His unmissable debut as leader in 1960, bringing with him Sam Jones and Jimmy Cobb from the Adderleys’ set-up. Highlights include the reclamations of three mighty Timmons originals — Moanin’, already recorded by Art Blakey, and Cannonball’s This Here and Dat Dere — and a near-solo rendition of Lush Life.
Unmistakable, irresistible jazz pianism — grooving, direct, gospelised, funky.

Full-on, sex-hungry, hard-grooving, rock-steady, into-the-future electric blues.
Check out Muddy dancing in his last minute on stage. Otis Spann led the closer — torch-carrying verses by Langston Hughes — because the boss was so knackered.
Look at all the people laughing, shouting out, swaying in their deck-chairs… and wonder about Dylan causing such a cataclysmic stink five long years later, on the same stage, going electric the same way (on the same type of Telecaster).

Modern Nigerian music starts here.
‘*****’, Mojo; ‘these songs leap out of the past like madeleines soaked in palm wine’, The Observer; ‘impeccably curated and packaged’, The Wire.

‘***** beautiful, deeply affecting… hard to beat as the year’s most worthwhile reissue’, The Guardian; ‘magnificent… wonderfully austere’, Time Out.

A blistering selection, with the series’ signature mixture of classic hits and recovered treasure.

Dazzling music from 1969, way ahead of its time, by a nonet with Woody Shaw and Dizzy Reece on trumpets, Joe Farrell on reeds, woodwinds, and English horn, Bob Northern on French horn, Howard Johnson on tuba and bass clarinet, Ron Carter on bass. Fresh from Bitches Brew, Lenny White plays drums at just his second recording session; trombonist Julian Priester is a few months away from Mwandishi.
Sideways establishes Hill’s signature twist on Monk and Bud Powell, with its angular, sinewy restlessness, and Caribbean tang. The horns are crossly careering. The evocative title cut has classical, cinematic manners, but in the service of East of the River Nile mysticism. Plantation Bag is magnificent, delirious, epic funk, with Lenny White channelling Clyde Stubblefied, and Ron Carter dug in deep. Noon Tide tears way further eastwards, in the same urgent cohort as classics like Yusef Lateef’s Chang, Chang, Chang and Pete La Roca’s Dancing Girls. Cascade is precisely skittering and eruptive, with wonderful trumpet-playing. Yesterday’s Tomorrow is playful, both jaunty and rueful, undecided, to close.
The arrangements throughout are imperious; the playing is uniformly superb. “We had rehearsal time and a lot of studio time. Some of those songs, we did take 45 or take 50. We played them over and over and over, till we got a complete take just right.’‘
Knockout.

‘*****’, The Independent; ‘captivating… Q Recommends’; ‘there is no end of exhilarating music on this beguiling album’, The Sunday Times; ‘full of heartstopping musical twists and turns’, The Beat.