Quincy Jones - From Q With Love (1999)

Q sure had his hand in a lot of good stuff, huh? Questionable track selection but Jones has earned the right to do as he pleases. I hope you don't mind if I just sit back and enjoy instead of pecking at this keyboard.

Billboard, February 27, 1999, p. 24

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #72

Tracks:

Volume 1:

Song	Album	Year	Hot 100	R&B	AC
Setembro (Brazilian Wedding Song)	Back On The Block	1989
The Secret Garden (Sweet Seduction Suite)	Back On The Block	1989	31	1	26
I'm Yours	From Q With Love	1999		73	27
Baby, Come To Me	Every Home Should Have One	1982	1	9	1
You Put A Move On My Heart	Q's Jook Joint	1995	98	16
Velas	The Dude	1981
Moody's Mood For Love	Q's Jook Joint	1995
Liberian Girl	Bad	1987
Love Dance	Give Me The Night	1980
One Hundred Ways	The Dude	1981	14	10	5
Rock With You	Q's Jook Joint	1995
The Lady In My Life	Thriller	1982
The Shadow of Your Smile	Sinatra at The Sands	1966

Volume 2:

Song	Album	Year	Hot 100	R&B	AC
How Do You Keep The Music Playing?	It's Your Night	1983	45	6	5
Something I Cannot Have	From Q With Love	1999		87
Human Nature	Thriller	1982	7	27	2
Everything Must Change	Body Heat	1974
I'm Gonna Miss You In The Morning	Sounds...and Stuff Like That!!	1978
Everything	From Q With Love	1999
Just Once	The Dude	1981	17	11	7
If This Is The Last Time	From Q With Love	1999
Somewhere	Hey Now Hey (The Other Side of the Sky)	1973
Heaven's Girl	Q's Jook Joint	1995
Prelude to The Garden	Back On The Block	1989
Sax In The Garden	From Q With Love	1999
At The End Of The Day (Grace)	Q's Jook Joint	1995

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: see individual album links above

Previously revisited for the blog:
Back On the Block (1989)
The Dude (1981)
Explores the Music of Henry Mancini (1968)

Quincy Jones - Back On the Block (1989)

Note: this release was originally purchased as a cassette tape, later replaced by a CD.

Wow. Q assembled one helluva group of musicians here, including Ray Charles, Joe Zawinul, Chaka Khan, Take 6, Bobby McFerrin, Miles Davis, George Benson, Al Jarreau, Sarah Vaughan, Ella Fitzgerald, Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock, Barry White, and on and on. Also, Jones was one of the first A-list musicians to fully recognize rap as a viable music genre, so this album also includes rappers Ice-T, Kool Moe Dee, Big Daddy Kane, and Melle Mel. Surprisingly, no Michael Jackson. The music is a mix of hip-hop, pop, world music, R&B and may be the first attempt to link rap to jazz. Unfortunately, the production (admittedly cutting edge at the time) hasn't aged well, so this album hasn't had the staying power that some of Q's other albums have. I really don't want to see musician credits include "Kick and Snare Sound" - even the real horns and bass are produced to sound like synths. Still, in 1989, this was commonplace in the market. Illustrating that fact, this album went platinum and led to seven Grammy awards:

• Album Of The Year
• Best Arrangement on an Instrumental
• Best Instrumental Arrangement Accompanying Vocal(s)
• Best Jazz Fusion Performance
• Best Engineered Recording, Non-Classical
• Producer of the Year, (Non-Classical)
• Best R&B Performance by a Duo or Group with Vocal

Press of the time:

• Billboard: "Not to be missed."
• CashBox: "a certified winner"
• Rolling Stone (★★½): "an extravagant musical theme park, and its best numbers work better as rides than as records"
• Robert Christgau: B+

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #9
• Billboard Pop CD: #8
• Billboard R&B: #1 (12 weeks)

Tracks: At the time of the album's release, I liked the tittle track, Wee B Dooinit, Setembro, and the covers of Weather Report's Birdland and The Brothers Johnson's I'll Be Good To You. For me, the Birdland cover is the highlight of the disc even with its overproduced synth sound. I hadn't heard these tunes in a while, so it was fun to hear them again today.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: I'm reminded of the few months, immediately after our wedding, that my wife and I lived in the Dallas area.

Previously revisited for the blog:
The Dude (1981)
Explores the Music of Henry Mancini (1968)

Quincy Jones - The Dude (1981)

First, let's get this out of the way: I think Quincy Jones is a musical genius. Performer, writer, arranger, producer - he does it all and he does it well. Even so, I didn't own this album as a teenager. Now I can't think of any reason why I didn't have it. Jones was starting his own Qwest label in the early '80s, but he owed A&M one more record. You would think that he might just haphazardly throw something together, but he put together a top-notch group of session musicians (Ernie Watts, Jerry Hey, Greg Phillinganes, Steve Lukather, Paulinho DaCosta), chose music written by hit songwriters (Rod Temperton, Barry Mann & Cynthia Weill, Stevie Wonder, Ivan Lins), got some famous friends to perform (Herbie Hancock, Stevie Wonder, Toots Thielemans), and used two top notch vocalists (Patti Austin and James Ingram) to put together a great pop album. You can easily see where Q was heading as he moved from this album to producing Michael Jackson's Thriller. He knew exactly who should be doing what. I usually don't talk about books on this blog, but Q's 2002 autobiography is certainly worth checking out of your local library.

