This breakthrough recording has a warm sun-tinged soulful jazz-funk feel, featuring a number of early “Ubiquity-era” classics including “Pretty Brown Skin,” “Hummin’ in the Sun,” “Can You Dig It?,” and the mid-tempo groover “Painted Desert.” This highly-collectable album seems to have set-up the foundation for what became Ayers’ signature sound moving forward. This brilliant, and often overlooked album from Ayers features some of the best jazz artists of this era, including trumpeter Charles Tolliver, saxophonists Joe Henderson and Harold Land, bassists Reggie Workman and Buster Williams, pianist Herbie Hancock, drummer Derek Bailey, and many others.Īyer’s first release on Polydor sees the vibraphonist shifting his focus away from straight-ahead jazz and towards a more funk-inspired fusion sound. During this same period, Ayers released two jazz-focused albums as a leader, with one of them being the 1967 recording Virgo Vibes (the other being the 1963 West Coast Vibes). Prior to to exploring a more funkier sound, Roy Ayers spent the sixties as a promising up-and-coming post-bop jazz vibraphonist, performing alongside Jack Wilson, Herbie Mann, and performing in the Gerald Wilson Orchestra.
Also remember to checkout BeatCaffeine’s 30 Essential Roy Ayers Songs playlist at the bottom of this post. Here are 15 essential records (in chronological order) by the jazz-funk legend. During the seventies and early eighties, the legendary artist released a string of groundbreaking recordings that defined any genre, fusing jazz, funk, and soul together to create his own signature sound which some have labeled “neo-soul.” Regardless of the label, his music can be heard across a wide diverse of settings, anywhere from the disco dance floor to a jazz nightclub.
ROY AYERS ALBUMS PLUS
Via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.Composer, vibraphonist, and vocalist Roy Ayers is one of the greatest jazz-funk musicians of our time.
Includes unlimited streaming of Roy Ayers JID002 The 8 tracks on this album testify to the love not only of a legendary musician’s legacy, but to the vitality & necessity of this music and these sounds in the present era, a thread that will likely run throughout all of the upcoming releases from Jazz Is Dead Records. Joining Ayers, Younge & Shaheed Muhammad on this musical journey are drummer Greg Paul, vocalists Loren Oden, Joy Gilliam, Saudia Yasmein, Elgin Clark & Anitra Castleberry, as well as Phil Ranelin & Wendell Harrison of the legendary Spiritual Jazz label Tribe Records. Over the course of its eight original compositions, written collaboratively by Younge, Shaheed Muhammad & Ayers and recorded at Younge’s Linear Labs in Los Angeles, the resulting album sounds both like an unearthed an unreleased album from Ayers’ classic period in the 1970s (which produced the oft-sampled “Red, Black & Green,” “We Live In Brooklyn, Baby,” “Everybody Loves The Sunshine,” and “Running Away), as well as something startling, new and unexpected. It wasn’t until 2020 that fans of Ayers discovered that in addition to those shows, the legendary vibraphone player had also recorded an entire album of new material with Adrian Younge and Ali Shaheed Muhammad. In February 2018, Roy Ayers performed four sold out shows in Los Angeles as part of the Jazz Is Dead Black History Month series.
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