ELTON DEAN — Happy Daze (as Ninesense) (review)

ELTON DEAN — Happy Daze (as Ninesense) album cover Album · 1977 · Progressive Big Band Buy this album from MMA partners
3.5/5 ·
Sean Trane
After the relatively disappointing OFtE album, the “nonette” group comes back with the more adventurous Happy Daze effort with roughly the same line-up, if it wasn’t for Malfatti having left. Just four fairly long tracks on this second (and final) album,

The opening 12-mins Nicrotte starts in a typical KTG fashion, but by the sixtgh minute, it has veered into a dissonant quagmire and ending back where it started. The album’s best moment is the 8-mins+ Seven For Lee, a torrid JR/F mid-paced piece, much reminiscent of what Tippett’s sextet did early on in the decade. In contrast, the flipside’ lo-paced Sweet FA is a relative disappointment, given the track’s promising title, as it’s mostly bluesy standardy jazz., but the second part does speed up to a sometimes dissonant hard bop trip. The closing almost-11mins Three For All is a bop/trad piece that continues the musical propos of its preceding track. Outside the excellent Seven For Lee track, this album doesn’t bear much resemblance to either KTG (as Elton liked to think) or even more BoB.

The weird thing about this Ogun 2on1 reissue is that the albums are presented in a non-chronological order, starting with the 77-released Happy Daze before the 76-released Oh For The Edge one. By Ogun label standards, neither of Ninesense’s two albums were particularly avant-garde, and they may even disappoint somewhat the people exploring the label’s catalogue, expecting extremely challenging music. But let not that deter you, both albums are still quite worthy of investigation for a more traditional jazz buff.

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