A good old-fashioned blowing session which, to my ears, is anything but old-fashioned. Two tenor saxophone players firing their best shots at each other. No quarter asked and none given. There's nothing quite like it in jazz to compare with two hard-hitting tenors in musical combat.
Norman Granz made a fortune pitting Flip Phillips and Illinois Jacquet against each other on record and in concert with JATP. Wardell Gray and Dexter, Dexter and Teddy Edwards, Gene Ammons and Sonny Stitt, Lockjaw and Johnny Griffin all carried on with the tradition. Putting two tenor saxes together can be like the Gunfight at the OK Corral and the Thriller in Manila combined.
Sadly, the practice has become less common and, if you'll pardon the pun, the thrill of The Chase* is gone.
However, that thrill is no longer gone when Nick Hempton and Cory Weeds lock horns. Hempton from NYC, Weeds from Vancouver (on home turf here) go for the jugular every time whilst keeping (just) within the boundaries of taste.
I haven't quite worked out the order of the solos or who played what but their contrasting sounds make the album all the more appealing and the result at this level couldn't be anything but a score draw. Mind you, there was more than Nick and Cory at this party.
On B3 Nick Peck provides the perfect launchpad both with his basslines and his big sound. One of the horns slots a few bars of I'm Beginning to See the light into his solo which, quick as a flash, Peck dutifully picks up in his. Then there's Cahill. He's the business in this set up. With JC on drums it would be nigh impossible for a band not to swing.
James Moody's Last Train From Overbrook, Dexter's Soy Califa and Gene Ammons' The One Before This nailed their colours to the mast. Hampton came up with Change For a Dollar and Loose Ends and Weeds provided Conn Men. A beautiful Polka Dots and Moonbeams featured, I think, Hempton and When Your Smiling was easy to listen to but maybe slightly, only very slightly mind you, out of place on this set list.
Love it! Lance
*The Chase - famous tenor sax battle by Dexter Gordon & Wardell Gray.
Release date: Feb. 28. BANDCAMP.
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