Press of the time:

• Billboard: "infectious hooks and catchy horn arrangements"
• CashBox: "his usual classy affair"
• High Fidelity: "his most commercially potent solo project yet"
• Record World: "The single 'Ai No Corrida' shows all signs of being an across-the-board smash"
• Smash Hits (7½ out of 10): "Not bad for a 48 year old!" [ed: you watch your mouth, youngster]

Album chart peaks:

• US Billboard 200: #10
• Billboard Jazz: #3
• Billboard R&B: #3
• CashBox: #14
• Rolling Stone: #16

Tracks: The two hit singles, Just Once (#17 pop, #11 R&B) and One Hundred Ways (#14 pop, #10 R&B), still sound good all these years later. Other highlights are Ai No Corrida (#28 pop, #10 R&B), Somethin' Special, Razzamatazz (#17 R&B), and Turn On The Action. The album might have been better if they had used a song other than The Dude. I like the Ivan Lins instrumental, Velas, featuring Toots Thielemans, but it seems out of place on this album.

For more information on the brief life of the CD longbox,
go visit The Legend of the Longbox.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: Mostly this reminds of my freshman year in high school (isn't that the most awkward year in a person's life? Don't get me started.). The song Just Once reminds me of the slap-you-in-the-face ending of the 1982 movie, The Last American Virgin. The rest of the music reminds me of other music produced by Q around that time (The Brothers Johnson's Stomp, Michael Jackson's Off The Wall, and George Benson's Give Me The Night).

Previously revisited for the blog:
Explores the Music of Henry Mancini (1968)

Frank Sinatra - Sinatra at the Sands (1966)

"LIVE IN CONCERT" WEEK (FEBRUARY 7-13, 2011)

Recorded in Las Vegas, January 26 - February 1, 1966.

"It's Frank's world. We're just lucky to be living in it."

- Dean Martin

Originally released only months after my birth, this CD represents the collaboration of a 'perfect storm' of musicians: Sinatra, Count Basie, and Quincy Jones. And in '60s Vegas, no less! This was one of the first CDs I ever purchased and I still consider it one of my top five favorite live albums of all time. Basie's band is cookin', Q's arrangements are without peer, and Sinatra is, well, Sinatra. It's all here: hip, up-tempo, wailing, standards, ballads, and cheesy Vegas stage chatter.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: #9

Tracks: You know you're in for a treat from the moment Sinatra takes the stage and asks, "How did all these people get in my room?" then launches into the definitive interpretation of Come Fly With Me. Other favorites include I've Got You Under My Skin, You Make Me Feel So Young, Get Me To the Church On Time, Where Or When, and My Kind Of Town. Basie's band gets a turn with a few instrumentals: One O'Clock Jump, All of Me, and Makin' Whoopee! These are all first rate, as you would expect. If I had to pick a favorite Sinatra cut, it would probably be Fly Me To The Moon (In Other Words) and the version here is incredible. In fact, listening to it right now, I've hit the 'back' button on the player so I can hear it again before moving on. Epic. Classic. If there is any downside to the CD, it is the 12 minute monologue/stand-up act that appears halfway through the set. Much of the humor is dated (and/or wasn't funny to begin with) and seems insensitive today, but I appreciate that he gives the band a brief break from playing.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: During the 1989-90 school year, I was responsible for teaching a high school jazz band. This particular group couldn't keep a slow tempo. So when I tried an arrangement of Georgia On My Mind, they sped it up every time. I was willing to try anything to get the group to play on the backside of the beat. One day, I played them Basie's version of Makin' Whoopee! from this disc to illustrate what I was looking for. While it was a good idea, it didn't really work. When the band finished playing the song at a concert, my good friend Eddie turned to my wife and said, "I know he's glad that's over." Which was true.

I had the opportunity to see Sinatra in Dallas in April, 1990. With tickets starting at $50, I just couldn't afford it then. Now I realize I should have taken out a loan.

Finally, I can't hear Basie's band without thinking of the classic scene in the 1974 movie Blazing Saddles where the orchestra, performing April In Paris, suddenly appears as Bart rides across the prairie.

Quincy Jones - Explores the Music of Henry Mancini (1968)

Quincy Jones might best be known these days for his production work with Michael Jackson, but he made his mark as a composer/arranger. For this release, he arranges 12 Mancini works for big band. What a great combination: Mancini is an outstanding composer, Jones is a fantastic arranger. Jones transforms many of the pieces, making them funkier and jazzier. The overall sound of the release is indicative of what was going on in the world of big band arranging in the late '60s/early '70s. It's a fun listen.

Peak on the US Billboard Top 200 chart: Did not chart

Tracks: I love how Jones takes a couple of ballads and makes them get uptempo tunes, like Charade. Jones even turns Moon River into a groovin' jazz waltz. Bird Brain gets your attention not only because of its style and an arrangement of the melody that doubles flute with either bass clarinet or vibraphone, but you also get a bass clarinet solo! The only weak arrangement on this CD is of The Pink Panther. Maybe the original is so good it can't be improved upon. The CD ends strong with the ever-popular Peter Gunn theme.

Personal Memory Associated with this CD: I remember playing the Mancini chart Mr. Lucky in high school jazz band, but the arrangement wasn't nearly as good or as swinging as the one included on this release.