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Reuben Wilson - Movin' On
Savant Records
One of my favorite organists, Reuben Wilson, manages to
re-emerge into the spotlight with one of the best albums of his
career, the excellent Movin' On. The choice of title is inspired
as Wilson has seemingly shed a lot of the organ cliches of his
classic '60's work and decided to attack the B-3 with an
inspired attitude that shows plenty of growth and relevance.
Truly, Wilson has 'moved on' from his early years and is
entering a new phase of his career fully rejuvenated and with a
seeming endless supply of fresh ideas.
Never the most prolific of artists, when Wilson does
decide to do an album he has always managed to set the bar high
and keep the quality up. Not that fans of B-3 organ grooves and
jazz fans in general have always noticed. A relatively
late-period signing to Blue Note when the label was mostly
encouraging its' artists to explore the popular soul-jazz route,
Wilson's five sessions for the label were pretty much ignored at
their time of release. After a subsquent three-album deal at
Groove Merchant and an album with The Fatback Band, Wilson
pretty much retired for the better part of twenty years. Thanks
to the acid-jazz revival and a ton of beatheads looking for cool
grooves to sample, Wilson's work steadily gained notice by word
of mouth and his older albums on Blue Note suddenly became
collector's items. It took roughly twenty years, but Wilson
finally got the respect he desrves as being a master of the B-3
and he relishes his role as elder statesman of the groove-jazz
era.
It's a role jazz desperately needs him to play as he is
one of the few surviving original artists of the sub-genre. Now
71, Wilson still manages to display a youthful vigor in his
solos and his mood here is decidedly ebullient, as is the
demeanor of his band. Featuring six-string wizard Grant Green
Jr. (Green Jr,. is a fine, fine guitarist, as was his father,
the immortal Grant Green Sr., but is the possessor of perhaps
the most well-meaningly unfortunate names in the music business
as far as being able to carve out his own identity. I mean, are
you gonna expect anything innovative from James Brown Jr. or B.B.
King Jr.?) and saxophonist Robert Chaseman as soloists along
with Wilson, the group takes the standard organ trio (usually
augmented by either guitar or sax but seldom both as this set
boasts) premise and expands the sonic palette tremendously.
While the premise of this album is to make great R&B-derived
groove jazz it somehow becomes much more than that. Wilson cuts
such a deep groove on this album it's a wonder he was able to
climb out of it!
Fans of R&B based groove jazz will love this album.
While not groundbreaking by any means, it is a killer disc that
will no doubt be great party music or music to get you grooving
around the house. You can't not get into a great mood while
listening to this. The grooves are infectious and the playing
fantastic. Check out Reuben Wilson, the last great original
master of the B-3! - Scott Homewood
www.savantrecords.com
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