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If you dig that early 60s beatnik groove raga jazz sound, it doesn’t get much better than Herbie Mann playing live at a comfortable spot like the Village Gate. This date features a typical Mann line-up for the time; a drummer, two percussionists, bass, vibraphone and his flute, which creates a pleasantly exotic sound that was Herbie’s trademark. All three of these songs are long extended jams that allow the soloists to relax and play long line solos that recall improvisations that existed around the world long before jazz hit the scene. This is not ambitious or particularly technically challenging jazz, rather these guys stay in the groove and let the solos wander and even pass to every member of the band on some songs. The lengthy percussion break on ‘It ain’t Necessarily so’ is particularly nice and shows how much this band was breaking from traditional jazz while still giving audiences a sound that was not overly complex.
A predecessor to the extended hippie jazz-rock jams of the late 60s, as well as acid jazz grooves in the late 80s, ‘Herbie Mann at the Village Gate’ has aged well and still sounds contemporary today.