Hank Mobley in The New Yorker

[Joe]

Richard Brody talking Hank, inspired by Mosaic's new set.

https://www.newyorker.com/culture/the-front-row/the-haunted-jazz-of-hank-mobley

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

thanks! reading now....

I mean i guess i see how a professional journalist would draw the line that hank never had political song titles......reminds me of why people rag on the New Christy Minstrels, they had no political songs, dylan was the true poet of the movement et al.......................

[chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez]

i like how author has learned from all the good mobley research put out thru the years

[CJ Shearn]

I don't generally care for Brody's viewpoints, but this article was pretty good.

[Joe]

7 hours ago, chewy-chew-chew-bean-benitez said:

i like how author has learned from all the good mobley research put out thru the years

No joke. It's an OK piece, didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. But I'm not really the audience for it. Still nice to see Hank get some attention from a media outlet of this size/reach.

[JSngry]

36 minutes ago, Joe said:

 It's an OK piece, didn't tell me anything I didn't already know. But I'm not really the audience for it.

Same.

I do think it's a positive that he recognized the shift in emotion of the later recordings. Me, I put it down to a stubborn passive-aggressive response to the usic-wide climate of playing more - more notes, more intensity, more aggression, more everything. Hank reacted to that by playing less of everything except personal intensity. The intensity on something like Dippin' is more than a little powerful, precisely because it's more energy jam-packed in minimal sized deliveries.

Kno0wing what we now know about Hank's "apparent depression" (and no, I'm not qualified to make a clinical diagnosis, but that's what it seems like with all the anecdotal evidence), there's a "militant minimalism" in the music that seems to reflect what was also going on in the person.

Also glad that he noted that last version of "Summertime", which is really one of the more bloody pieces of recorded jazz, all things considered. But that's a pretty bloody record, period, whenever Hank is on it, which is not always.

[ghost of miles]

10 hours ago, CJ Shearn said:

I don't generally care for Brody's viewpoints, but this article was pretty good.

Same here on both counts!

[clifford_thornton]

It is aiiit. I like the music better.

[CJ Shearn]

2 hours ago, ghost of miles said:

Same here on both counts!

I remember he bashed a movie just for how an ethnnic were portrayed (even if you disagree with that, is it really worth slamming a film entirely?) and how he felt underwhelmed by Both Directions at Once because he expected it to be like  live Coltrane which is a bit absurd.  I write about jazz but don't consider myself a "critic" in that sense of the word I write about what I enjoy, stuff I don't like I'll leave to someone else. I feel like writers such as Brody  have an entitlement to something and what they write about has more to say about them as people.  Critics are a strange bunch.

[gmonahan]

Liked the article. Like others here, I'm always glad to see Hank get a little attention.

 

 

 

gregmo

[JSngry]

Going back to the LT Series, Cuscuna has kept Hank plausibly appreciated for 40+ years. I certainly hope that there is somebody around to carry on that task, and also that there is a cultural  climate that will be receptive to it. "Hip" was never hip, never will be. But hip is forever, hopefully.

[Brad]

1 hour ago, gmonahan said:

Liked the article. Like others here, I'm always glad to see Hank get a little attention.

 

 

 

gregmo

Exactly. I wonder how many non jazz people ever heard of him before. Maybe this article will help. 

[Late]

The article had me revisit A Slice Of The Top. I didn't know that Hank considered this album his finest work.

[Kevin Bresnahan]

1 hour ago, Late said:

The article had me revisit A Slice Of The Top. I didn't know that Hank considered this album his finest work.

I really do like this one.

[Late]

1 hour ago, bresna said:

I really do like this one.

Me too. And the fact that Hank composed and arranged this album from prison — he must have had a bittersweet attachment to it. The playing is above par, with Tyner and Morgan especially shining. If there's a certain "melancholy" to Mobley's solos, one can find it here. As much as I adore Billy Higgins, I keep wanting to hear Elvin on this album (but maybe that's because McCoy's on it). In the end, the recording's once again available for us all — Hank's personal favorite.

[Rooster_Ties]

1 hour ago, bresna said:

I really do like this one.

Slice is my #1 favorite Hank album (has been for well over 15 years), with Third Season a close second.

[jlhoots]

3 hours ago, Late said:

The article had me revisit A Slice Of The Top. I didn't know that Hank considered this album his finest work.

Nice liner notes by John Litweiler. Haven't seen him around here lately.

[Gheorghe]

I didn´t know that Hank Mobley had lung Cancer. I knew he had respiratory Problems as early as 1970 I think, because you can hear it already on "Thinking of Home" that he is short of breath. 

But if he really had Cancer it seems even more Incredible that he tried a gig just few months before he died, the one with the Duke Jordan Trio. 

[JSngry]

I had heard collapsed lung, never heard lung cancer until now.

[Brad]

NRFS has always been my favorite. 

[Steve Reynolds]

On 3/26/2020 at 7:15 PM, bresna said:

I really do like this one.

Me too

[LWayne]

A Slice of The Top is my favorite as well. Whom am I to argue with Hank?

 

LWayne

[Late]

The New Yorker article has sent me on a Hank Mobley listen-a-thon. I've really been enjoying this album:

I always forget that it's John Hicks on piano and not Cedar Walton. The compositions on this album are first-rate, and I think I might actually like Blue Mitchell paired with Mobley more than Lee Morgan paired with Mobley. (Blasphemy!) The ballad "No More Goodbyes" has to be one of Hank's finest. Plus, the minor key bossa nova is wonderful.

[Gheorghe]

14 hours ago, Late said:

The New Yorker article has sent me on a Hank Mobley listen-a-thon. I've really been enjoying this album:

I always forget that it's John Hicks on piano and not Cedar Walton. The compositions on this album are first-rate, and I think I might actually like Blue Mitchell paired with Mobley more than Lee Morgan paired with Mobley. (Blasphemy!) The ballad "No More Goodbyes" has to be one of Hank's finest. Plus, the minor key bossa nova is wonderful.

Yes, that Bossa is also my favourite on this Album. And it´s one of the few occasions to hear Jackie McLean playing a bossa. He sounds great on it. 

[Joe]

Damn, Woody Shaw is just killing it on THINKING OF HOME. Hank, meanwhile, sounds particularly inspired by the material he penned for this date.