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Jazz after 1979 that still sound GREAT

MR_ZIMMSMR_ZIMMS 210 Posts
edited June 2013 in Strut Central
Just to name a few great (spiritual) jazz albums after 1979:

Rickey Kelly - My kind of Music (1979)
George Coleman - Amsterdam after Dark (1979)
Schamek Farrah & Folks - La Dee La Da (1980)
Kamau Kenyatta - Asia Eyes ('80's)
Trio Spitsbergen - No one Around ('80's)
Bobby Broom - Modern Man (2001)
Sleep Walker - The Voyage (2006)
Routine Jazz Quintet - Routine Jazz Quintet (2008)
Roy Hargrove Quintet - Earfood (2008)
All Conrad Herwig albums (1991-present)
Matthew Halsal - On The Go (2011)


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  • ppadilhappadilha 2,244 Posts
    Vijay Iyer and Rudresh Mahanthappa have been making pretty great jazz over the past few years.
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    mark murphy did his best stuff in the 80's.
  • GuzzoGuzzo 8,611 Posts
    Nimbus label











  • LaserWolfLaserWolf Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
    Pharaoh Sanders Journey To The One and Rejoice.
  • edith headedith head 5,106 Posts
    This came out in 2008 and is most excellent

  • JimsterJimster Cruffiton.etsy.com 6,955 Posts
    LaserWolf said:
    Pharaoh Sanders Journey To The One and Rejoice.



    Chick Corea Akoustic band on grp is good.
    Dee Dee Bridgewater "Love and Peace"
    I like Wynton Marsalis "Intimacy Calling"
    Kenny Garrett"African Exchange Student"

    There are loads, not even touched the obscure stuff.

    Jazz will not die while there are people who want to let off on an instrument.
  • HorseleechHorseleech 3,830 Posts


    Phil Cohran - African Skies
  • tabiratabira 856 Posts


  • mrmatthewmrmatthew 1,575 Posts
    Some of my favorite jazz albums are from post 1979.

    Just off the top of my head

    Sonny Sharrock - Ask The Ages
    Ornette Coleman - Tone Dialing & Song X (with Pat Metheny)
    Bill Frisell - Rambler and pretty much his entire discography
    Ron Miles - entire discography
    Wynton Marsails - In This House, On This Morning
    Charlie Haden / Hank Jones - Steal Away
    Matthew Shipp - entire discography

    Current ACT label.
    All Thirsty Ear Label.
  • MR_ZIMMSMR_ZIMMS 210 Posts
    Cool! Thanks guys !
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    Why '79?
  • dammsdamms 704 Posts



  • MR_ZIMMSMR_ZIMMS 210 Posts
    Because by then (1979) jazzfunk became a bit "played out" and the mix of disco and jazz wasn't a great success as well. The only new thing that was happening to jazz was that is was transforming into fusion (Yellow Jackets etc).
    So most of the be-Bop cats went straight back to their roots and a new generation was standing up as well.
    So did jazz stay true and vital?
    In my opinion It did
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    MR_ZIMMS said:
    Because by then (1979) jazzfunk became a bit "played out" and the mix of disco and jazz wasn't a great success as well. The only new thing that was happening to jazz was that is was transforming into fusion (Yellow Jackets etc).
    So most of the be-Bop cats went straight back to their roots and a new generation was standing up as well.
    So did jazz stay true and vital?
    In my opinion It did


    Weren't there cats bringing back the "traditional" Jazz at the time that Fusion continued?
  • GamleOleGamleOle 508 Posts
    Danish release from 1983



  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    people have never stopped making "vital jazz music" but "jazz" hasn't been culturaly relevant since the early 70's and not commerically viable since the late 70's when lots of the big jazz labels folded. maybe muse records and a couple of others kept the flame goign (in the sense of producing quality recordings of name artists and young lions) a bit until the early 90's

    "jazz" has moved to the museums, conservatories and music faculties. it is "mood music" for cafes and "sophisitcated" love scenes in movies. "jazz", as a movement, is pretty much dead, and i don't think that's a controversial statement at all.
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    crabmongerfunk said:
    people have never stopped making "vital jazz music" but "jazz" hasn't been culturaly relevant since the early 70's. it has moved to the museums, conservatories and music faculties. it is "mood music" for cafes and "sophisitcated" love scenes in movies. "jazz", as a movement, is pretty much dead, and i don't think that's a controversial statement at all.

    Only if you've never been to New Orleans where jazz is still very much alive and well...with young people no less.
  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    HarveyCanal said:
    crabmongerfunk said:
    people have never stopped making "vital jazz music" but "jazz" hasn't been culturaly relevant since the early 70's. it has moved to the museums, conservatories and music faculties. it is "mood music" for cafes and "sophisitcated" love scenes in movies. "jazz", as a movement, is pretty much dead, and i don't think that's a controversial statement at all.

