Jazz Detective Schallplatten & CDs

Review: Bobby Rodriguez only ever put out one solo album throughout his musical career, the much coveted Simply Macrame, with the majority of his time spent mentoring in and playing with California State University Long Beach Studio Day Band or The Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra. This sublime LP from 1973 has been kindly reissued by Jazz Detective, complete with its original artwork, and it still sounds fresh and full of ideas 45 years after its initial release. Tropical in its movement but traditional in terms of execution, the album explores the funner, more dance-friendly side of jazz, with Rodriguez's supreme trumpeting at the forefront. Although it's only four tracks long, the LP truly showcases the man's dexterity with his horn, and the free-minded tendencies that often went into his jazz. This is 1973, remember, so you're looking at some pretty genre-defining material here. Not to be missed...