Search - Ike Quebec :: Easy Living

Underated Tenor

Walter J. Von Ahn | Jersey City | 04/02/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"First a note of caution. The Japanese import advertised only has six tracks. "B.G.Groove Two" and "I.Q. Shuffle" are not included. The original session included five blues numbers and three ballads but only three blues numbers and the ballads were chosen for an album that was never released. Later all five blues tracks were released as " Congo Lament". Then Blue Note released a CD with all eight numbers that is no longer available. My guess is that Blue Note Japan bought the masters of the album that was never released. Both CD's have the same cover art.



This is however a great album. Ike Quebec should have earned himself a place in the pantheon of jazz if one only considered his role in the education if Alfred Lion. He nudged Blue Note from boogie-woogie to swing and then to the modern jazz of Powell and Monk. In the forties he made some great albums with the likes of Tiny Grimes and Ram Ramirez. After a long bout with the jazzman flu he came back in '59 to make a handful of wonderful albums. This album, recorded in `62 is one of those.



Ike stayed with the blues and swing when others were going off in new directions. But looking back I think he got it just right. Try playing Miles "Someday My Prince Will Come" or "Coltrane" recorded the same year and then play this album. It's not too cool, not too hot, - just right.

"

Summit of Jazz Blues

Gabriel Cazes | El Pinar, Canelones Uruguay | 06/23/2003

(5 out of 5 stars)

"Ike Quebec carrer peacked during the 40's, and during early sixties we have a comeback of his art, this CD belongs to that period. This album shows him at his maximum maturity. Ike Quebec strength would be the blues, here the spirituallity he achieves is supreme, technical mastery and the most subtle interpretations get combined, particularly in Congo Lament, Que's Pill and Easy Living.
Unfortunately personal dificulties took Quebec out of the front line during part of the forties and part of the fifties; that's why he is not so well known as other great tenor saxophone players like C. Hawkins, that influenced him. This album is for the greatest pleassure of every jazz, soul & blues lover. Recorded at 1962, the album also has excellent sound quality."

Hard to Find, But Worth It for Ike's Fans

Richard B. Luhrs | Jackson Heights, NY United States | 02/18/2009

(3 out of 5 stars)

"The only one of tenor saxophonist Ike Quebec's five early 1960s Blue Note albums not to have been reissued thus far, EASY LIVING is perhaps most noteworthy for the sonic variety it injects into this small but wonderful body of recordings - which were, sadly enough, also Quebec's last.

Whereas all of Ike's other LPs and singles from this period feature him as the lone horn in moody, minor-keyed small group settings, EASY LIVING (recorded in January 1962 but not released until 1981, and then only in part and under a different title) adds a second tenor saxophonist, the effusive Stanley Turrentine, as well as trombonist Bennie Green (who may well have been the session's co-leader, as he contributed two of the four original pieces performed) to the lineup, resulting in a much larger and rather less subtle sound. While it's interesting to hear Ike in this expanded context, fans of his other work will probably be somewhat less impressed by the jumpier ambience here.

Opening with a slow, nine-minute rendition of the blues standard "See, See Rider," EASY LIVING proceeds to wind its way through four solid, if unspectacular, compositions from the three hornmen before finishing with a trio of oft-covered ballads performed only by Ike and the rhythm section. This is, of course, the master blower's preferred environment, and it's safe to say that these three performances are the most effective of the date. Still, with no other examples of Quebec's playing in a larger front line under his own name from this era available, the rest of EASY LIVING is intriguing both as a curio and a perfectly good example of Blue Note's then-predominant hard bop sound. No doubt it will be re-released sometime in the relatively near future as part of the label's ongoing self-upgrade; until then, however, only serious fans need invest the time and money to seek it out."