Herbie Hancock

Flood (Live) - 1975

Herbie Hancock was all but unstoppable at the midway point of the 1970s. Following his tenure in Miles' great quintet through the latter half of the 1960s, working with the trumpeter to lay the groundwork for jazz-fusion at the turn of the decade, spacing out and stretching the groove beyond recognition with Mwandishi and pumping out some of the most refined, sophisticated funk of all time with Headhunters, Hancock was the master. It was all his turf. On Flood, the 1975 live album he recorded with the Headhunters lineup in (of all places) the Tokyo Sun Plaza, Hancock doesn't necessarily bring anything that he hasn't brought to record before, but featuring cuts from each of his previous three LPs - all of which are stone classics - the album serves as a Headhunters-era greatest hits that proves, yes, this band really was as good as it sounds on record. Chamelion and Watermelon Man, while great, lack the fire that only comes from having performed them a few too many times, so it's the tunes from Man Child and Thrust that really smoke here. Actual proof, indeed. This two-disc set runs a shade over 74 minutes, so burn it to a single, put it in the dash and enjoy those last few days of summer.

Manuel Göttsching

E2-E4 - 1984

After stealthily recording his first solo LP Inventions for Electric Guitar a decade earlier under the name of his former band Ash Ra Tempel, Manuel Göttsching single-handedly created the movement defining E2-E4 in a single take, albeit a heavily overdubbed one. Gliding along on a steady chug of electronics that lean closer to Kraftwerk than the house genre it all but defined, the album slowly percolates in washes of synths and gentle polyrhythms for a steady 58 minutes, peaking with Göttsching's heavily delayed guitar in the latter quarter. It's undoubtedly the intersection of krautrock and dance, and one that sounds a tad dated a couple decades on, but even though it's surface concept has been beaten to death by the glowsticked masses, its naive sense of venturing into unknown territory still translates into an intriguing, joyous listen.

Beach Boys

Stack-O-Tracks - 1968
Considering the Beach Boys' status as America's foremost 'vocal' group of the 1960s, the release of this all instrumental LP in 1968 is among the most bizarre of all time. Then again, with the band's sales numbers in an all-out free fall since Pet Sounds, Capitol's desperate attempt to sell anything Beach Boys-related is pretty apparent here. That said, Stack-O-Tracks is an incredibly intriguing listen no matter what the circumstances were that brought it to the marketplace. Originally packaged with a pull-out booklet containing chord diagrams, complete lyrics and vocal charts (sadly missing from all reissued versions), Stack-O-Tracks collected the backing tracks to 15 of the band's biggest hits and brought Brian Wilson's brilliantly orchestrated production out from behind the wall of voices. This vocal-free treatment of tracks spanning a four-year period form a remarkably cohesive package, with unconventional instrumentation popping up surprisingly early in their career and the band's debt to the technique of Phil Spector laid out well before the recording of Pet Sounds began. One of the few Beach Boys LPs that failed to make the charts, Stack-O-Tracks remains a rare treat for those who've bothered to seek it out. The version here contains 3 bonus instrumentals and a short hidden track tucked into the end. Enjoy.

Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette

Ruta and Daitya - 1971
In this midst of their tenure with Miles Davis' group, pianist Keith Jarrett and drummer Jack DeJohnette stole away a little time while in Los Angeles to create Ruta and Daitya. Alternating between avant-funk and minimalist classic jazz, the LP comprises a group of brilliant sketches that serve as a meditative counterpoint to what the duo were producing on stage and in the studio with Miles. Jarrett is undoubtedly the master of ceremonies here, improvising from end to end and effortlessly switching from woodwinds, acoustic and electric pianos, sometimes playing two at once, but always working within the confines of the two man ensemble as DeJohnette works the range of his kit and taps away on African percussion. I initially approached this album with the expectation that it would be similar to Miles' work around this same time. Although it's a logical extension from that, Ruta and Daitya is a different animal entirely. Enjoy.

Nucleus

Elastic Rock - 1970

By 1970, the influence of Miles Davis' electric directions ran as deep as could be imagined. Cannonball Adderley fused deep R&B grooves into his repertoire, Carlos Santana stretched into the realm of ambient jazz, and Weather Report built the entirety of their early career around the understated sonic explorations that Davis stretched to the breaking point with In a Silent Way. But across the Atlantic, Ian Carr and Nucleus took a more literal approach to absorbing Miles' influence - they simply copied the blueprint. But that's not to say that the results weren't spectacular in their own right. With a traditional jazz lineup plus the addition of electric guitar and electric piano (either a Wurlitzer or Hohner Pianet, as opposed to the Fender Rhodes that Miles favored), Elastic Rock harkens back to the electric explorations that lead up to Filles De Kilimanjaro rather than unwisely aping the Bitches Brew material that left so many groups reeling. The compositions are also extremely short by fusion standards, with many of its 14 tracks hanging around the two minute mark - making Elastic Rock come off as a collection of fragments, sketches and half-baked ideas on the surface, while in reality, its cohesiveness is stunning. Moody, thrilling, and unmistakably familiar, Nucleus’ first effort is a solid foundation for a band that would soon take the ideas explored here to the furthest reaches.

Heat Warps Music Nerd Fast Fact: Nucleus drummer John Marshall and keyboardist Karl Jenkins left the group to join Soft Machine in 1976.

Jimmy Smith

Root Down - 1972

As an undeniable master of the Hammond organ and one of the cornerstones of soul-jazz, Jimmy Smith's official output on the Blue Note and Verve labels is surprisingly tame - mildly funky at best. Root Down, recorded live in Los Angeles in February of '72, is the exception. Fronting a band of younger musicians with a clear bend on funk as opposed to the trad-jazz contemporaries that he had paired with throughout much of his career, Smith stretches the grooves to their limit throughout the LP and pulls the funk off in a much more earthy and soul dominant direction than JB, Sly or Funkadelic were taking it around the very same time. While most listeners will immediately recognize the title track as the impetus for the Beastie Boys song and EP of the same name, once this LP gets in your ears and under your skin, it's clearly runs deeper than a sample. The version here includes the full length tunes as they were recorded - as opposed to the truncated versions that made up the original LP. Get it good.

Captain Beefheart

Trout Mask House Sessions (Grow Fins Volume 2) - 1969

Captain Beefheart was once quoted as saying that he composed the entirety of Trout Mask Replica in an eight hour burst of creative genius. In truth, it was created over a period of about 8 months, during which Beefheart holed up the Magic Band in a small house in the LA suburbs, blacked out the windows, handed out rations of lima beans and forced them into marathon rehearsals that would average 12 hours a day. But before the Magic Band took their creation into the studio to lay it down in an incredible single-day session, Frank Zappa recorded the entirety of Trout Mask Replica in its natural environment; the house in which it was created over those eight grueling months. The result is tighter, tougher, more assured than the studio album, and completely instrumental, since Beefheart intended to overdub his vocals in the bathroom at a later date. Interspersed with fly-on-the-wall chatter among the band, Zappa, random guests and neighbors, plus the constant tap of a typewriter, it's a field recording in the truest sense and an indispensable document for lovers of the creative process. God bless the Captain.