In 1966, two powerhouses from the fabled Blue Note roster of the 1960s combined forces for live performances at the historic jazz venue Slugs’ Saloon in Manhattan’s East Village. Thanks to the drummer on those dates, a new Blue Note Records classic release Forces of Nature: Live at Slugs’ is born nearly sixty years later.
Pianist McCoy Tyner and tenor saxophonist Joe Henderson need no introduction to those with even a moderate understanding of jazz luminaries. Though they played in different bands, these in-demand sidemen found themselves on the same recording dates, including Henderson’s own impactful releases Page One (1963) and In ‘N Out (1964).
By the spring of 1966, Henderson and McCoy were in transition, trying out various ensembles after leaving the Horace Silver’s and John Coltrane’s bands, respectively. Henderson joined Tyner’s trio of Henry Grimes on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums for some gigs at Slugs’ some time that year, and engineer Orville O’Brien was on hand to record them, probably in hopes that a record company would buy the recordings and release them. They never did in this case and the master tape is presumed lost. But DeJohnette asked O’Brien for a copy at the time and he stashed it away in his personal library, where it sat for decades.
A few years back, DeJohnette decided he wanted the tape to reach the public and so he turned to the right man to get that done: Zev Feldman, the patron saint for lost jazz recordings. In addition to running his own Resonance Records and Jazz Detective labels, issuing previously unreleased live recordings, Feldman worked for Blue Note as a consulting archival producer and he knew that he’d find a willing partner in Blue Note head Don Was.
With cooperation from the Henderson and Tyner estates, DeJohnette – the last surviving member of this occasion’s quartet – produced these recordings along with wife Lydia DeJohnette and Feldman; engineer Matthew Lutthans undertook the crucial remastering job.
Forces of Nature: Live at Slugs’ (November 22, 2024, Blue Note Records) is an “astonishing windfall of an album” as depicted by jazz critic Nate Chinen in his insightful liner notes. DeJohnette, Joe Lovano, Jason Moran, Joshua Redman, Nasheet Waits, Terri Lynne Carrington and Christian McBride also wrote down their perspectives on the recordings for the release’s booklet, a signifier of the huge import of these recordings.
There are just six tunes played, but they’re stretched out over four vinyl sides, as these cats squeeze every drop of energy and inspiration out of each number.
“Isotope,” one of Henderson’s seminal songs, gets worked over in its hard bop form, as Tyner is showcased here as he did on the 1964 studio original. He doesn’t fall back on his familiar cliches (which would have still made for an excellent solo because McCoy Tyner cliches are just so good), and swings harder at Slugs’. DeJohnette isn’t Elvin Jones who drummed on the original but he comes up with polyrhythms on his own, displaying a unique approach to the drums this early on.
DeJohnette’s shuffling waltz sets off the early Tyner composition “The Believer” to a propulsive cadence, threatening to blow apart at times but the steady and perceptive Grimes keeps the meter under control. Tyner maintains a light touch as he breezily courses through his extended aside, and trades a couple of licks with Henderson and DeJohnette.
The hard bop workout “In ‘N Out” is more incendiary for this occasion and it doesn’t seem to matter that things go on for nearly half an hour. Henderson never seems to run out of original phrases during his 12-minute tear, and he doesn’t even has to pause to come up with them. Tyner cooks for nearly as long before trading blows with DeJohnette and Henderson, firing off a blizzard of notes that stays true to the blues-based pattern.
“Taking Off” is another side-long jam, this time a racing, minor blues devised on the spot by the band as a vehicle for major blowing. Here, the rhythm section is indispensable in both keeping the fire lit and setting the wide parameters. The peak comes, however, from DeJohnette’s own feature, a continuation of the complex timekeeping he was doing behind the front line. Happening so early in his unsurpassed career, the 23-year-old had already established a recognizable signature.
“We’ll Be Together Again” is the lone ballad piece but that doesn’t stop Henderson from pouring on the passion. It’s also slow enough to reveal Tyner’s rich and elaborate melodicism, and Grimes later gets his turn to shine with a marvelous bass solo.
Joe Henderson and McCoy would cross paths again in the studio sporadically over the ensuing decades, including on Tyner’s Blue Note masterpiece The Real McCoy the following year. However, Forces of Nature: Live at Slugs’ offers a rare glimpse of these two giants at their peaks convening on the bandstand freed from the constrictions of the studio and munificently supported by contemporaries who later went on to make their own mark on jazz. The combination of these men with the raw spirit of playing in a famed venue at a time when music all over was racing out toward new frontiers makes the often-stormy Forces of Nature a perfect storm.
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