# An Oakland Black Jazz reissue is a revelation—and comes with questions: Videos, Photos

- Link: https://jazzblues.eu/2020/12/03/an-oakland-black-jazz-reissue-is-a-revelation-and-comes-with-questions-videos-photos/
- Published: 2020-12-03T20:03:22+01:00
- Author: https://JazzBlues.EU

**A Black-empowering label’s catalog from the 1970s is re-released. Should Black
people helm its return? About eight minutes into Kamaal Williams’’ Dekmantel podcast,,
I haphazardly experienced a record nerd geek out. I lost it. Some mysterious ‘on
fire’ 70’s jazz ripper of a tune, surely not Herbie Hancock, just blew in. Appeared.
Trolling me cause I didn’t recognize it off top.**

See, Herbie usually lets the horns eat; meaning have at it, take a couple of bars
to fill things out, before he comes back with some head-snapping monsta theme. Not
the case here. Horns and guitars were not a luxury afforded by this budget.

Turned out: It was Roland Haynes’ single “[Second Wave](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1iNRx8pw7kM),”
such a cherry track he named an album after it. Haynes and Kirk Lightsey duel it
out on Fender Rhodes keyboards, spiraling along the stratosphere. And the headlong
rhythm section of Carl Burnett and Henry “The Skipper” Franklin—drummer and bass
player dead-eyeing each other for supremacy—try to keep up. A stripped-down, economical,
bare-bones fusion attack. Built for speed and multiple needle drops, sending the
listener back to the upstart drum solo at the head.

I’d never heard something so raw and intricate, transparently holding not a damn
thing back for a next take that may not come. Constructed, sonically, with all the
benchmarks of peak fusion grandeur.

Talking ’bout big hair, thick stache fusion-noodling keyboard runs with Jan Hammer
cocaine-hysteria pace. But still the anarchy of a mega-talent player who could easily
be signed to Brainfeeder or International Anthem today. With superior technique 
and a warrior mindset, this is not the safe, easy-listening version of jazz. These
musicians are chomping scenery, trying to get some shine. They’re keeping it moving.
Double-time. Hunger, blasting at ‘Spinal Tap volume 11, is the not-so-elusive subtext
cooking for six minutes and change.

Roland Haynes released his first and only album, _Second Wave, on _April 6, 1975,
by way of Oakland’s Black Jazz Records. From jump, with the eye-catching melting
Afro on the cover, Haynes shot-called what this record was about: the second wave
of fusion. It’s a headstrong dive into the wildly exploratory side of jazz. No watered-
down radio-friendly Beatles covers here.

With the album’s six moving tunes, Haynes is documenting the post-Miles Davis fusion
era just before the pre-1980s disco-boogie progressions took over. Along with _Second
Wave_‘s headlong flights, there are meditative, poised moments, too—the twinkly 
special chord progressions on “Aicelis” were so impressionable that Digable Planets
repurposed them in the early ’90s, on the latter part of “It’s So Good to be Here.”

**A lost legacy of Black Jazz**

Black Jazz Records was founded in 1969 by pianist Gene Russell, along with percussionist
Dick Schory. It’s believed to be the first jazz record label started by an African-
American since 1921. In the late ’60s and early ’70s, some Americans were finally
taking jazz, in all its evolutions, seriously as an artistic enterprise. Miles Davis’
_Bitches Brew__ _from 1969 was the tipping point of sorts. Funk, fusion, spiritual,
astral, and soul started to flower away from the all-encompassing “jazz” moniker.

A number of Black-run collectives had organically sprung up across the country at
the time. In Chicago, there was the AACM, Association for the Advancement of Creative
Musicians, which spawned among many other artists the Art Ensemble of Chicago. In
Watts, Horace Tapscott founded UGMAA, Union of God’s Musicians and Artists Ascension.
In Brooklyn, the CBA, Collective Black Artists, included Reggie Workman, Donald 
Byrd, and Stanley Cowell, co-founder of the Strata-East Record label, among its 
members. In Detroit, Wendell Harrison, Phil Ranelin, and others formed a collective
called The Tribe.

“To promote the talents of young African American jazz musicians and singers” read
Black Jazz’s mission statement. Under Russell’s artistic direction, the label—easily
identifiable by its Black-handshake emblem— put out about 20 albums during its short
tenure. It possessed a tight roster that included Count Basie’s former bassist Cleveland
Eaton and well-respected keyboardist Doug Carn. Then, due to ownership issues, general
neglect, and, one assumes, the travails of being an independently owned Black business
in a field dominated by majors corporations, the label went under in 1975.

