So, perhaps you’ve noticed the activity here on No Notes has picked up at least a little. I’m slowly emerging from some other time-consuming projects, and getting back up to speed, bit by bit.
In checking through comments on the About page for the first time in, well, too long, I was interested in one mentioning The Graham Bond Organisation, which I’d never heard of, but which apparently once recorded “SJI.” Commenter texandrea wrote:
My first encounter with the song was a version by the Graham Bond Organisation. Bond — Hammond organist, alto saxophonist and singer — was a key figure in London’s 60s jazz, blues and r&b scenes. A member of (father of British blues) Alexis Korner’s Blues, Inc. for some time in the early Sixties, Graham Bond featured many future high-profile musicians in his band, including jazz-fusion guitarist John McLaughlin; drummer Jon Hiseman and the late tenor sax player Dick Heckstall-Smith, founders of jazz-rock band Colosseum; and, last and fame-most, bassist/harmonica player/singer Jack Bruce and drummer Ginger Baker, two thirds of world-renowned band Cream (the third being Eric Clapton).
I made a note to self to look into that, but before I could so much as Google the group, I randomly encountered this YouTube video.
There seems to be a whole genre of videos like this on YouTube: It sets the song (released in 1966) against a bunch of images assembled by … well, whoever put this video on YouTube, I assume. It starts with a hand putting down a record needle on the 45, then shifts to a montage of photos of the band.
I like the arrangement, the horn, the drumming, the organ, the pacing, and so on — the only thing I don’t like, I’m sorry to say, is the singer, which I gather is Bond. I just don’t care for his voice. Sorry! But I kind of wish I could just hear an instrumental version of the recording, because I really do like the arrangement.
Here is an unofficial Graham Bond site; here’s the Wikipedia entry.
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