A sweet electric set from the great Herbie Mann – one of his best of the time! Like a number of his contemporaries recording jazz for Atlantic, Herbie had moved pretty firmly into a funky soul mode by the mid 70s – adding in lots of electric instrumentation and vocals to keep up with the success of some of the bigger-selling jazz albums of the time. Oddly, this approach actually sounds pretty darn good to us – especially having the hindsight of over 25 years to get over the shock of any sort of perceived "sell out". The players are all pretty tight, and Herbie manages to keep things pretty hip on all tracks, sticking to his roots in Latin-influenced playing. The record features remakes of "Comin Home Baby" and Joe Cuba's "Bang Bang", plus a version of Astor Piazzolla's "Deux Xango", and the orignals "Paradise Music", "Body Oil", and "Waterbed". LP, Vinyl record album

A wild and groundbreaking record recorded by the great French tenor player Barney Wilen! Although he got his start as a bebopper in the 50's, Wilen sort of dropped out of sight by the end of the 60's – and only emerged from time to time to cut strangely experimental sides. This record is unlike anything he ever made, and features a wild mix of African rhythms, ambient sound, and Wilen's deep deep tenor. By this point, Wilen had been absorbing a lot of different influences, from Coltrane, to Pharoah Sanders, to some of the European free players, and his sound is a weird mish mash of styles that weaves in and out of all the stuff on the record. It's a haunting bit of afro jazz and funky noise, with some cuts that are spacey, and others that are nice and funky. Includes the cuts "Afrika Freak Out" and "Zombizar", plus lots of other goodies! LP, Vinyl record album