    Only if you've never been to New Orleans where jazz is still very much alive and well...with young people no less.

    i have never been, i plan to go one of these days but what i think you are describing is the exception to the rule...i hope i am wrong about that.
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    crabmongerfunk said:
    HarveyCanal said:
    crabmongerfunk said:
    people have never stopped making "vital jazz music" but "jazz" hasn't been culturaly relevant since the early 70's. it has moved to the museums, conservatories and music faculties. it is "mood music" for cafes and "sophisitcated" love scenes in movies. "jazz", as a movement, is pretty much dead, and i don't think that's a controversial statement at all.

    Only if you've never been to New Orleans where jazz is still very much alive and well...with young people no less.

    i have never been, i plan to go one of these days but what i think you are describing is the exception to the rule...i hope i am wrong about that.

    Yes, I guess it is the exception to the rule...BUT considering it's the very place where jazz originated to begin with, I'd say it's up to the rest of the world to either catch up again or stop trying to define what jazz is based on a cultural disconnect that never actually followed suit and disconnected in NOLA. In other words, jazz is first and foremost a street music and not necessarily that of the nightclub or recording studio. They are still JAZZ funerals after all.
  • gazgaz 232 Posts
    GamleOle said:
    Danish release from 1983




    liking this , want
  • gazgaz 232 Posts


  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    crabmongerfunk said:
    people have never stopped making "vital jazz music" but "jazz" hasn't been culturaly relevant since the early 70's and not commerically viable since the late 70's when lots of the big jazz labels folded. maybe muse records and a couple of others kept the flame goign (in the sense of producing quality recordings of name artists and young lions) a bit until the early 90's

    "jazz" has moved to the museums, conservatories and music faculties. it is "mood music" for cafes and "sophisitcated" love scenes in movies. "jazz", as a movement, is pretty much dead, and i don't think that's a controversial statement at all.

    Didnt Jazz have cultural relevance when it was mined by Hip Hop in the "Golden Age"?
  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    maybe but that was also part of wave of 70's retro going on in general around that particular time. i am not sure that answers the question. put it this way, when corporate amerikka tried to ram swing music down our throats in the late 90's or early 2000's did that mean that particular genre of jazz was relevant again or that it had always had relevance? i just think the audience for "jazz" is relatively small and has been diminishing for some time now and that it has little relevance to a mainstream audience other than as a signifier of something else like sophistication, nostalgia, urbanity, etc. etc...when it does appaear in a mainstream presentation it's usually a whimsical or nostalgic vocal number in the vein of "god bless the child", "girl from ipanema", "what a wonderful world" or "moody's mood" etc rather than something instrumental, exploratory or hard driving. i grant you that i could be talking complete shit here...
  • batmonbatmon 27,574 Posts
    crabmongerfunk said:
    maybe but that was also part of wave of 70's retro going on in general around that particular time. i am not sure that answers the question. put it this way, when corporate amerikka tried to ram swing music down our throats in the late 90's or early 2000's did that mean that particular genre of jazz was relevant again or that it had always had relevance? i just think the audience for "jazz" is relatively small and has been diminishing for some time now and that it has little relevance to a mainstream audience other than as a signifier of something else like sophistication, nostalgia, urbanity, etc. etc...when it does appaear in a mainstream presentation it's usually a whimsical or nostalgic vocal number in the vein of "god bless the child", "girl from ipanema", "what a wonderful world" or "moody's mood" etc rather than something instrumental, exploratory or hard driving. i grant you that i could be talking complete shit here...

    I hear you, but there are still regular Jazz nights here in NYC.
    My local bar that closed had a decent Jazz evening every thursday and that same band now plays sundays at the Red Rooster in Haarlem.

    The Retro 70's Wave? When was this?

    When Hip Hop started sampling the shit, dont tell me there werent a gang of attention given to Hip Hop Jazz/Jazz-Hop or whatever folks tried to subset that steez. Its wasnt Jazz but certain Jazz music was being highlighted, IIRC. The 90's had plenty of Jazz references.
    Brandford on Tonight Show, Mo' Better Blues film to name a couple. Wynton had his high exposure years in the 80's through the 90's.
    Nora Jones - (Jazz or not) was featured all throughout Jazz mags, and was a Pop star for a hot minute....(if she counts).

    I dont watch Treme but what role does Jazz play on that show?

    all add...

