Album Reviews

Spoon’s latest is an introspective affair that trades the group’s usual tuneful exuberance for something more contemplative. But don’t be aFreud! It’s got all of the group’s signature moves, from deep, behind the grooves beats to catchy melodies set against vast empty spaces punctuated by exclamatory soundscapes.

Will there ever be another jazz singer with the elegance, clarity, and emotional depth of the late Shirley Horn? I don’t think so. Horn put more into, and got more out of her pauses than many singers get of the notes they actually sing. Her piano playing was equally sophisticated yet economical. Everyone from Joni Mitchell to Diana Krall has been influenced by Shirley Horn.

Airplane aficionados have long maintained that the monaural mix of this classic '60s album is the best way to hear it, and those lucky enough to own an original mono pressing--issued in the Spring of 1967--will certainly concur. Think about it: we're talking about an album of 36-year-old music that still holds sway over listeners of all ages. How many young listeners in 1967 were grooving to music made in 1931? Only those lucky enough to understand that the music of Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, et al., was not ancient history, though the primitive recording quality may have made them sound that way.

The Move, in their heyday — which was roughly 1967-71 — were quite popular in England and in Europe, despite never quite breaking through in a big way here in the States. Even so, The Move’s reputation has since continued to grow in stature — and their celebrated, hard-to-find sophomore LP, February 1970’s Shazam, has just been reissued by Esoteric Recordings. Read Mark Smotroff’s review to see if the Esoteric update of Shazam belongs in your collection and on your turntable. . .

The first Blood, Sweat and Tears group led by Al Kooper and including his former Blues Project bandmate Steve Katz, was the sophisticated assemblage that produced but one album. This one.