专辑简介

This recording does not revolutionise the history of jazz, nor is it a showcase for a musical prodigy. Instead, these musicians have around 170 years of experience between them of playing live for swing dancers, jazz purists, night owls, festival fans, club goers and casual listeners. They can be heard on dozens of recordings as accompanists or soloists. So they know their craft. The session leader has brought back the once-popular subtone, hence the title of the disc. Playing with plenty of air, he produces a big, breathy subtone sound. It's not about quick fingers or the slickest odd rhythms or changing harmonies. It's about telling stories from the smoky "juke joints" of the forties, when the audience didn't care whether what the band on the small stage was playing was "real" jazz. Just as long as you could dance to it, and it had swing, and you could still hear a friend talking, maybe about the blues. This jazz was not from textbooks, it was from personal experience, fading slowly into the background with booze and jitterbug. These are the stories told here by Duke Seidmann and his rhythm section. They won't change the world. TWIDDLY BITS gives us the crumbs that remain when that which we rub between our fingers has all but gone. RECORD HOP is not a dance for eternity, but a dance here and now with an attractive partner in your arms. I CAN'T GET STARTED, or can I? TAKE 'EM OFF, TAKE 'EM OFF - a partner's clothes, or the debt(s) of the dancer? The gospel mood leaves the choice open. On SUNDAY you can still smell the smoke from Saturday night on your clothes, but somewhere between the bar and the church, SEARSY, KALLI THE KOOLO and even WILLIE with his HAND JIVE meet with the unspoken hope of some BROTHERHOOD OF MAN. Ancient, repackaged pieces like ROYAL GARDEN BLUES are side by side with new ballads like Gaby Moreno's DAYDREAM BY DESIGN, preluded by David Ruosch in Willie "The Lion" Smith mode.

This is not a CD for purists or followers of the genius cult. But if you want to dance, drink, smoke, or listen to someone putting his own blues into words, you'll find that this will do very nicely as a soundtrack .