ROLAND KIRK jazz LP MERCURY “We Free Kings” stereo ‘61 EXCELLENT

$

33

Artist:   ROLAND KIRK

Title:   “We Free Kings”

Label:   MERCURY.  Stereo pressing on medium weight vinyl.  Label is black with silver text.  Catalog number is SR-60679. 

Year:  1961. 

Condition: 

DISC:  Vinyl is EXCELLENT with full original gloss.  Has been played a small number of times and handled with care.  There are a couple slight hairline paper scuffs but no serious or audible marks or problems.  Plays beautifully with superb fidelity.  Labels are clean.  This hard-to-find LP is one that you will never need to upgrade.      

JACKET:   Jacket is nice VG+.  Laminated front panel is clean and bright, with a small area at the upper right where the top layer has torn.  A few small wear spots on bottom seam.  Reverse is clean with no writing or stickers.  Not a cutout.  Overall a very nice jacket to accompany the beautiful disc.     

Track Listing: 

Side One:

• Three for the Festival
• Moon Song
• A Sack Full of Soul
• The Haunted Melody
• Blues for Alice  

Side Two:

• We Free Kings
• You Did It, You Did It
• Some Kind of Love
• My Delight

Review: 

“We Free Kings, Roland Kirk's third long-player, is among the most consistent of his early efforts.  The assembled quartet provides an ample balance of bop and soul compliments to Kirk's decidedly individual polyphonic performance style.  His inimitable writing and arranging techniques develop into some great originals, as well as personalize the chosen cover tunes.  With a nod to the contemporary performance style of John Coltrane, as well as a measure of his influences -- most notably Clifford Brown and Sidney Bechet -- Kirk maneuvers into and out of some inspiring situations.  His decidedly 'Trane-esque solos on "My Delight" are supported with a high degree of flexibility by one-time Charles Mingus' pianist Richard Wyands and Dizzy Gillespie percussionist Charlie Persip.  The album's title track is a Kirk original, based on the melody of the Christmas hymn "We Three Kings."  Incorporating recognizable melodies into Kirk's oft times unorthodox musical settings would prove to be a motif throughout his career.  An example is the highly touted cover of Charlie Parker's "Blues for Alice."  This is an ideal avenue for the quartet to explore one of Kirk's specialties -- the blues.  The almost irreverent manner in which he fuses blues and soul music into the otherwise bop-driven arrangements is striking.  "A Sack Full of Soul" is a funky number with a walking-blues backbeat that perfectly supports Kirk's swinging solos.  The stop time syncopation is reminiscent of Ray Charles' "What'd I Say." "

(courtesy Lindsay Planer, allmusic.com.)

Guaranteed to be original and authentic.  I do not sell bootlegs or modern reissues.

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The records are removed from the jackets to protect the cover.
Both the LP and jacket are sandwiched between additional layers of cardboard.

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