USA, 1959, hard bop
Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers – Art Blakey and The Jazz Messengers (Moanin’): Is there an album out there faster out of the blocks than this one? What a banger to open with! Morgan’s front-and-center trumpet, Timmons’ classy piano work, but oh my… Blakey’s percussion… side B opens with the “Drum Thunder Suite”, and it’s a joy to listen to, to follow its three-part structure, hearing Blakey show off just what he can do, not only with the physical instruments but with his own sense of how to handle three disparate themes. Blakey carouses here, his drums like cannons, firing to the heavens only to have the sky echo back his own music… in thunder.
Museum Musica 