| | |  | Punk | Home » » » Complete Atomic Basie | | | | | | | Product Promotions: | | | | | Description: | | Bristling with excitement and electricity, this 1958 album represents the finest accomplishment of Count Basie's "New Testament" big band. His "Old Testament" band of the late 1930s, featuring stars Lester Young, Herschel Evans, Dickie Wells, and Buck Clayton, perfected the blues-drenched, straight 4/4 rhythm of Kansas City swing. Building on the blues foundation, this 1950s band features more ambitious compositions and a more dynamic sound and incorporates more modern developments. One constant, however, is the anchoring rhythm guitar of Freddie Green. As always, Basie can dig deeply into robust stride statements or choose each note as if he had to pay for them separately. Neal Hefti, the primary composer and arranger here, marvelously captures the strengths of each individual musician. His arrangements sparkle exuberantly on the up tunes and create vivid and exotic moods on the slower ones; clever and innovative without ever being overblown. Beefy tenor Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis, who was only in the band for a relatively short period, offers the most valuable and vital solo contributions, recalling Ben Webster's tenderness at times, squeaking and honking like an R&B man at others. --Marc Greilsamer | | | Product Details: | | | Audio CD Release Date:
| May 31, 1994 | | Studio:
| Blue Note Records | | Number Of Discs:
| 1 | | Average Customer Rating:
|  based on 20 reviews |
| | | Track Listing: | | | 1. | The Kid From Red Bank | | 2. | Duet | | 3. | After Supper | | 4. | Flight Of The Foo Birds | | 5. | Double-O | | 6. | Teddy The Toad | | 7. | Whirly-Bird | | 8. | Midnite Blue | | 9. | Splanky | | 10. | Fantail | | 11. | Li'l Darlin' | | 12. | Silks And Satins | | 13. | Sleepwalker's Serenade (Alternate Take) | | 14. | Sleepwalker's Serenade | | 15. | The Late Late Show | | 16. | The Late Late Show (Vocal Version) | |
| | | Customer Reviews: | |
Average Customer Review:
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3 of 3 found the following review helpful:
 ClassicSep 11, 2009
With all that happened in jazz after be-bop, big band jazz may be the last genre you land on. Listen to Steely Dan and this takes you to Miles, and Miles piggybacks you to Coltrane. If you are a rock person, it can take years to discover jazz prior to 1960. You are probably a jazz modernist, and big band seems like grandpas music.
Well, I am here to tell you, this logic is just wrong, and you need look no further than this album. Atomic Basie is big blues with warm, loving arms. The arrangements are lush as on any Beatles or electric Miles album. 1950s music, this comes at you with the embrasing sound of tube recording. This is a varried blues, with tons of instrumental textures, and nuances. Happy little chord subtitutions pop from Basie's charts constantly.
Soon, you are hooked, cuddling with this most mainstreem and inviting of jazz like a puppy in a blanket. The sophistication here, and there is plenty, comes from the layering of the instruments. The suave shading Basie puts in every messure. The little toots of muted horns that work as part of a rich whole. Nothing will stand out like a Coltrane solo or a Tony Williams drum abstraction, but the genius is the synergy of sound--the subtle little entrences and exits that you discover over years of hearing Atomic Basie.
So go ahead--listen to Ascention, Mahavishnu, Henry Cow, all the stuff that has become part of the diet for true music freaks like us.
But do yourself a favor: DIG ON THIS, too.
2 of 3 found the following review helpful:
 BEWARE! This is the MONO mix.Oct 28, 2008
This was an early 1957 stereo Roulette recording and one of Basie's best albums. Capitol/Blue Note elected to remaster this masterpiece in mono, instead of using the stereo master. They should be ashamed to release this wonderful album in this form. The stereo version is amazing. If you can find a used copy the first mid 80's CD issue of this on French Vogue (which is in stereo) grab it! (try Amazon France) The only reason I don't give this domestic reissue just one star is that it does contain some alternate and out takes. Not everyone is into the "back to mono" movement.
