Blue Mitchell - Blue's Blues

BLUE MITCHELL
Blue's Blues
1972
256+ VBR
Vinyl rip & scans from Mainstream MRL 374

Good news and bad news, faithful readers. The bad news first: this will be the last round of posts for a few days. The good news is the reason. Before the weekend I picked up a used turntable at a good price, a Technics SL-D20, to replace the crappy Kenwood belt-drive my buddy lent me and the vinyl's sounding fuller and much cleaner! Even better news is that all new vinyl rips on Soundological will not only sound better, they'll need less cleaning up so I can post them more often. The best news is this post of Blue Mitchell's Blue's Blues was the first LP played on the table with a brand new Audio Technica AT92E needle.

Blue Mitchell - Trumpet, Flugelhorn
Darrell Clayborn - Bass [Fender]
Ray Pounds - Drums
John Guerin - Drums
Joe Sample - Electric Piano, Piano [Acoustic]
Freddie Robinson - Guitar [Electric]
John Mayall - Harmonica
Herman Riley - Saxophone [Tenor], Flute

1 Casa Blues (8:25)
2 Just Made Up (7:32)
3 Blues' Blues (7:05)
4 Granite & Concrete (9:51)
5 I Didn't Ask To Be (10:09)


AMG Review
by Scott Yanow

At the time that this Mainstream LP was recorded, Blue Mitchell was the featured trumpeter with John Mayall's blues group. Mayall returned the favor for Blue's set, playing harmonica with an electric octet headed by Mitchell. Among the sidemen are Herman Riley (on tenor and flute), keyboardist Joe Sample and guitarist Freddy Robinson. The material (all obscure originals) is primarily blues-oriented, and the music overall is listenable and funky, but not particularly memorable. Just an average date from these fine musicians.

Dusty Groove review

Sweet soulful work from trumpeter Blue Mitchell -- a set that has him working with a slightly large group of players, but in a style that's always very much in the groove! There's a nice electric undercurrent to the record throughout -- sometimes in the instrumentation from other players, sometimes in the overall way the grooves are put together -- which gives the record a quality that's almost like a funky soundtrack at the best moments! The lineup is a bit weird, too -- with Joe Sample on keyboards, Freddy Robinson on guitar, Herman Riley on tenor and flute, and even John Mayall on harmonica -- playing with a vamping funky edge on a few tunes! The title track -- "Blues Blues" -- is a great little jazzy break number, and other tracks include "Granite & Concrete", "Casa Blues", and "I Didn't Ask To Be".

Like the bluesier style of jazz on this release? You also might want to check out a rediscovered lost session from around the same time where Mitchell played with Mayall and Albert King over here.

If you haven't already stopped by the Blue Mitchell post put up earlier this month on Soundological, you might want to check it out since it has beaucoup links and info regarding his 70s material. Otherwise, get down on it HERE and HERE.