Tracks: Desafinado//Samba Dees Days//O Pato//Samba Triste//Samba de Uma Nota So//E Luxo So//Baia

Hooray bossa nova! Hooray Brazil! Well, I’ll be honest and admit that my exposure to Brazilian music is rather limited and pretty obvious – I’ve heard the first Os Mutantes album, Joia by Caetano Veloso and of course the album everyone’s heard even if they’ve never heard of it, Getz/Gilberto. But I did spend a good part of my first few months with the internet downloading Sergio Mendes tunes from Limewire, so at least there’s that.

I really do like Bossa Nova, though. Many’s the afternoon I’ve whiled away with an Astrud Gilberto compilation on the turntable, drifting of amidst the narcoleptic haze of minor chords. I guess I’m attracted to it for the same reason most people are – it manages to be about as quiet and unassuming as it’s possible for a pop song to be while still remaining complex and interesting. I don’t know how people from Brazil approach it, but I tend to view it as such lovely, sunny music, like an evening breeze. Unfortunately this sort of listenable quietude has given it the reputation of being elevator music, but as I said the joy of good bossa nova is that it doesn’t step across the line into muzak – there’s usually a great deal of tension in the song, keeping it tightly wound and more than a little danceable.

Given my fondness for this sort of thing, I was looking forward to Jazz Samba quite a bit. Saxophonist Stan Getz is one half of the Getz/Gilberto team, and he has such a marvellous cool jazz sort of tone. Getz was instrumental in introducing Brazilian music to American audiences, both through this album and through his collaborations with Joao Gilberto and Antonio Carlos “Tom” Jobim. He wasn’t the first, granted – Dizzy Gillespie had already been playing “Desafinado” with his big band for a while, and the film Black Orpheus had of course broken Brazilian music in a big way back in 1960. It actually makes sense that Black Orpheus would have that sort of affect on people. It’s actually a very slight, perhaps even vacuous sort of film (once you get past the idea of an all-black cast playing dignified human beings in 1960 – although I’m not sure you can describe anyone as dignified if they spend most of film running about in gold lame short-shorts), but the makers had such an obvious fascination with the ornamental aspects of Brazilian culture, and layer on the sensory overload to such an extend what with all the swirling colours and constant songs and dancing, that I really doubt that anyone in 1960s America could have failed to be moved. For sheer spectacle, Black Orpheus makes Singin’ in the Rain look like A Man Escaped. Plus they had Jobim doing the songs, and that guy is ace.

To get back around to this album, though (although it’s my blog and I am free to ramble as I will) – Stan Getz recruited Charlie Byrd, fresh back from a state-sponsored tour of Brazil, and together they recorded Jazz Samba. “Desafinado” went on to be a massive hit and really lit a fire under the 1960s bossa nova craze. I can see why “Desafinado” would be a smash – it’s a great song to begin with, and benefits especially from Getz’ lovely sax work and the neat little pulsing bass intro. The percussion is a bit busy, though – there is this especially annoying little tick-tick on a drum rim that is through the whole song and bugs the heck out of me. Maybe the beefier percussion is meant to serve as the “samba” element of the album? And then of course there’s also Charlie Byrd’s guitar work... I’ll be perfectly frank and admit that I could do without Charlie Byrd. He’s a very able guitarist, but he solos his way through everything and the results are just too damned busy. There’s also the problem of his being mixed too bloody loud, and the result is an irritating, tinny jangle away in the right channel that just will not shut up! Why can’t he just play nice little warm chords like Joao Gilberto would? I guess that’s the “jazz” element of the album... I shouldn’t be too hard on Byrd, since he was apparently the driving force behind putting the album together, and he does sound alright when he isn’t trying to noodle away at the same time as Getz. He does have terrible guitar tone, though.

All in all, this is a noble and largely successful attempt to “do” Brazilian music. The best songs here are the Jobim numbers “Desafinado” and “Samba de Uma Nota So” and they are genuinely great recordings, thanks in no small part to some great work by dual bassists Keter Betts and Gene Byrd. The fact that there are two bassists does give some idea of the problem inherent in this album, though. It feels over-stuffed and noodly, and that is never something I want to be able to say about a bossa nova album. The drumming isn’t very good, either...

So, if you’re interested in bossa nova then the best bet might be to just download the two tracks below and then get Getz/Gilberto instead. This is a good album, but hardly a classic – the other cuts can’t hold a candle to the two stand-outs, and “Samba Dees Days” is genuinely annoying. Overall it’s given over a little too much to light-jazz noodling. Remember what I said about good bossa nova being able to avoid the pitfalls of muzak? Still, it’s a very listenable album with some genuine highlights contained therein, and I suppose someone who'd never heard this style of music before would adore it.

Having said all of this, the best version of "One Note Samba" is still of course the one Stereolab did with Herbie Mann.

6.5/10

Download: Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd - Desafinado Mp3
Download: Stan Getz & Charlie Byrd - Samba de Uma Nota So Mp3