My Favorite Buddy Rich Album - "Plays and Plays and Plays"

[Eupher]

Recorded in 1977 in the studio.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9c8LOfVcEgM

It just don't get no tighter than this -- tighter than a bull's ass in fly time. I've played 2nd trombone on the Nestico chart "Ya Gotta Try" and it's a smoker. Gotta play LIGHTLY on that one! Don Menza played tenor in the group "Supersax" back in the 70s and wrote lots of burning swing charts. Listen to those trombones bite and listen to the saxes burn through, Buddy kicking them all.

Bob Mintzer is another tenor player who has built a career on not only his charts, but his big band. Great stuff.

The only stinker in this album is "Kong" but we can forgive Buddy for this one. He was trying to be pop-you-lair and his fans didn't and don't give a shit about funk or disco. Just play some burnin' swing and get 'r done. 

Charts:
1. Ya Gotta Try (Sammy Nestico) 0:00
2. Time Out (Don Menza) 3:36
3. 'Round Midnight (Thelonious Monk, Arr. Dick Lieb) 9:23
4. Tales of Rhoda Rat (Bob Mintzer) 16:11
5. No Jive (Bob Mintzer) 24:09
6. Lush Life (Billy Strayhorn, Arr. Phil Wilson) 30:05
7. Party Time (Bob Mintzer) 34:14
8. Kong (Composer Unknown, Arr. Lou Marini) 39:50
9. Mickey Mouse (Jimmie Dodd, Arr. Barry Kiener) 44:54

Personnel:
Alan Gauvin – saxophone
Dean Palanzo – saxophone
Steve Marcus – tenor saxophone, soprano saxophone
Bob Mintzer – tenor saxophone, flute
Mauro Turso – saxophone
David Stahl – trumpet
Dean Pratt – trumpet
John Marshall – trumpet
Ross Konikoff – trumpet
Clinton Sharman – trombone
Rick Stepton – trombone
David Boyle – bass trombone
Joshua Rich – guitar
Steve Khan – guitar on "Kong"
Barry Kiener – keyboards
Jonathan Burr – bass
Will Lee – bass on "Kong"
Buddy Rich – drums
Errol "Crusher" Bennett – congas on "Kong"
Gwen Guthrie – vocals (on "Kong")
Josh Brown – vocals (on "Kong")
Lonnie Groves – vocals (on "Kong")
K. R. Grant – vocals (on "Mickey Mouse")

[Eupher]

Barry Kiener, the piano player on this album, died of a heroin overdose about 9 years after this album was recorded. He was 30 when he died, which made him about 21 when he recorded this album. Unbelievable talent gone to waste from drugs. A tragedy.

[freedumb2003b]

Barry Kiener, the piano player on this album, died of a heroin overdose about 9 years after this album was recorded. He was 30 when he died, which made him about 21 when he recorded this album. Unbelievable talent gone to waste from drugs. A tragedy.

Same for Traffic's flautist Chtis Wood who all but created the jazz/rock flute countermelody sound - even more than Ian Anderson. Dead at 33 from liver disease resulting from booze and drugs. I literally have ties in my closet older than that.

[Eupher]

Same for Traffic's flautist Chtis Wood who all but created the jazz/rock flute countermelody sound - even more than Ian Anderson. Dead at 33 from liver disease resulting from booze and drugs. I literally have ties in my closet older than that.

There are tons of examples of those world-class musicians who have died from overdoses. I recall an account of vocalist Billie Holiday who remarked at Charlie Parker's funeral (paraphrased), "I'm probably the next to go." She died at age 44 in 1959 while Parker died at age 34 in 1955. Both were heavy boozers and heroin users. I caught one of Chet Baker's last performances in the Quasimodo in Berlin in 1986. He was a trumpeter in the 298th Army Band in Berlin in the late 1940s and his ear brought him world-renowned success. But he stayed a constant user of heroin and eventually launched himself out of a hotel room window in Amsterdam in 1988.

A little more currently, Stevie Ray Vaughan (blues guitarist) died in a plane crash at an early age (I think 1990 or so), but he was clean and sober when that happened.

Gigging on the road is a tough life - which explains why I am loathe to do more of that. I've spent a boatload of time living out of a suitcase, from gig to gig. Mrs. E still thrives on it (she's a violinist/violist and pianist), but not me.