Footprints represents
to me the apex of Wayne’s capacity to build haunting complexity of evident
simplicity and to take winding musical journeys while still staying in the same
spot. This is what I hear throughout the seminal Adam’s Apple album that featured Footprints and other classics
including:
A renowned weirdo who as a teenager loved science fiction
and dreamed of becoming a film maker, Wayne grew up in Newark, New Jersey in a
neighborhood called the Ironbound, named for being surrounded by railway
tracks. As a saxophonist he played with Art Blakey’s Quintet in the early 1960s,
until he was poached by Miles Davis’ quintet that happened to include Herbie
Hancock on piano.
He’s known as the eccentric genius who always answers one
question with another. His biographer Michelle Mercer opens the book
“Footprints” with a description of her first conversation with Wayne, which came
while she was covering a 2001 tour. She asked how he’d chosen the reportoire.
“What’s your earliest recurring memory?” Wayne offered in response. “Cause that’s Ocam’s Razor!” When fans would go
backstage hoping to chat with Wayne about the show, he would respond with a
one-liner like “This is the safe stuff we’re talking here! We can go deeper
whenever you’re ready.” One writer who
frequently accompanied rock fusion groupWeather Report on the road remembers at
one point asking Wayne for the time. Wayne
started talking about the cosmos and how time is relative. Joe Zawinul, the
hard-charging type-A Czech-born piano player who founded Weather Report with
Wayne, quickly interceded. “You don’t ask Wayne shit like that. It’s 7:06.”
Wayne is the most prolific of the three I’ve profiled here, with a staggering
collection of album after album of unbeatably creative music. These include a
lot of overlooked gems like Etcetera,
ends with the driving and relentless intensity of Indian Song.
Wayne, Herbie and McCoy were surrounded by and at times
joined like-minded musicians who I could perhaps describe as the archangels of
this saga. These include saxophonist Jackie McLean and trumpet players Freddie
Hubbard and Booker Little.
My taste in jazz has remained heavily centered in this era.
But as you can guess, this era – like every era – would lose steam. What
followed was a different sound, one that I’m either still learning to enjoy or learning
to accept that I don’t.
Albums of the era
The
Soothsayer, 1965
|
|
Second
Genesis, 1960
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Et
Cetera, 1965
|
Wayning
Moments, 1962
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The
All Seeing Eye, 1965
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Night
Dreamer, 1964
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Adam’s
Apple, 1966
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JuJu,
1964
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Schizophrenia,
1967
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Speak
No Evil, 1964
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Sideman performances of the era
The
Witch Doctor, Art Blakey, 1961
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Indestructible,
Art Blakey, 1964
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The
Body & the Soul, Freddy Hubbard, 1963
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E.S.P.,
Miles Davis, 1965
|
The
Search for New Land, Lee Morgan, 1964
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