🎷 AotW: Jazz The Dave Brubeck Quartet - TIME OUT

[Captain Bacardi]

The Dave Brubeck Quartet
TIME OUT
Columbia Records CS 8192

Released 1960
Peaked at #2 on the Billboard 200 Albums Chart (1961)
"Take Five" peaked at #25 on the Billboard Hot 100 Singles Chart (1961)

Songs:

1. Blue Rondo A La Turk (Dave Brubeck) - 6:42​

2. Strange Meadow Lark (Dave Brubeck) - 7:20​

3. Take Five (Paul Desmond) - 5:24​

4. Three To Get Ready (Dave Brubeck) - 5:21​

5. Kathy's Waltz (Dave Brubeck) - 4:48​

6. Everybody's Jumpin' (Dave Brubeck) - 4:22​

7. Pick Up Sticks (Dave Brubeck) - 4:16​

​

Musicians:
Dave Brubeck - Piano
Paul Desmond - Alto Sax
Eugene Wright - Bass
Joe Morello - Drums

Liner Notes: Steve Race

Available at Amazon.com: http://www.amazon.com/Time-Out-Dave...=sr_1_1?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1334343170&sr=1-1



Capt. Bacardi

 

[Rudy]

One of those top jazz albums that any collection should not be without. I know practically every note on this one.

Having said that, my favorite is actually Time Further Out. The other three in this serious are Time In, Time Changes and Countdown: Time In Outer Space. (The early Columbia album Brubeck Time is not part of the series.) All five are available together in two very affordable sets and I highly recommend either one.

The more recent "Original Album Classics" set gives you all five in mini-LPs, with the current price just over $20: http://www.amazon.com/Original-Album-Classics-TIME-CD/dp/B003924NZ4 .

If you prefer jewel cases, grab the For All Time box for around $30 (still only $6/disc): http://www.amazon.com/For-All-Time-Dave-Brubeck/dp/B0001FGB9I .

I'm all for discussing the whole series in this thread, if there is enough interest.

Details out of the way....now back to the music. The concept of this album was Brubeck's experimentation with odd time signatures. While all songs tend to explore different time signatures and polyrhythms (even more traditional ones), one thing that I notice with this album and the others is that they go down smooth like butter. It is all so effortless that you don't get the feeling that you're listening to some obscure Don Ellis tune. And there is a big melodic component here: this is jazz with a melody that you can whistle.

Standouts include "Blue Rondo a la Turk," which sets off the tone with a 9-beat-to-the-measure Turkish rhythm pattern: three measures of 2-2-2-3 and one of 3-3-3. "Three To Get Ready" alternates measures of 3/4 and 4/4. The big breakthrough on this album comes by way of the Billboard Top 5 hit single, "Take Five," the lone Paul Desmond tune on the album. "Kathy's Waltz" introduces polyrhythm, best described by the original liner notes IMHO:

Kathy's Waltz (dedicated to Dave Brubeck's little daughter) starts in 4, only later breaking into quick waltz time. As in the Disney-born "Someday My Prince Will Come", Dave Brubeck starts in triple time, then urges his piano into a rocking slow 4. Theoretically it is as if Joe Morello's three beats had ceased to be the basic pulse, and had become triplets in a slow 4-beat blues -- though with Eugene Wright's 1-in-a-bar bass as the constant link between piano and drums. The listener who keeps abreast of the cross-rhythms here can congratulate themself on sharing with the Brubeck Quartet an enlightened rhythmic sense. Even feet are useless in following a time experiment of such complexity.​

​

This same rhythm also appears on a later Brubeck album, Brubeck Plays Bernstein Play Brubeck, on the track "I Feel Pretty" from "West Side Story".

If it sounds complex, it sure doesn't sound that way. It is neat to listen along and follow everything happening rhythmically.

An A&M tie-in: both Brubeck and Burt Bacharach studied under Darius Milhaud. And note how both used many offbeat time signatures in their compositions.

 

[Captain Bacardi]

I've also had this entire implanted in my brain over the years. I rarely play "Take Five" anymore since I've heard it a zillion times, although Joe Morello's drum solo is classic. My favorite track is "Blue Rondo" - I just think Desmond's sax solo is the epitome of "cool".

What's remarkable about this album is the popularity among general music fans. Most music lovers are aware of this album and many know "Take Five". Remember how the Doors guitarist quoted a part of "Take Five" on "Light My Fire"?

There's a new box set available that unfortunately is just an import. But it's the entire Columbia Collection, that also contains the album Angel Eyes, which is one of my favorite Brubeck titles. It's available at: http://www.amazon.com/Columbia-Year...=sr_1_6?s=music&ie=UTF8&qid=1334702511&sr=1-6


Capt. Bacardi

 

[Rudy]

That huge Miles set was an import also, and IIRC was only available via Amazon UK. I know it cost a bit, but the cost worked out to around $3.50 per disc, even as an import (since VAT is deducted when you order from outside the UK).

I can't find a link to the Brubeck set, but I do remember it being announced earlier in the year. The link above points to a 5-disc set.

 

[Harry]

Even I have a copy of TIME OUT on LP around here somewhere...

Harry

 

[Rudy]

If it's a 6-eye copy, it's quite desirable. (Although I'm not sure if it came out during or after the 6-eye labels...the 2-eye "360 Sound" labels came shortly after.)

Part of Brubeck's touch was that he could play advanced jazz yet appeal to those who weren't necessarily jazz fans. In fact, that was part of the reputation that dogged him during their popular years (especially with the classic quartet, which is on this album). Very listenable, and easygoing, yet there's a lot going on.

 

[Dave]

"I hear you're made about Brubeck...", Donald Fagan sings into "New Frontier", referencing this album in the song via a video where a couple are making out in a bomb shelter & the man pulls out this record album & he and the girl are dancing to it, as the front cover is shown and Fagan sings the praises of Dave "being a pioneer and how they got to have some music in the New Frontier", while there's a cartoonish image of the band playing it & the video is strictly live-action w/ a number of animated sequences...

Surely whatever jazz fans there must have been in my family have had this record & I can somehow picture it being at my parents' house, or at least at one relative's we must have visited... (and can pretty much say my mind is reeling back to where I can at least vaguely recollect it playing!)

The music was surely influenced by Brubeck et. al's con-current visit to Istanbul, Turkey and naturally the "standard" that "Take Five" had quickly become, I can surely be encyclopedic about, citing the myriad cover versions it had quickly gotten, such as Chet Atkins, Al Jarrau, Paul Desmond (who made at least two or three, along w/ Gabor Szabo playing on one of 'em & at least one Live), among a handful, or two of others...


-- Dave

 

[Captain Bacardi]

"I hear you're made about Brubeck...", Donald Fagan sings into "New Frontier",

More like "I hear you're mad about Brubeck..."

 

[Dave]

Eh, that's right--a typo-...

Then again, Donald Fagan's pronounciation (& enounciation) of some words hasn't changed...!


-- Dave