V.A.

Jazz Toys

(Perfect Toy Records, 2005)

Europeans have a very fickle sense of cool.  Some things simply work there that don’t work here.  And some things are cool across the Atlantic that are just cliché and cheese filled here.  Case in point: the majority of the tracks on Jazz Toys.  Beyond the disco and uncomfortable sounding funk of this compilation there are a number of tracks that can actually be translated into American Cool.  The Earth Quakers do “Soul Samba” and while there’s a bit too much orchestration, which plagues other funk tracks on here, the acoustic guitar works well together with the rest of the group.  Fusion classic, “Chameleon”, gets re-done by Kaatee Frits Quartet.  Interesting choice of covers.  But frankly, no one’s going to be able to pull off a cover of this tune that touches the original; close, but not quite there.  Additionally, there are a number of more traditional jazz tracks.  Chet Baker, who apparently recorded one off dates with European groups during tours, here gives us a track with a French group that sounds too Latin style to hail from the interior of the continent.  The other more traditional sounding jazz track comes from a group called Hipnosis.  Most of their albums are instrumental, but for this compilation, they choose to include a vocal number.  And I can’t say that it works out in their favor.  Not bad, but the female vocals just aren’t all that pleasing.  In its totality, this compilation isn’t really all that pleasing either.  Some artifacts of music gone by are lost for a reason.   Here, sometimes unfortunately, they find the light of day.

V.A.

I Like It (Vol. 2)

(Compost, 2005)

I Like it Vol. 2 is a compilation from Compost Records that’s organized and compiled in an interesting fashion. From each of four different producers or groups comes a selection of any favorite songs each might have. The genres touched upon hit upon everything but country and gospel pretty much. The first gentlemen up, Trevor Jackson, gives us listeners a cover of an Augustus Pablo track, which ends up sounding a bit too cheesy for good tastes, and a few electronic based songs. A man simply named Pole serves up a solo Dave Thomas (from Cleveland’s Pere Ubu) track, an extremely solid hip-hop outing from The Goats and a good electro hip-hop track from Headset (Plug Research). A track from Can, apparently off of a single of theirs, along with some jazz and funk come from the collection of Dorfmeister (Kruder & Dorfmeister). For some reason, though, the folks who compiled this disc saved the most singular of visions, and least interesting to me, series of selections for the end of the record.  The group Trockski some more electro along with a P-Funk jam of inferior quality.  These tracks serve as in interesting way to compile a record, insight for fans of each of these artists, but also serve to form a very spotty album. I sold it.