Shuggie Otis Fakes the Funk; The Gossip Transcend the Sleater-Kinney Comparisons; Charles Mingus
Shuggie Otis, son of Johnny Otis, a child prodigy, played on Zappa's Hot Rats when he was only 15?or so say the liner notes of this new reissue of his 1974 LP. Does that make him a bigger prodigy than Cameron Crowe? Apparently he was even asked to join the Stones during the gap between Mick Taylor's departure and Ron Wood's permanent installation. Considering they also auditioned Peter Frampton, maybe that's not as auspicious as it sounds.
The Stones dug playing with Billy Preston in those years, and Shuggie Otis is a damn near replica of Preston. Look at that afro! It says "funky" all over. Difference was, Shuggie's hair was real, Preston's was a wig?but despite their follicular differences, they were about on the same level as far as funk goes. Which means that Shuggie's only slightly funkier than Don McLean or Mike Oldfield.
"Aht Uh Mi Hed," despite the Slade-esque phonetic spelling, is almost George McRae-ish in its light-rocking capitulation to the future-as-of-yet-unseen, i.e., disco. But it's too weird, too sluggish, too primitive to be disco. This is like a Tinkertoy album. Or at least that's Shuggie's approach, which apparently was so successful he's lain dormant for almost all of the 26 years since this album was waxed. Maybe it took everything out of him, since it was a three-year-in-the-making extravaganza that saw Shuggie, child prod that he was, pulling a Stevie Wonder and playing every instrument on the record. Although this resulted in obvious filler like "Rainy Day," an instrumental that wafts through textural soundscapes based on Hammond-organ-produced aural wallpaper and fluttering Al DiMeola guitar arpeggios, this album's still a masterpiece of inspired autonomy on an almost Kraftwerk/Moroder level.
To wit: "Pling!" which, despite its Stereolab-like title, is almost transparent in its ambient nonpresence. The most simplistic kind of synthetic exercise, it sounds like something that would be played in a Wurlitzer store, or on one of those player-organs. It's gotta be a joke, right? But then one realizes, this was all comin' from the mind of a 19-year-old kid. The joke is that these club DJ fools?who are not in any way "artists" like they'd have you believe but actually the buttboys of the Western world?are now proclaimin' the kid some kinda visionary for dull rocking-horse rhythms like "Not Available" (which admittedly is getting closer to disco).
In '77 the Brothers Johnson had a minor hit with Shuggie's "Strawberry Letter 23," which, with its celestial guitars and shimmering mystical textures, could easily be Prince (or PM Dawn). But it's the last three tracks, recorded earlier, that are really what all those digital creeps and post-hip yahoos are raving about. "Sweet Thang," true to its title, is the funkiest track on the entire LP, a bouncing groove that, while falling short of George Clinton- or Sly Stone-like proportions, is still an okay jam. "Ice Cold Daydream" features the same kind of bubbling synthesizer that a lot of people were using at the time, from Preston to the clowns who did "Popcorn." It also demonstrates the kind of primal guitar prowess that no doubt sold him to Jagger and company. Ironically, just as the guitars heat up, the song fades.
Which makes way for "Freedom Flight," which is like a cross between Hendrix's studio experiments on Electric Ladyland and Tangerine Dream. There's also some sax, great lobs of oceanic bass, cackling bird-sounds (produced by keyboards of course) and a general "ambient" atmosphere throughout that suggests the permanent Rest Home of the future. But cheer up?Shuggie's still way more mood-ring and earth-shoes than he is body piercing and lederhosen.
Joe S. Harrington
That's Not What I Heard plays like a frisky night walk during the summertime in the French Quarter. Illustrating this point are the lyrics that finish up "Swing Low": "make it uh, uh, good...we'll keep it our secret, honey/way down low/between me and you girl, no one has to know." While Beth's swaggering attitude lingers on topics of lust and getting it on, the album's theme remains constant: TCB. Just like Elvis, the Gossip has no problem talking the talk and doing some hip-shaking pelvic thrusts in between.
This lusty three-piece, originally from Arkansas, take something new (the now popular just-guitar-and-drum setup, a la the White Stripes), something old (bluesy rock 'n' roll) and something borrowed (gospel) to create the now sound of today. And much like the innovative Make-Up ca. '96, the Gossip borrow both from their surroundings and the records they listen to. Take the stripped-down "And You Know," as Beth taunts us with, "And you know/you know/it's gonna feel good/I would do anything to have it/who cares what your friends say, you gotta try," which is emphasized by Nathan's raunchy guitar work and Kathy's simplistic drumming.
