Doug Carn – Infant Eyes (1971)

Doug Carn
“Infant Eyes”
Released 1971 on Black Jazz Records (BJ/3)

Welcome 1:15
Little B’s Poem 3:50
Moon Child 7:56
Infant Eyes 9:50
Passion Dance 5:58
Acknowledgement 8:45
Peace 4:30

Doug Carn – piano, electric Piano, organ
Jean Carn – vocals
Bob Frazier – flugelhorn, trumpet
George Harper – flute, tenor, saxophone
Al Hall Jr. – trombone, trombone
Henry Franklin – bass
Michael Carvin – drums

Produced by Gene Russell

Although he recorded a 1969 album in a trio setting for Savoy (which I’ve never heard), Doug Carn is of course most famous for his relationship with the independent Black Jazz label. His albums on that imprint may be single-handedly responsible for the label’s canonical status in Afrocentric spiritual jazz. They are remarkable for many reasons, not least of which is the presence of innovative lyrics sung by his then-wife Jean Carn, who not unlike Abbey Lincoln used her voice as part of the ensemble arrangements rather than as a vocalist with a backup band. The communal family vibe is accentuated by the beautiful album cover photography and the opening tune Little B’s Poem; together with the cover photo, I feel like I knew their daughter and wonder where she is now and how she feels about all the musical attention today. While the following albums from the Doug and Jean Carn would push further with original material, this first album is noteworthy for it’s reworking of compositions by jazz heavyweights that they admired – Bobby Hutcherson, Horace Silver, Coltrane, McCoy Tyner, and Wayne Shorter. In particular, adding lyrics to that material and making the compositions into something else is the big achievement here.

I have a repress vinyl of this that sounds pretty good and began to mess around with a digital rip of it, but am unsure whether or not to keep working on it. This CD pressing from 1997 sounds okay but the second side (of the original LP) suffers from nasty wow and flutter from whatever source tape they used. This was the first appearance of this album on CD and I am not sure if there has been any other remastered versions since, but I kind of doubt it. In fact last year somebody claiming to have a set of Black Jazz master tapes was selling the whole bundle on Craig’s List for a hefty sum; the auction was dubious as they were comprised of 1/2″ reels, which even for a studio on a budget in the early 70s would have been a substandard format, and claimed to come with full reproduction rights. Most likely the reels were production copies or just plain counterfeit, the listing was not online long before it was either met with an offer or taken down. Hopefully that doesn’t mean that we’ll be seeing a new series of reissues mastered from 1/2-inch tape.. Unfortunately a few of the other extant Doug Carn reissues have the same wow-and-flutter problem. Badly stored tapes, damaged playback equipment, sloppy transferring, or all of the above, it doesn’t really matter – the end result is that this precious, important music hasn’t received the treatment that it merits. But the most important thing is that it is still available and people can hear it. Since the reissued vinyls were most certainly just the CD master with an R$AA equalization curve applied, there isn’t much point in having both versions except for purely fetishistic reasons. Unless I can manage to get my hands on original vinyl pressings, they are however all we’ve got..

The liner notes by Doug Carn are a treasure. Written just for the reissue, they have a remarkable amount of detailed recollections for being composed more than thirty years after the recordings, showing just what a special time this was for everyone involved. While this is not my favorite of the Carn albums on Black Jazz, it is unique and on its own it is a great record. The title cut, which according to the notes was the first fruits of Doug’s experience with writing lyrics to other peoples’ music, stands out as the most fully realized work here.

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Lonnie Liston Smith and The Cosmic Echoes – Cosmic Funk (1974)

Lonnie Liston Smith & The Cosmic Echoes
“Cosmic Funk”
Released 1974

Flying Dutchman Records (BDL 1-0591)
1 Cosmic Funk Smith 5:39
2 Footprints Shorter 6:11
3 Beautiful Woman Smith 6:58
4 Sais (Egypt) Mtume 8:16
5 Peaceful Ones Smith 5:03
6 Naima Coltrane 4:01Produced by Bob Thiele
Engineered by Bob SimpsonElectric bass – Al Anderson
Congas, Percussion – Lawrence Killian
Drums – Art Gore
Percussion – Andrew Cyrille , Doug Hammond , Ron Bridgewater
Acoustic and electric pianos, percussion – Lonnie Liston Smith
Soprano saxaphone, Flute, Percussion – George Barron
Vocals, Piano, Flute – Donald Smith

You will have to escuse me if I don’t give this album the presentation and descrption it really deserves. I have wanted to post about here for a long, long time. But for anyone else who is celebrating Christmas alone, as I currently am, I feel an urgent impulse to put this album out there. While all of Lonnie Liston Smith’s records with the Cosmic Echoes may have carried more or less the same variations of messages about peace and love, nothing comes close to the eruption of the first cut off this one that gave the album its name, which introduces Lonnie’s brother Donald Smith on vocals

CITIZENS OF THE WORLD
IT’S TIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIME for WORLD PEACE!

followed by a long hair-raising scream to let you know he really means this.

This song is one of the heaviest slabs of spiritual/soul jazz funkiness out there. The track, along with much of the rest of the album, combines creative use of electronics in some seriously psychedelic flourishes along with free and post-bop jazz explorations. While his next album, “Expansions”, may get the lion’s share of attention for this former Pharoah Sanders sideman, I find this album to be every bit its equal and in fact I seem to come back to it more often. Beyond the first cut, the rest of the album is a real treat too, with first-rate original compositions along inspired readings of Wayne Shorter’s “Footprints” and, unafraid of taking the risk, a vocal version of Coltrane’s “Naima.”

 

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