Count Basie - The Atomic Mr. Basie
Roulette, 1957
We are in the midst of a string of jazz and world music albums that, quite honestly, are absolutely perfect for cooking dinner too. While I complained about the lack of blues representation on this list, there is a ton of jazz, which is great because the whole point of listening to 1001 albums was to find stuff outside of my comfort zone. Despite the absolutely incredible album cover, The Atomic Mr. Basie is a fine jazz record for popular consumption. Nothing explosive about it. As previously noted I lack the context or vocabulary to properly analyze jazz records, but I did enjoy listening to this one. However I've since listened to the next record on the list--Thelonious Monk's Brilliant Corners--and it pretty much punted The Atomic Mr. Basie from my brain.
On a side note, going back to under-representation, I flipped through the index and found that there are a grand total of ZERO Ween albums on this list. What gives? I'm a relative newcomer to the church of the Boognish, but the fact that you have Limp Bizkit (and not even Significant Other, but Chocolate freaking Starfish and the Hot Dog Flavored Water) and no Chocolate and Cheese or The Mollusk is insulting and causing me to second guess this whole project. You could also make an argument for The Pod, God Ween Satan: The Oneness, White Pepper, or Pure Guava. Is Ween one of those bands with such a high (literally) barrier of entry that these relatively buttoned-up music critics wouldn't touch it with a ten foot pole? I mean I get it, I was once a hater too, thinking Ween was only for crude stoners and low lifes but all it took was listening to the complete discography over the course of a few months to change my opinion. To quote the coach from Letterkenny:
That said, now I'm on the lookout for more egregious omissions for the sternly worded letter I plan on writing to the editors of this tome.
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