Following on from Paul and myself’s offerings, Jimmy Monsta Funk gives us a stellar selection from his own stacks of wax, closing off Rollin’ With The 9s strong. Beginning in 1929 he manages to go across jazz, pop, funk, electronic, house and pirate radio. I’ve said this before and I’ll say it again, the dude is crazy deep with records.
The everlearning music inquisitor that JMF is, his selections are steeped in musical importance as much as personal reference. Make sure you check the accompanying notes below. This should be required reading for Music 101.
This mini-series has been a pleasure to dive down in to for me. Whilst I have my own indulgent radio show to talk about music I don’t often get the chance to have JMF’s and Paul’s selections explained to me in the way they have been in this format. Despite its brevity, I’ve learned a lot with the selections that everyone made. I’m thinking this should be a yearly thing, more frequently if we can manage it.
Rollin’ With The 9s – Part 3: Jimmy Monsta Funk
1929
Louis Armstrong – When You’re Smiling (Coral)
A giant of 20th Century music who played, sang and scatted his way through the American songbook and influenced many a musician to either follow or to rebel against him. Armstrong first recorded this song in 1929 and it became a standard in his cannon.
1949
Louis Jordan And His Typanny Five – Saturday Fish Fry (MCA)
Jordan’s Jump Blues music was a follow on from the blues and a precursor to Rock and Roll, his style would go on to influence the likes of Coxsone Dodd of Studio One fame (who heard his music on stints cutting cane in the US and over the radio back in Jamaica), he was in some respects also a precursor to rap music, using rhyme and alliteration to tell a story over a strident backbeat.
1959
Olatunji! – Jin-Go-Lo-Ba (Drums Of Passion) (Columbia)
We often look to Western Classical Music as a pillar of all modern music, but without the incessant and insistent beat of Africa, we would have no strong foundation. Babatunde Olatinji brought his own Yoruba rhythms to work with the likes of John Coltrane, Horace Silver, Max Roach and Stevie Wonder. This song has been covered over the decades by Carlos Santana, Candido and Jellybean, amongst others.
1969
Bob & Earl – Harlem Shuffle (Island Records)
Although this song was originally released in 1963, it was a commercial failure in the UK, only garnering the attention it deserved on its re-release in 1969. The song was arranged by (an as yet unheard of) Barry White and it’s introduction was sampled for the ‘House of Pain’ hit ‘Jump Around’.
1979
Prince – I Wanna Be Your Lover (Warner Brothers)
As far as my favourite recording artists are concerned (at least one’s the average joe would know), Prince always comes out somewhere on top. Although most of his key work was released in the early to mid-1980s, this track from Prince’s second album showcases the virtuosity he would become known for.
Already Prince’s work is imbibed with the trademark high falsetto and salacious wordplay, but all that you hear was played by, sang by and multitracked by the Purple one, then when the song breaks down we get a full-scale jam, which truly shows you the force of musician as arranger.
1989
Exocet – Lethal Weapon (Catt Records)
This is the year where the number of records I possess rises dramatically (I must have got an increase in pocket money or a raise from my £2.80 an hour!), there were so many well-known classics to choose from, but in the end I went for one of those faceless bangers that fed the warehouses of England. I know very little about Exocet, but when this track dropped on a fuzzy TDK cassette, it would also derive an immediate reaction.
1999
DJ Rasoul – Kickin’ Ass (Zebra Recordings)
Two big records from this year were swerved (Shades of Jae by Moodymann, Knights of the Jaguar by DJ Rolando aka The Aztec Mystic) in favor of a record from a lesser-known talent from San Francisco. I went to SF in 1999 on a little DJ excursion, meeting some of the bright lights of the city, playing to some hyped up rooms and getting a sense of the tangents the locals had gone down (be it the house doings of Spundae or the deeper approach of Dub Tribe).
Making sure to visit every establishment selling vinyl, I found myself in Zebra Records (which felt more like an electronics store dedicated to scratch DJing competitions in its downtime, than it felt a house mecca), but the guy there pushed me to buy his latest house 12, I did, it’s one of the best slices of disco cut up I ever did pick up and the drums do kick ass!
2009
Martyn – Is This Insanity? (ft. Spaceape) (3024)
Much like Paul and KPs previous mentions on Ras G, when Spaceape passed to the other side, I was regretful of a talent lost, his voice always melifoucious and on point (check his cover of Prince sound Sine of the Times with Kode9 for a true version excursion). When I first started listening to Martyn, I heard a producer taking the palette of Detroit Techno and painting his own vision with different brush strokes, Great Lengths was a producer at the peak of his powers, adding Spaceape on top made this package track straight up epic.
2019
The Comet Is Coming – Super Zodiac (Impulse!)
The last couple of years have seen a resurgence in Jazz music, with young practitioners bringing the old school chops with a new school post-rap, post-rave swagger. The Comet is Coming is one of the many projects that features the insistent blowing of Shabaka Hutchings, this album also features the polyrhythms of drummer Max Hallett, with the vibrant electronics of Dan Leavers, it feels like an amalgamation of all of the ideas that came before it while striking out to a place on its own at the same time.