The Attitude of "Modern" Jazz

There's a lot of variety in today's hard/post bop scene, including a large segment that is fairly commercial, especially over the last couple years as a sort of very laid back style has become very profitable and a staple on jazz radio.

Edited by js - 20 Aug 2013 at 7:11am

Potter is a great saxophonist, but some of his sound is getting towards that radio friendly sound. Redman is very eclectic, some things are quite different from others. I don't know that Holland album, or at least I don't recall it.

I certainly have a lot of free jazz and electric fusion in my collection, but those sounds can get old too.

Amilisom wrote: I can't completely figure out what it is, but there's something about hard/post bop over the last 20 years of so that I really dislike. I think it may have something to do with the "attitude" that musicians today approach the genre. This attitude seems to affect the groove in a way that feels much less pristine to me. A way that seems fake, as though instead of trying to be honest to the music, they instead try to make the music "cool". Do any of you have similar feelings?

Edited by Sean Trane - 21 Aug 2013 at 10:09am

snobb wrote: dreadpirateroberts wrote: js wrote: Subtlety can go a long way for me. Speaking of subtlety, I'm very interested in hearing that acoutsic/techno album you reviewed just the other day, John. It sounds like it'd be very, very interesting you can hear album in full here: http://soundcloud.com/dawn-of-midi/dom-final-mix-mp3

Excellent, thanks, Slava - checking it out now

I appreciate what you are saying here and I will try to respond in a series of posts.

Amilisom wrote: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7pgSlTHBif8 It has been a while since this discussion, but I wanted to clarify with an example that I found. This is Kenny Barron and Charlie Haden playing live. On this tune he establishes a kind of straight-eighth groove that is neither latin or post-bop, due to emphasizing the downbeats. It probably takes its roots from jazz fusion, but I want to clarify that I don't dislike jazz fusion. There's just something ugly about this groove that tries to deceive the listener into thinking that it swings when it doesn't. In fact, I feel like I almost hear this groove even in modern bop that DOES swing. Due to this it's hard for me to enjoy modern jazz. Can any of you hear what I'm describing?

Edited by idlero - 28 Dec 2013 at 9:59am

I know what you mean, Amilisom. There are plenty of technically good players around today, but they don't have the sound and feel of the originals in the 50s and 60s (and earlier). Also, the recording engineers don't get the sound that they did back then - thinking of Rudy van Gelder in particular. Nowadays, there are dozens of mikes and the recordings have lost that original sound. The bass has a nasal. trebly sound that I really dislike, and you will never find a drummer or a recording of drums that have that 60s feel to it - that is partly because drum kits have changed a lot.


I got a fairly recent "Impulse" (not the real Impulse) album by a pianist, and it sounds as if my head has been stuck inside the piano with the lid closed.  It is way too overwhelming.

Another point is that today's horn players, though well trained, tend to have a very thin, generic tone, with little feeling or soul to it. This makes five-piece saxophone sections in big bands sound very dull and uninteresting, compared with, say, Benny Goodman's saxophone section. Some of this problem is due to the fact that the early saxophone players played horns by Conn, Buescher and Martin that had a bigger sound (even though the keywork wasn't as comfortable as on today's instruments).


Getting back to the drums, up to the late 1960s, K Zildjian cymbals were still made in Turkey, and they had a fabulous sound. Any surviving ones today are worth a fortune. Then, Zildjian moved its manufacturing to the U.S. and the new cymbals were nowhere near as good as the Turkish ones. They still aren't. Zidljians consulted with Elvin Jones and they came out with a range called K Constantinople. I have three of those, and they are very nice, but they still lack the old sound. There is a solution to this, though, which most drummers are probably not aware of. A guy called Agop, who worked for Zildjians in Istanbul, opened his own cymbal factory in Turkey. Just a few years ago, they brought out a limited edition series called "Istanbul Agop 30th Anniversary". Those cymbals are amazing, and are the real thing. I have the 13" hihats, the 18" crash and the 22" ride. Each is an orchestra unto itself. What a big sound! I wish that I could have Jo Jones over, to hear those hihats.

The type of drums changed toward the end of the 60s, and rock drummers use different equipment from that used by jazz drummers. It is quite common for there to be no vellum on the front of the bass.

Although some rock drummers are technically very good, rock drumming bores me to tears. A lot of rock drummers have so much gear onstage that it looks as if they bought the whole store. There is a veritable forest of stuff, and it's ridiculous when you consider how much noise Art Blakey could make with just a 5-piece kit.

I once played a jazz gig where our drummer had to use a rock drummer's massive kit that was already onstage. He almost disappeared in the forest, and he said plaintively "I'm over here, Stan" to the pianist! He extracted a 5-piece subset of the equipment and played on that.