On a Blue Note kick yet again- Grant Green

So finally after a few years of wanting to get my hand on the Blue Note Grant Green "1961-1966 Retrospective" box set I finally found it for a reasonable price. Curiously enough my set was made in Europe and shipped from Germany. Not sure why this is the case. Anyways, I feel like a kid in a candy store again. I mean this set has is jam packed with great jazz and incredible musicians over 38 tracks on 4 cds. I love vinyl but it has just become imposible to get all these records without having to fork over a few kidneys. Of course I have heard a ton of these tracks but not all.. not all.. I would calculate I may not have heard 14 of the 38 tracks compiled although I probably have a bunch of them on mp3 format somewhere..The pictures in the booklet, inserts etc (some should be in the picture immediately above this blurb) are the typical wonderful Francis Wolff photography. Its always interesting to me that these jazz cats always look so sharp in all the pictures. I mean they are perfectly groomed, manicured, dressed, styling gentlemen. All of them. For all the stuff you hear about who was doing what drug or having what problem when you look at the pictures Francis Wolff took they are all dressed to the nine's and styling.

Of course after taking a probably forced leave of absence from the label Green was back at Blue Note in 1969 and cut some incredible yet more on the funky/popular spectrum of things. Bob Blumenthal, like most critics, sort of dismisses the later Green and I feel thats very misguided but having said that the music on this box cannot be argued with or dismissed. Its great jazz. I am not a fan of compilations but for $20 this is a very worthwhile look at my favorite guitarist. Right now I'm listening to Jimmy Smith jamming with Green on their only collaboration now one of my favorite tracks I can tell its Lou Donaldson from the Natural One- Funky Mama- just came on.. This stuff is very hot....Of course Grant Green begins the song... One thing I found interesting is how young Green looks in the pictures be they from his arrival to New York City in 1961 or from later sessions in 1965.. and to add something to the discourse Gran Green apparently smoked Kool cigarretes by the way...