Biff, baff, boof.
Two hunks of deep Wackies roots; and an amazing, previously unreleased coup de grace.
First off, a haunting, dazed, raving account of being kicked out of a squat; with heavy bass, killer organ, sublime backing vocals, and a hurting, searing Stranger Cole. ‘We’ve got to find a better place.’
Then a tough instrumental outing on the same deadly, signature Wackies rhythm as Clive Hunt’s Black Rose, by Wanachi.
And on the flip: stark, visionary, semi-acoustic primitivism, from the same drama school as early Ras Michael & The Sons of Negus.
Unmissable Wackies.

Searing, unmissable cover of canuck rockers The Guess Who, by way of Junior Walker.
B-Boy’s gonna choke on his herbal vape when he cops that break.
‘These eyes… crying every night… for you.’

A close collaborator and friend of The Beach Boys, his was the first issue by their Brother Records imprint. This was cut at Brian Wilson’s house in 1969 and thought to have been lost.

Our favourite Santana LP. So much to enjoy besides the dazzling guitarism of Carlos Santana — channeling John Coltrane — and John McLaughlin.
It’s book-ended by contributions from Alice Coltrane. The stunning opener is a mellotron version of Going Home, her adaptation of a theme from Dvorak’s New World Symphony, which she first recorded for the album Lord Of Lords. Alice plays piano and Farfisa organ. And to close, the title track re-works a tune from JC’s Kulu Se Mama, with Alice on piano here.
Percussionist Jose Chepito Areas chips in his perfect Samba de Sausalito, with bass-playing by Doug Rauch, and keys by Tom Coster, both superb, and Tony Smith from Malo behind the drum-kit.
Later on, the one and only Flora Purim drops by, magnificently lighting up another samba, Yours Is The Light.
And none other than Leon Thomas had just joined. He duets beautifully with Wendy Haas on a breezy jazz-funk version of Love, Devotion & Surrender; he’s back for full-throated yodelling on When I Look Into Your Eyes, with fine flute-playing by Joe Farrell, and some tasty funk to close; and he’s wonderful on the bubbling Light Of Life, riding a striking strings arrangement by Greg Adams from Tower Of Power, with echoes of CTI.

Sides for the Apollo label, cut in New York in the mid-1950s.

Classic Miami soul, originally on Blue Candle, from this Jazzman imprint.

Utterly stupendous music from JG’s long wilderness years — radio recordings freshly dug out from 1965, three years after the austerely avant-garde brilliance of Free Fall kissed goodbye to any chance of a record deal for the best part of a decade.
Amazingly, more than anything — out of nowhere — you hear the quicksilver, stark brawn of fellow-Texan Ornette Coleman. Bill Meyer’s review in the Wire hits it on the head. ‘His liberal use of split tones and abrasive timbres underline his awareness of the advances of Albert Ayler’ — whilst in other passages ‘Giuffre’s quick fingering and elongated tones sound like the missing link between first generation free jazz and the advances in technique that Evan Parker presented on his solo albums ten years down the road’. Jazz On A Summer Day it ain’t.
‘Free counterpoint’ is a kind of collective improvisation which envisions the New Thing without bluster. ‘He wrote out full scores,’ recalls Joe Chambers in the excellent booklet, ‘with drum parts written as another voice. They look like Schoenberg and Webern scores, right in line with what I had been studying in college.’
The other players are awesome, too. Bassist Richard Davis is here, perfumed with masterpieces like Out To Lunch, The Space Book and Rip, Rig And Panic, all recorded within the previous year. (That’s him on Astral Weeks, by the way.) Chambers’ drumming is sensational.
Jazz fans, it’s a must. Hotly recommended.