AUDIOPHILE CD
CHRIS MCGREGOR’S BROTHERHOOD OF BREATH Brotherhood Fledg’ling Records Born in South Africa, McGregor discovered black jazz, founded the Blue Notes band, headed a big band, was hounded by the authorities and then fled to Scandinavia and England. His sound combined jazz improvisation and South African vibes and possibly because of this, he never really received the backing he deserved from his record label, RCA. This album, featuring McGregor and his 12-strong band, including three of the original Blue Notes, was released in 1972 and a little cracker it is too. “It transpired that the rights to the album had reverted back to the artist,” said label boss David Suff, “and Chris’s widow wrote to the label and asked for the master tapes back. They’re in pretty good nick, they don’t look as though they’ve ever been touched.” The quarter inch tapes were flat transferred into the digital domain and then Dennis Blackham,
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engineer at Skye Mastering mastered them from there. “He had a very musical approach to the album,” said Suff, “He was more interested in preserving the feel of the album rather than taking a pernickety view. You know, ‘there’s a funny little noise from the foot pedal of the piano that we can take out’ which then damages the frequencies elsewhere. Not Dennis, he uses his ears.” Suff did an A-B comparison with the original album after the event – not before or during – just to monitor how the mastering had gone, “The newly remastered album has more life in it, it’s far more interesting. Dennis has done so little yet has squeezed that little bit of extra energy out of the tapes.”
THE SUPREMES This Is the Story, the ‘70s Albums Vol.1 1970-1973: The Jean Terrell Years Hip-O-Select Digitally remastered, this three CD box set is beautifully presented in hard-back book-style packaging, and examines the oft-overlooked
early seventies recordings of The Supremes. This was a tumultuous period when Diana Ross left, and taking her place, in walked Jean Terrell. Terrell’s Supremes were a brilliant outfit and are often overlooked or, worse, deemed unworthy of attention because of the void created by Ross. The new group was a lot more democratic than the Ross lead version, as producer, Frank Wilson explained, “I wanted to demonstrate a greater degree of versatility with the group, so it wouldn’t just be ooh and aahs, but Mary would take a lead and Cindy would take a lead.” In addition, Terrell had the power to lead from the front, “It was a voice that got your attention”, said Wilson. The group scored three hits in the early ‘70s: ‘Up the Ladder to the Roof’, ‘Stoned Love’ and ‘Nathan Jones’. ‘Stoned Love’ was the final number one R&B and pop hit for the Supremes in 1970, while both ‘Nathan Jones’ and ‘Up the Ladder to the Roof’ were Top Ten pop and R&B hits in 1971 and 1970, respectively - all are included on this set.
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12/4/07 15:23:45