  • granjerogranjero 147 Posts
    Of course it's contentious to say Jazz Is Dead. It's certainly a heritage music when it appears in the mainstream but I'd say so is Rock and Hip Hop and classical music but that it's more to do with the narrow confines of populist taste than it is to do with a lack of innovation or energy.
    Jazz was once pop music; from jazz came skiffle and rock & roll and so on. Naturally over the course of 80 or 90 years it becomes less "vital" (to most people).
    Tons of 21st century jazz sounds awesome and amazing., and artists are still finding new things to say and are saying things in new ways. In the UK, for instance Kit Downes has made 3 beautiful-sounding albums.
    I love Treme and in the last season Anton Baptiste tries to play "modern" and there's another character who is a jazz trumpeter but in the main the music that's featured is New Orleans music (awesome blues, funk and second line type trad jazz music).
  • HarveyCanalHarveyCanal "a distraction from my main thesis." 13,234 Posts
    granjero said:

    Tons of 21st century jazz sounds awesome and amazing., and artists are still finding new things to say and are saying things in new ways. In the UK, for instance Kit Downes has made 3 beautiful-sounding albums.
    I love Treme and in the last season Anton Baptiste tries to play "modern" and there's another character who is a jazz trumpeter but in the main the music that's featured is New Orleans music (awesome blues, funk and second line type trad jazz music).

    Jazz literally started out as parade music. Fusing the drum circle activity at Congo Square to the military band template of the late 1800's, jazz was marched up and down the streets of New Orleans and from there, onto the world at large.

    Then it was transformed into a hundred different sub-categories as different places put their spin on it.

    But then during the 70's, the traditional jazz funerals started taking on a different color, with an emphasis on funk being pushed to the forefront. No more clarinets, nor old white dudes leading the charge.

    The outer public saw it as the street sweepers sophisticating street music by covering Monk and Bird and whatnot. But the revelation was really the other way around. It was jazz being taken back to its original form, and since then second line culture has not only enjoyed a massive revival...but IMO brass bands have actually evolved jazz to a place its never been before.

    In many ways, bop killed the progression of jazz by making it merely sit-and-admire music, like you are staring at a painting in wonder instead of grabbing a tambourine and actively becoming a part of the jazz movement at work. All of the popular innovations since then have only driven jazz farther down the hands-off, museum piece rabbit hole. So my contention is that only by taking jazz back to the streets, where it belongs, was anyone able to ever bring jazz back to life, which is exactly what's been happening in New Orleans the past ~25 years or so.

    Talk that shit, now roll with it...
  • LaserWolfLaserWolf Portland Oregon 11,517 Posts
    granjero said:
    Of course it's contentious to say Jazz Is Dead. It's certainly a heritage music when it appears in the mainstream but I'd say so is Rock and Hip Hop and classical music but that it's more to do with the narrow confines of populist taste than it is to do with a lack of innovation or energy.
    Jazz was once pop music; from jazz came skiffle and rock & roll and so on. Naturally over the course of 80 or 90 years it becomes less "vital" (to most people).
    Tons of 21st century jazz sounds awesome and amazing., and artists are still finding new things to say and are saying things in new ways. In the UK, for instance Kit Downes has made 3 beautiful-sounding albums.
    I love Treme and in the last season Anton Baptiste tries to play "modern" and there's another character who is a jazz trumpeter but in the main the music that's featured is New Orleans music (awesome blues, funk and second line type trad jazz music).

    Everyone is making good points, and I don't think there is any real disagreement here, only different perspectives of the same reality.

    BUT skiffle! GTFOOHWTWAUKS!

    In the 30s and 40s jazz was popular music.
    In every decade since there have been popular and ground breaking jazz artists including today.
    As for Jazz labels, independent labels come and go. We might never see another like Blue Note or Stax or SST.
    When I moved to podunk Portland in 1977 we had more jazz clubs than New Orleans or NYC did at that time.
    Every town I have ever lived in had a jazz scene*.
    None as important, vital or influential as NOLA, but still there.

    *Except Okmulgee OK, but some of the Western Swing players were awesome and listening to Coltrane.
  • JimsterJimster Cruffiton.etsy.com 6,955 Posts
    Esperanza Spaulding beat Bieber to Best New Artist Grammy a year or so ago.
    She's jazz. Deal.
  • fishmongerfunkfishmongerfunk 4,154 Posts
    J i m s t e r said:
    Esperanza Spaulding beat Bieber to Best New Artist Grammy a year or so ago.
    She's jazz. Deal.

    are grammy's being handed out on merit now? isn't it solely industry politics that determine who gets nominated for a grammy, much less who wins one?

    i am not dissing esperanza spaulding one bit but she is an attractive, stylish female (not unlike norah jones or diana krall who paved the way before) who can be easily marketed to certain demographics (the strabucks crowd springs to mind)
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