Search - Jimmy Smith :: Open House/Plain Talk

Open House Distorted Talk

J. Thomas | Out on the Lost Highway | 12/03/2006

(3 out of 5 stars)

"Great Jimmy Smith sessions with 2 outstanding sax men, Ike Quebec and Jackie McLean. Content is 4 or 5 stars but the sound quality is 1 star, terribly distorted (microphone stage overload) on most of the horn work. This must be the reason this one has never been given the RVG treatment. Too bad."

What a line-up

James S. Yeoman | 10/13/2007

(5 out of 5 stars)

"No matter what you say about the recording, this is a great CD, in part because it's actually two albums with Jimmy, Blue Mitchell, Ike Quebec, Jackie McLean, etc. in top notch form. If you can imagine all four together you should buy this CD. This is jazz, not one of Jimmy's commercial endeavors with strings or heavily arranged albums, although Ike really knows (knew)what he is doing in that department and probably gave Jimmy lots of pointers. With Ike around, nobody could give a halfhearted attempt and still keep face, as he was a mature pro who had paid his dues. If you do not know Ike or Jackie, this is a accessible place to begin."

Excellent

Bill Your 'Free Form FM Handi Cyber | Mahwah, NJ USA | 07/01/2010

(4 out of 5 stars)

"If you blamed Jimmy Smith for making the same type of albums from 1959 to 1971, you would also have to be pretty p-ssed off with Hershey for making that chocolate bar the same way for the last century. It's true that up until Root Down, his break to hard funk, Smith divided his time between southern fried small combo blues like Open House/Plain Talk, and big band epics like Cat: The Incredible Jimmy Smith (Dig) with the great Lalo Shfrin or Bashin (Dig) with the equally capable but far more traditional Oliver Nelson



But the smaller projects, like Open House/Plain Talk leave little to be desired. The blueprint works in its simplicity: blues with fantastic players and tons of space for these guys to work. Here, he uses top hitters like trumpet player Blue Mitchel and great alto sax player Jackie Mclean, both of whom I'll hip you more to later, so stick around.



Now blues is great in itself, but where you take it is where it counts. Muddy Waters used it for emotional expression, Howlin' Wolf used it as a tractor mower. Smith of course comes from jazz and on these albums is using a more polished form of the great blue bedrock to improvise amazingly: he twists and turns with lightening agility and amazing musical skill. His use of speed and variations on riffs is incredible, and you simply cannot get tired of hearing music so fundamental yet so sophisticated.



I have been stretching ideas when listening to these two Smith albums, and it strikes me that when we think about the late 1950s and early 1960s in the American South, all we think of is Jim Clark and George Wallace and their fire hoses and bloodhounds. We tend to forget Muddy, the Wolf, Jimmy Smith, Elvis and his friends at sun records, and the chicken shack music that was being born in this creative hot bed.



This music is so genuine, the fried grease tradition that oils this creativity could have only come out of this era in the south. It is an empowering notion, even if I am not sure why I thought of it--but either way you just gotta here this Jimmy Smith material.



Oh yeah, I almost forgot. I was surprised, although all music being connected I should not be, to hear Jackie McClean playing music this straight. He went on to make one of the best avant guard jazz albums of all time, Destination Out. Blue Mitchel later showed up on a great John Mayall album, Turning Point.



Get both of these, and play them with Open House and Plain Talk--you'll see soon its all of a piece.



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