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Another treat is the appearance of James Brown horn man & arranger Fred Wesley who arranges all the horn parts & plays in the section along with trumpeter Jeremy Pelt & sax man Jaques- Swartz- Bart who gets some good rips in on tenor. In my opinion this is the album that best represents Soulive. This is a record where you can push the play button & let it go till the end. The band is able to fuse all of their many influences on this album from hip hop, house music, soul,R&B & of coarse modern jazz into a sound that is without a doubt their own.
Well I just had to express how I feel about this Soulive album Doin Something despite the 23 other reviews. The core Soulive trio of Alan Evans, Neal Evans & Eric Krazno are in top flight throughout the entire album. The one vocal track "Romantic" sung by Stephine McCay is also great & fits perfectly along side the instrumentals. For me a person who was on the ground floor of Soulive, being a student at The Berklee School of Music at the same time as Soulive guitarist Eric Krazno & living in the apartment downstairs from him.
Check out the song "One in Seven" and you'll hear the house or "Bridge to Bama" one of my personal favorites and you'll hear alittle of each. Check this album out & let it Do something to you. I got to hear lots of their music in its first stages. Doin Something holds alittle fun for everyone, each song has that head nodding groove but then you hear the melodies which remind me of a cross between bebop & intricate Chick Corea tunes thrown into a Lou Donaldson, James Brown bag.
I want to hear how these guys are progressing. This is a great follow up to Soulive's first album. Sometimes I wish they just recorded with the three of them, but the horns do sound nice. Soulive, the great soul jazz ensemble.
In the mean time, keep listening to this funky album. It's got some killer grooves that can put you right in the mood. They are one of my favorites, and probaly will be for years to come. They have the style, the looks, that appeal to the younger generation, yet they can still get down and groove and play some real jazz.I think we're only in the early stages of Soulive, but my guess is that they grow into a very decent band.
Soulive are the kings of modern soul funk jazz. Smoking soul, Soulive knows how to bring down the house.I think one of the reasons Soulive is so successful is that they appeal to everyone. Now they're signed to probaly the greatest record company in the country; Blue Note, which also hosts Medeski Martin Wood, Terence Blanchard, Joe Lavano, Charlie Hunter, Cassandra Wilson, and many more.I am a huge fan of organ trios. With their last studio release, Next, Soulive proved to have some soul left in them, but we haven't gotten anything in a while.I happened to catch a Soulive preformance on BET jazz the other night, and these guys were smoking.
And it's really bugging me. This is tight grooves. Soulive hasn't released a studio album in a while.
This is a great trio of young players but the guitarist's "hep-jazz-cat" look is pretty funny. Great sound a -little smooth at times though.
However, as another reviewer noted, it's not AS organic as MMW gets. This was my first Soulive album I bought, after seeing them 3 times live. I do not tire of this song ever. Assuming you can appreciate the piano greats like Bill Evans, McCoy, Chick and Herbie, you should love this. Stephanie McKay provides those, and one can tell she has as much soul as the three backing her in easily the most emotionally moving piece on Doin' Something.
Next is one of three tracks to have a 4 piece horn section. Track 3 is Evidence, and this is the debut of Neal playing piano, which some may not like, but I absolutely love. These guys posess that organic funk groove that makes the Meters or James Brown so much funkier than all the newer stuff held down by click tracks or (ugh) drum machines. The tracks (Doin' Something, Cannonball and Roll The Tape) just don't seem to be as spontaneous as the others as just a trio or plus one horn feel, which of course would make sense since it is trio plus horn arrangement.
Probably the most surprising thing of this album exists after the song supposedly ends. Definitely an album highlight. Bridge to 'Bama is next and is quite good. Onto the music.The album opens with one of their better known tunes, Hurry Up.And Wait. Before I delve into my review, I must say that this will be rather biased, as I know the drummer somewhat well and have other connections to the band (namely, their manager, jeff Krasno, Eric's brother).
This is another one of my favorite tracks off this album by far. Some of the solos on here seem rather haunting for the key/mode they're chosing, very modern and cool. Yes, it doesn't have that same raw energy that they posess live or on Turn It Out; yes the sonic qualities and mastering of the recording may not be top top notch; but it just gives it its own flavor, which I think should therefore be viewed in a slightly different light from how you'd view them live to truly appreciate the efforts on here, which are plentiful. Next is another well known tune, One in Seven, and is one of the more distinctive cuts. Last is another on of my favorite cuts, Joe Sample.
But I digress. I wasn't sure if I'd like the studio efforts for I know that they work extremely well live. It just has that quirkiness to it which I've grown to love from these guys. Cannonball is next, one of the horn section pieces, and is fine in its own right, but questionable as to it belonging on here.Shaheed is track 7, possessing a rather memorable melody played down low on Neal's B3, and serves as a great transition from Cannonball into Romantic, the album's one vocal piece. Check out how the tenor sax man (not detrimental to the song in any way) always comes back into the same melody during his solo, giving the song a strong sense of unity for which to expand off of. Next is Roll The Tape, which I like best of the three horn section pieces.
It is Neal playing solo piano in more of a true jazz-classical style, and it is astounding; first because one most likely wouldn't expect it from him, and second, one wouldn't expect to hear it on a Soulive album. But wait. This album I hope I should not tire of for a long time to come.
Two simple melodies start it off and they end it all with one statement of the Steppin' riff off of Turn It Out. However, after the first listen though, I was hooked. Afterwards is another one of my favorite tracks, Solid.
But still, I prefer it to be just as a trio or trio plus horn. If this doesn't get your foot tapping, then I don't know what will. Now I share the same sentiments with most other reviewers on here that Soulive loses some of it's essence having these guys play along.
Don't get me wrong, it's not a bad albumto put on and groove to, it just doesn't have that same raw, in-the-club, jam feel that turn it out did. Also in comparison with their first album this one does have a smooth and slightly overproduced sound which seems to be taking them farther and father from their original vibe of "live preformance as the escence of music" (or somthin like that). As there seems to be a bit of controversy over the horn section I thought I'd break the tie. First of I play trumpet so there's nothing I like more than some fat brass licks and solos, however, most of the tracks with horn arangements seem a little out of place and choppy if you will.
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