CDOTD 2/13/2023

 Sonny Sharrock: Ask The Ages (MOD)

Borrowed from the library

I've noticed that I have 3-4 hits on this blog on a daily basis. I imagine someone thinking, where's the jazz? I'm a jazz musician, right?

Well, not the way I see it. I'm a musician first and foremost; the idiom and practices comes after. 

My listening tastes and influences are quite varied, but there's nothing special about that, is there? Even my friend Tom Wendt, a walking encyclopedia on jazz, told me of his admiration for electronic music pioneer Tod Dockstader. None of us are simple. Few of us are defined by a single parameter. 

Even this album, ostensibly a jazz album, doesn't fit neatly into standard jazz practices. Only four musicians are listed: Sonny on guitar, Pharoah Sanders on tenor and soprano, Charnett Moffett on bass, and Elvin Jones on drums. A band that needs little introduction individually. Producing is Bill Laswell, who I'm told "rediscovered" Sonny in the early 80s, when he was in early retirement. 

Right away from the start, the first two tracks have tracked guitars, Sonny playing lead and rhythm parts. It's not an outrageous departure from standard jazz, but slightly unusual. This is to say nothing of Sonny's liberal use of distortion pedals.

I remember this album from its original release, but didn't pay close attention to it. Quite a few of my friends really enjoy it. I remember the first track, "Promises Kept". It's catchy, but develops some heat and intensity due to Pharoah's presence. The tunes in general are fairly simple, direct. It's on the fourth cut, "As We Used To Sing", a simple melody that leads to Sonny's most fiery playing. The same could be said for the even simpler "Many Mansions". Maybe it's jazz, but there's an intensity and noise level more closely associated with rock music. 

The mix sounds strange to me. I find it to be a little muddy, but can it be helped? Layering Sonny onto himself, perhaps that's just how it sounds. The saxophone sounds a little distant to me, like it was recorded from across the room, whereas the bass (which occasionally gets swallowed in the mix) sounds much more up-close.

I saw Sonny Sharrock play, once. I'm sorry to say that the most I remember about it was that I found the concert rather bland and uninteresting. I don't remember any of the fire he brings here, or that got him fired from a gig with Miles. (He was famously left off the credits on the original Jack Johnson album.) He chewed on a guitar pick the entire show. He became the headliner at the Fulton Theater (soon to be renamed the Byham) when the Sun Ra Arkestra pulled out of the night, during a festival organized by Manny Theiner and presented by the Pittsburgh New Music Ensemble. (This is all very much based on my less-that-reliable memory.) Seeing as Sun Ra died in 1993, and Sonny in 1994, the date had to be in between those times. 

I don't know if this band ever played live. That would have been something to see. Friends of mine have put together a group to play this album, adding a second guitar. It's appropriate, considering the overdubbing used to produce this.