A smoking live performance from these two Chicago blues legends – recorded at the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, but with a gritty electric vibe that's very much like the duo's best work back home! The approach is very stripped-down and unadorned – just vocals by both Guy and Wells – with Buddy on guitar and Junior on harmonica – plus additional piano from Pinetop Perkins, and even the mighty Bill Wyman on bass. Wyman produced the set – very faithfully too – and titles include "How Can One Woman Be So Mean", "Hoodoo Man Blues", "My Younger Days", "Messin With The Kid", and "Ten Years Ago". CD

... CD

Tortoise's third album and a pretty remarkable creative leap for the inventive Chicago ensemble – now with the great guitarist Jeff Parker in the fold! Like their earlier records, TNT features a haunting mix of percussion, electronics, and jazz-oriented instrumentation – put together with an approach that's even more sophisticated than earlier releases. That said, the guitar makes a huge difference – and there's a lot of guest players in the mix, including horns and strings. Definitely one of their best ever! Titles include "Swing From The Gutters", "Four Day Interval", "Jetty", "Everglade", and "The Equator". CD

Very hip work from Art Turk Burton – percussionist, educator, and underground figure on the AACM scene in Chicago for decades – working here on a set of very long, live readings of key jazz tunes, served up with help from some equally hip musicians on the scene! The great Ari Brown plays tenor in the group, alongside the alto of Edwin Daugherty, keyboards of Ed Beard, and bass of Yosef Ben Israel – in a group that also features plenty of congas from Art, and more percussion from Sammie Torres and Dushun Mosley too – as the group takes off on these very extended performances that are filled with plenty of strong solos over equally strong percussion too! Maggie Brown brings in some vocals and spoken parts too – and titles include long takes on "Song For My Father", "Freedom Jazz Dance", "Listen Here", "Afro Blue", and "Inner City Blues". CD

Jimmy pays tribute to an earlier generation of R&B – in a hard-wailing set of soul jazz, done with backings from the legendary Oliver Nelson! A few tracks feature vocals by Jimmy, in a rough bluesy style, and others have some harmonica by Buddy Lucas – in a raspy, hard-wailing mode that still fits in nicely with the jazzier style of the album. Jimmy's organ is right up front on most numbers – recorded with that full, dynamic sound that makes so many of his Verve albums a treasure – and the best numbers have a more contemporary 60s groove alongside the older bluesy roots. Grady Tate plays drums – surprisingly funky at times – and other players include Melba Liston and Tom McIntosh on trombones, Billy Butler on guitar, Bob Cranshaw on Fender bass, and Joe Newman on trumpet. Titles include "Hi Heel Sneakers", "TNT", "Boom Boom", "Ain't That Just Like A Woman", and "One Mint Julep". CD

Features "Blues For 3+1", "Ode To Billie Joe", "Organ Grinder's Swing", "Ape Woman", "(I Can't Get No) Satisfaction", "Funky Broadway", "Mellow Mood", "Burning Spear", "One Mint Julep", "Hobo Flats", "Groove Drops", "TNT", "Blues In The Night", and "the Sermon". CD

A seminal bit of west coast cool jazz from the mid 50s – a session led by Cy Touff, a lesser-remembered player from the LA scene, and an instrumentalist who used a bass trumpet! Cy's working here in the company of a host of more familiar names – including Richie Kamuca, Russ Freeman, Johnny Mandel, Leroy Vinnegar, and Pete Jolly – on a set of tightly arranged tunes that have a swinging ensemble feel that reminds us a bit of Bob Cooper's work from the time. The CD features the 8 original tracks from the album, plus 2 bonus cuts – and titles include "It's Sand Man", "Primitive Cats", "A Smooth One", "TNT", "Groover Wailin", and "Prez-ence". CD

Although he was the consummate high-class hipster at the start of his career, for some reason Jimmy Smith seemed to hit a forced sort of rootsy style about halfway through his years at Verve. The style worked well for him, even if it sometimes languished in bluesy tones that seemed a bit forced – and on this album, his basic trio of Grady Tate and Kenny Burrell are augmented by arrangements by Oliver Nelson. Nelson keeps things from getting too hokey, and Jimmy's organ lines are free and sharp on the best cuts. Titles include "Mustard Greens", "Hobson's Hop", "Got My Mojo Workin", and "High Heel Sneakers". Jimmy pays tribute to an earlier generation of R&B – in a hard-wailing set of soul jazz, done with backings from the legendary Oliver Nelson! A few tracks feature vocals by Jimmy, in a rough bluesy style, and others have some harmonica by Buddy Lucas – in a raspy, hard-wailing mode that still fits in nicely with the jazzier style of the album. Jimmy's organ is right up front on most numbers – recorded with that full, dynamic sound that makes so many of his Verve albums a treasure – and the best numbers have a more contemporary 60s groove alongside the older bluesy roots. Grady Tate plays drums – surprisingly funky at times – and other players include Melba Liston and Tom McIntosh on trombones, Billy Butler on guitar, Bob Cranshaw on Fender bass, and Joe Newman on trumpet. Titles include "Hi Heel Sneakers", "TNT", "Boom Boom", "Ain't That Just Like A Woman", and "One Mint Julep". CD

