Sean Trane
Apparently the album to celebrate a return of Rollins in the studio, Next Album was recorded over the summer of 72, produced by Keepnews and released on the Milestones label and it is a mixed bag, with the A-side being electric and funky-fusiony while the flipside is much more traditional. Indeed, his pianist plays electric and the line-up features two drummers and a percussionist of a selection of tracks, mainly in the opening Playin’ in the Yard, even if the following Poinciena still bears a certain boppy aura. The band features Gables on keys (el or ac), Cranshaw on bass, Lee on drums (with the assistance of DeJohnette on two tracks) and Jenkins on Latin percs. As you can see this is mainly the same line-up for the next few albums to come.
Of course, on the flipside, you’ll rightly expect Everywhere Calypso to feature these Latin percussions, which is personally not my cup of tea. The shorter Keep Hold of Yourself has an hard-bop feel, despite an interesting few opening Rollins lines, while the closing Skylark is definitely a standard early 60’s tune, without much interest, especially some ten years later. Rollins is often hailed as an avant-gardist sax tooter, but it is not with albums like the present that he broke much ground (or anything else for that matter), and if this had been called Previous Album, it might have sounded more actual ten years sooner. Of course matters would change with the upcoming much more adventurous Horn Culture.