, Bill English on drums, and Gene Taylor on bass. There is no question in my mind that while this album may not be as popular, its up there as one of the great Jazz recordings of all time and one of those sessions that may have been typical Autumn day for some, but in one studio atleast was a momentuos chapter in the annals of Modern Jazz. The studio was on fire... and Eddie swung hard. - - If you've ever been to a jam session in the community where patrons have been known to walk in in possession of their own tambourines... and everyone is up and dancing - - even to John Coltrane, be it on the bandstand or the juke box... this album will take you there ! ! !"