Beth struts through numbers like "Where the Girls Are," with scandalous lyrics channeled through her soulful heart. The Gossip has a take-no-shit approach to punk rock. On "Hott Date," Beth sings, "Looking for some action baby/won't you give it to me/I need some satisfaction baby/come on give me what I need." That they live south of the Mason-Dixon becomes apparent when, on the appropriately titled "Southern Comfort," she croons, "Honey, ain't no woman like a Southern girl." Justifying my hypothesis that all roads lead to the South. Now if only more Southern ladies would pick up instruments, maybe I'd be able to offer my services as a go-go dancer. With Faster Pussycat, Kill! Kill! projected behind the band while they played.
The Gossip play Feb. 21 at the Knitting Factory; Feb. 23 at Maxwell's; and Feb. 24 at the Bowery Ballroom with the White Stripes.
Lisa LeeKing
All through the 70s, Atlantic, the original owners of the material, made extensive use of it, repackaging it in at least half a dozen configurations. Mingus recorded for the label during the years '56-'61, and in that period rendered some of his finest masterpieces: Blues & Roots and Pithecanthropus Erectus, which demand to be heard in their entirety. But Mingus encroached on so many different musical styles during those years?jazz, blues, rhythm & blues, gospel, avant-garde?that it becomes clear that thematic unity wasn't always his strong suit. At least here some attempt has been made, for perhaps the first time, to tie it all together in a package that flows as if all this stuff was meant to be together. At the same time, it still touches base with all the forms described above.
Package is okay, though the personnel listings are sketchy. I don't like the format, but that's a minor complaint. The music is superb. Mingus was one of a handful of artists in the late 50s who fully took command of the language of jazz and purposefully led it to its next incarnation. Despite Ken Burns, jazz didn't happen in cookie-cutter installments. It was an organic growth, and the different movements bled together. By the late 50s, the unity created by the language of bebop had already fragmented in different directions. On the one hand, there was hard bop, on the other hand you had a kind of swanky cocktail jazz (Miles, Brubeck, etc.), and then there were the purveyors of the avant-garde like Eric Dolphy, Cecil Taylor and Ornette Coleman (who were mostly unknown at that time). But about the best thing you can say about Charles Mingus is that his music doesn't really fit into any of these categories?his music is all his own.
Mingus was an artist who made certain nods toward the avant-garde without totally immersing himself in freewheeling chaos. Nevertheless, to get a sense of where Mingus?and jazz?was moving in 1957, one need only listen to "Haitian Fight Song," which not only contains one of Mingus' best solo bass excursions but also some harmonically challenging piano work by Wade Legge. It's obvious he was attempting some of the same harmonic variations that Cecil Taylor was experimenting with at the time (it's all post-Bud Powell stuff anyway). The whole 12-minute track is like a festive storm of inspired testimonial that never gets dull. Swing and bop textures still live on "Reincarnation of a Lovebird"?Curtis Porter (aka Shafi Hadi) blows a very Charlie Parkeresque alto solo. It's joyously melodic, which is one of Mingus' great gifts and something this album, with its unified sequencing, makes very clear. Mingus never got uptight and blew a melody with too many variations?he could work the same theme over and over, weaving intricately into whole new phrases but always going back to the basic melody. That's something he learned from bop and the big bands, and it always stayed with him.
Some of Mingus' most intricate work came in 1959 with the recording of Blues & Roots. That was the album where he really went for a more gospel feel, possibly inspired by fellow Atlantic recording artist Ray Charles. Songs like "Cryin' Blues" and "Moanin'"?contained herein?are evocative of many down-home traditions in their conjuring of the church as well as their gritty gutbucket melodies. Horace Parlan, who came from the gospel school anyway, plays a downright churchy vamp in the midst of the aptly named "Wednesday Night Prayer Meeting," and Mingus literally whoops for joy. This song is a hand-clapping, foot-stomping celebration that suggests once again that Mingus was one of the true champs of extended composition.
On Oh Yeah, his final album for Atlantic, from which three tracks on this compilation are culled, Mingus switched to piano and let Doug Watkins assume bass duties. On "Wham Bam Thank You Ma'am," Mingus leads a five-piece ensemble through yet another gospel-tinged melody, and allows tenor saxophonists Roland Kirk and Booker Ervin to solo freely. Mingus' discovery of Ervin was responsible for laying one of the most promising young tenor sax players on the jazz world. Unfortunately he died tragically young but not before rendering one of the all-time great tenor sax albums, The Trance. Mingus, meanwhile, would continue to forge even bolder experiments into the 60s, but by then he'd left Atlantic. This compilation is about as concise an overview of that fruitful period as one is likely to hear.
Joe S. Harrington