Black Jazz didn’t have the marketing bankroll, “the machine” similar to labels like
Columbia, Blue Note, or even the smaller Flying Dutchman, which all put out records
by Herbie Hancock, Donald Byrd, Eddie Henderson, Bobbi Humphrey, and Lonnie Liston
Smith in the year _Second Wave_ was released. With all that other talent on somewhat
mainstream platforms—and the radio play and promotional budget to go with it—Haynes’
genius album all but disappeared before it could get rolling nationally.

Real Gone Music, based in Orange, CA, has just re-released Second Wave and will 
reissue the entire Black Jazz catalog stretching into 2021. Popular for its stream
of rediscoveries and re-issues, Real Gone first began tracking down the rights to
the Black Jazz catalogue back in 2017. Finally, after a couple of leads went cold,
the label was able to connect with the rights-holders in early 2020.

For years the Black Jazz catalog was blatantly bootlegged, which led to UK acid 
jazz aficionados as well as hip-hop crate-diggers pulling beats and breaks from 
the canon. Next, Japanese specialty label Snow Dog Records reissued the catalog 
in its entirety from 2012-2013. From that, famous DJs like Theo Parrish and Gilles
Peterson kept the legacy up front for listeners by constructing their own mixes,
selecting dance-floor jazz burners from the archive.

**A reissue raises issues**

This latest round of reissues, at this particular time, gives rise to an interesting
question. Considering the Black Jazz label’s origins and mission, would a Black-
owned company—which Real Gone is not—be more appropriate to return this music to
the world?

“When it comes to Black-owned imprints, you only have a limited amount of success,”
label owner and esteemed music archivist Amir Abdullah told me during a recent phone
interview. His 2017 unearthing of five two-track master tapes featuring the Charles
Mingus Quintet performing live in 1973 at Detroit’s Strata Concert Gallery set the
jazz world—and every major news organization—ablaze. Released in 2018 on Abdullah’s
180 Proof Records, along with BBE Music, Mingus: Jazz In Detroit/Strata Concert 
Gallery/46 Selden was a rare situation: A substantial piece of African American 
culture thought lost or forgotten was excavated, released, distributed, and treated
with the proper historical context intact by a Black-owned label.

“Back in those days, quite similar to right now, unfortunately, between the distribution,
not getting paid for what is sold, royalty rates, it’s like you can’t win,” Abdullah
said. “You couldn’t really hire a proper PR company back then, you had to go with
what you have. While Strata found success, they had to come out of their own pocket
and do a lot of favors.

[[

“Listen, [I’m a Black owner of a reissue label](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=juB7tsjRSgg).
Jazzman and all these other reissue labels are either Japanese or European. There’s
a handful of Black-owned reissue labels out there. There is a reason for that. That
Black Jazz is such a great catalog, it’s a shame no one really did it justice.”

Real Gone Music is obviously exerted some loving care with the Black Jazz reissues.
The label’s archive has been remastered by Mike Milchner at Sonic Vision Mastering
and pressed on black vinyl at Gotta Groove Records, with lacquer cutting by Clint
Holley and Dave Polster at Well Made Music. Plus additional liner notes in both 
vinyl and CD releases by Pat Thomas, author of Listen Whitey! The Sights and Sounds
of Black Power 1965-1975 highlight similarities between what was happening then…
and what’s happening right now. Real Gone has committed to donating $500 to the 
Equal Justice Initiative with each Black Jazz album release. That’s a great start.

But additional material in the catalog release would help complete the whole story
of a scrappy Black label committed to Black artists, which has risen in popular 
estimation so many years after its demise.

“What’s the real story behind them, and why did they specifically go out of business’’
asks Abdullah. “Meaning, don’t reissue the albums without context behind it. No 
one has dug deep enough to even bring out extra unreleased tracks, visual assets,
or the stems to the albums. Not even previously unreleased albums from known or 
unknown artists on the label.”

![15 Best Jazz Songs - Simply The Best | uDiscover Music](https://i0.wp.com/www.
udiscovermusic.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/best-jazz-songs.jpg?w=640&ssl=1)

### _Related_