Admission: As much as I love jazz, I have never<\/i> gotten into John Coltrane the way I\u2019ve gotten into similar artists like Miles Davis, Thelonious Monk and Bill Evans. Oh, I can listen to works like A Love Supreme<\/i> and recognize them for the genius they are\u2026 but, in general, I can\u2019t pick up a Coltrane album, listen to it, and walk away with the same appreciation as I would with other artists. And, Lord knows, I\u2019ve tried to develop an appreciation over the years.<\/p>\n
Still, I try\u2026 and recently decided I would try yet again, this time by listening to Coltrane<\/i>, his 1957 debut as a band leader. And, while this disc does not quite demonstrate the greatness that some will say Coltrane would eventually ascend to, it\u2019s still a pleasant enough listen.<\/p>\n
Having been dismissed from Miles Davis\u2019s band due to his drug use, Coltrane shows on a good 50 percent of this album how much of an influence Davis had been on him. The second half of the album features the work of trumpeter Johnnie Spawn; Coltrane also borrowed pianist Red Garland (for songs on the first half) and bassist Paul Chambers from Davis\u2019s ever-revolving lineup. While Spawn is no match for Davis (and no disrespect is meant to Spawn by that comment), the three tracks that close this album\u2014\u201cStraight Street,\u201d \u201cWhile My Lady Sleeps\u201d and \u201cChronic Blues\u201d\u2014all sound as if they could have been recorded in Coltrane\u2019s time with Davis\u2019s band.<\/p>\n
What is interesting about this portion of the album is that it gives Coltrane a chance to show off his own songwriting abilities on \u201cStraight Street\u201d and \u201cChronic Blues,\u201d two pieces which are among the strongest works on the disc. \u201cWhile My Lady Sleeps\u201d is a pleasant enough outing as well, though the final chord doesn\u2019t resolve as well as it should have, and is a bit grating on the ears.<\/p>\n
It is in the opening number of the album, a cover of Calvin Massey\u2019s \u201cBakai,\u201d that Coltrane and the band struggle to live up to the expectations of greatness in the world of hard bop. It takes time for the song to catch the listener\u2019s ear, and Coltrane\u2019s solo never quite captures the attention and spirit as does Garland\u2019s piano work. And I personally can\u2019t say I liked the \u201cshave and a haircut\u201d reference in baritone saxophonist Sahib Shihab\u2019s solo near the end of the track.<\/p>\n
If anything, Coltrane\u2019s work suggests he was a better fit with some of the more controlled pieces, such as \u201cViolets For Your Furs,\u201d which weren\u2019t as active and frantic and had a more solid structure to them. This isn\u2019t to say that Coltrane couldn\u2019t handle hard bop; \u201cTime Was\u201d proves that he was capable of holding his own in the genre.<\/p>\n
As enjoyable of an album as Coltrane<\/i> is, I\u2019d be hard-pressed to say that these six songs suggested that Coltrane would become as big of a name in the genre of jazz that he did. He was smart enough to surround himself with musicians that helped to elevate the music; artists such as Garland, pianist Mal Waldron (who handled the ivories for the second half of the disc), Chambers and drummer Albert \u201cTootie\u201d Heath all play a major role in making this album as enjoyable as it is. But while Coltrane is a competent musician and soloist, his solos aren\u2019t quite as exciting as one might have expected. Perhaps it was because Coltrane was still growing into his role as a session leader, or even into his position in the world of jazz. Only listens to other albums will prove if this was indeed the case\u2014and this disc does make me curious enough to want to listen to more works from Coltrane. So, in effect, it did its job.<\/p>\n
For the neophyte into the world of Coltrane\u2019s, then Coltrane<\/i> is a decent enough entry point (though I\u2019m certain others would argue that this title would belong to other albums in his discography). It\u2019s strong enough to make you want to discover more of his work, yet has the suggestion that the best still lay ahead of him.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":34675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"tags":[],"artist":[7917],"rating":[5612],"class_list":["post-46530","review","type-review","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","artist-john-coltrane","rating-rating-b-minus"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46530","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/review"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46530"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/review\/46530\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/34675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46530"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46530"},{"taxonomy":"artist","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/artist?post=46530"},{"taxonomy":"rating","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyvault.adishjain.in\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/rating?post=46530"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}