A brilliant tribute to one of the greatest jazz trumpeters of the 50s – featuring 3 full albums of material, plus some bonus tracks as well! Conte Candoli is a name that's appeared on countless sessions as a sideman or studio player, but here, Conte really sparkles as a leader – setting fire amidst some great small group lineups that include the players Bill Holman, Lou Levy, Lawrence Marable, Leroy Vinnegar, Max Bennett, Stan Levey, and Ira Sullivan. The set features material from 2 Bethlehem albums by Conte – Sincerely Conte and Powerhouse Trumpet – plus an Atlantic album, West Coast Wailers – and a rare 78rpm session for the Chicago-based Chance label, and a few additional tunes from a New York session in 1956 with Hank Jones! Conte's never sounded better – and with all this material in one place, the 2CD set is a great bargain overall. 30 tracks in all – with titles that include "Mambo Junior", "Flamingo", "TNT", "Thank You Judge", "Comes Love", "Tune For Tex", "Fine & Dandy", "Night Flight", "Toot Sweet", "Jazz City Blues", "Four", "Groovin Higher", "Lover Man", "Pete's Alibi", "Cheremoya", and "Jordu". CD

A landmark record – not only in the career of Grady Tate, but in the realm of adult vocals as well! Grady's incredible here – cool, classy, and amazingly stepping from the role of being a simple jazz drummer, into a world of sophisticated vocals that really caught the world by surprise. The backings are lush, but light – as cooly poised as Grady's own vocals, and still able to hit the right amounts of soulfulness to make the tunes come across with a sound that was quite different than the usual adult pop record of the time. The whole thing's an amazing mix of jazz, soul, and vocals – set to arrangements by Gary McFarland and Mike Abene, and supported by wonderful backings from Jerome Richradson. Includes the sublime "Sack Full Of Dreams", a swirling track that sounds a lot like Scott Walker to us – plus Grady's classic reading of "Windmills Of Your Mine", and the tunes "TNT", "Would You Believe", "All Around The World", and "A Little At A Time". ! CD

A landmark record – not only in the career of Grady Tate, but in the realm of adult vocals as well! Grady's incredible here – cool, classy, and amazingly stepping from the role of being a simple jazz drummer, into a world of sophisticated vocals that really caught the world by surprise. The backings are lush, but light – as cooly poised as Grady's own vocals, and still able to hit the right amounts of soulfulness to make the tunes come across with a sound that was quite different than the usual adult pop record of the time. The whole thing's an amazing mix of jazz, soul, and vocals – set to arrangements by Gary McFarland and Mike Abene, and supported by wonderful backings from Jerome Richradson. Includes the sublime "Sack Full Of Dreams", a swirling track that sounds a lot like Scott Walker to us – plus Grady's classic reading of "Windmills Of Your Mine", and the tunes "TNT", "Would You Believe", "All Around The World", and "A Little At A Time". ! CD

A massive collection of Tortoise rarities – including work from non-US releases, tour-only EP material, compilation tracks and more – plus the long out-of-print, heavily sought after Rhythms, Resolutions And Clusters remix album – all at a great price! You really couldn't ask for a better collection of errata from the celebrated group. It features some of the best work the collective and individual members (Jeff Parker ('97-present), John Herndon, John McEntire, Doug McCombs, Dan Bitney, David Pajo ('95-'97) and Bundy Brown ('91-'94)) have ever done! Rhythms, Resolutions And Clusters – featuring adventurous re-imaginings by such a diverse roster as Casey Rice, Steve Albini, Brad Wood, Jim O'Rourke and Mike Watt – is possibly the face value boon of the collection given it's known "legendary lost" status, but pretty much everything here is just as tough to find, if not literally impossible! The set contains 3CDs and a DVD, which features most of Tortoise's music videos and extensive rare live performance footage. Frankly, we'd have paid $20 just for a CD single with "Gamera", and that's just the kick off track on disc 1! Other tracks on disc 1 include "Blackbyrd", "Sex For Elizabeth", "To Day Retrieval", "Whitewater", "Autumn Sweater", "A Grape Dope", "Blue Station" and more. Disc 2 includes "Madison Area", "TNT (Nobukazu Takemura remix)", "Why We Fight", "CTA", "Adverse", Cliff Dweller Society" and more. Disc 3 (Rhythms, Resolutions And Clusters) includes the tracks "Alcohall", "Your New Rod", "Cobwebbed", "The Match Incident", "Tin Cans", "Not Quite East Of The Ryan", "Cornpone Brunch" and more. DVD includes the videos for "Salt The Skies", "Dear Grandma And Grandpa", "Seneca", and more, plus live footage from Toronto in '96, the Deutches Jazz Festival in '99, Chic-A-Go-Go in '05 and the Burn To Shine project in '04. CD

A rare album from American bassist Tommy Potter – a session recorded in Stockholm in 1956, and originally only issued briefly in the US on Atlantic's short-lived East-West jazz subsidiary! The album's got a hard-edged feel that's quite different than most other Swedish jazz of the time – less of the cool notes the Swedes had picked up from the west coast scene and American modernists of the 50s – and more of the gritty, bottom-grooving styles that were coming into the US mix as hardbop started to give birth to soul jazz. Potter's bass is firmly at the lead on most numbers – and other players include Rolf Ericson on trumpet, Ake Persson on trombone, and Gunnar Hacke Bjorksten and Erik Norstrom on tenor – plus rhythm from Freddie Redd on piano and Joe Harris on drums. Tracks include "Punsch", "Russ & Arlene", "Reets & I", "The Imp", and "TNT". CD