0 of 1 found the following review helpful:
Definitely explosiveJun 06, 2008
I've been on a big time big band kick of late, so after I got done pulling out (and putting back) a bunch of my Duke Ellington stuff, I bought some things new to my collection, including Thad Jones' Consummation and this highly recommended (by The Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings: Eighth Edition (Penguin Guide to Jazz Recordings)) work. After a couple of days with Consummation, and loving it to death, I realized that I hadn't yet given my Atomic Basie a listen and that Thad was with Count at the time of the Atomic recording, so I was curious to see if I would find the roots of Jones on this CD. I'm not exactly sure I found the roots of Jones. I think I might have found the whole tree. In big band annals, this recording has to be in the top three. It has a ton a depth and it plumbs every possible dimension to the fullest. The songs are a good mix of "blow 'em out" tunes as well as soothing ballads and big band swing standards, even including one vocal piece, an alternate take of The Late Late Show. What sets this apart from other big band recordings is the piano playing of Count Basie, as distinctive and prevalent as ever. Some might even get a little tired of hearing the famous Basie lick, or threads of it where he throws it in, but personally, I think it is like the artist's signature on a painting and I consider the work more valuable when it has it than when it does not. And most important for the audiophiles out there, this recording, although it is more than 50 years old now, is remarkably clean. The songs are mixed well, the instruments sound sharp and bright, and the solos are never out of balance with the support sections. Indeed, this recording sounds remarkably similar to Consummation in that its production is extremely modern sounding and Rice Krispie (snap-crackle-pop) free. I try not to get too casual in my reviews so that everything ends up getting five stars, but this one is truly deserving of that high ranking and praise.
For the jazz history buff and those who want to explore Basie's work further, I highly recommend picking up Basie's The Complete Decca Recordings, which features more of his singing as well as music more typical of the formative years of big band and swing music, instead of the already accomplished and fully developed style of big band featured in this recording. And for the music history buff, there is also a new book out: Dream Lucky: When FDR was in the White House, Count Basie was on the radio, and everyone wore a hat.... I haven't read it, but The Wall Street Journal had good things to say about it, so it is probably worth a look.
1 of 2 found the following review helpful:
You won't need a chairMay 22, 2008
cuz you won't be sittin' down when you listen to this. Signature Basie all over. Zoom in on the bass player. The horns punching. It's all here. I bought this for Whirly-Bird. Hang on to your hats.
2 of 2 found the following review helpful:
One of the Best EverJun 08, 2007
Simply put, this is one of the finest big band albums ever made. It has everything you could think of going for it, outstanding musicians, and an arranger who was born for the Basie band.
There has never been a more complimentary arranger for any band than Neal Hefti was for Basie during their brief association. Hefti's own album "Hot 'N Hearty" is ample proof of what a superbly hip arranger he was and what he would later contributed to the Basie band. Hefti never followed trends. Like Pete Rugolo, he set them.
I'll forever be thankful to my dad for introducing this album to me in the somewhat poorly mastered stereo LP version when it was first released in the early days of home stereo. I still have that record and it features the entire band on the right channel and the Basie rhythm section on the left. If you listen to it with head phones it'll drive you nuts! The monaural version released for this cd is much better balanced.
Dang, what more can you ask for in a big band? You get burning swingers like "The Kid From Red Bank (New Jersey, that is!)" and "Whirly Bird", one of the finest muted trumpet solos ever put to wax on the soulful, "Duet" featuring Thad Jones and Joe Newman and an absolutely all-time classic "Li'l Darlin'" where Wendell Cully (again muted trumpet) just breaks your heart. And everyone's already mentioned how Jaws contributed.
My only disappointment is with all the two-fers being released by Nelson Riddle, Billy May and on and on, they didn't include the almost-as-good "Basie Plays Hefti" recorded around the same time. Just glad I kept mine.
Simply put, this is my favorite Basie Album though I wish they'd release the nicely after-hours "String Along With Basie" and "Not Now, I'll Tell You When" just for the flag wavingly superb "Ol' Man River."
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