So this is about a year late, but to all cliche about it: better late than never, right? So here it is the long awaited sixth link the The Jazz Chain. For people new to The Jazz Chain it’s pretty simple: I am taking a tour through Jazz through a six degrees of Kevin Bacon kind of model. I started with one of my favorite albums of all time in any genre: Art Blakey’s Orgy in Rhythm. Then I took one of the “sidemen” from that album, Sabu Martinez, and went and listened to one of his albums, one where he was the band leader: Sorcery! And that’s the pattern. For each album I listen to I pick one of the contributing players and listen to an album of their own and so on and so on. The last album in the chain was Johnny Girffin’s 1957 debut, Introducing Johnny Griffin. The drum player on that album was the legendary Max Roach and that is who we’re here to listen to today. With his album Drums Unlimited.

Drums Unlimited – Max Roach – 1966

Now, for my money, personally, from all I’ve heard? Art Blakey will probably always be my preferred legendary jazz drummer. I simply find his music more interesting and his energy infectious. Now as to who is the better drummer? Well, sometimes you see Blakey listed higher than Roach and sometimes you see Roach higher than Blakey.¹If the list is strictly jazz drummers you usually see them in the 1 and 2 spot. But if you’re talking about who was the more important drummer? Well then the nod probably has to go to Roach, who is considered the defining drummer of bebop.²Which is why if you’re looking at best of lists that aren’t just jazz drummers you’ll often find Roach, and Blakey may be nowhere to be found. He worked with all the greats and on some of their finest and most celebrated albums including Miles Davis’ Birth of the Cool, Thelonious Monk’s Brilliant Corners, and Sonny Rollins’ Saxophone Colossus.

Drums Unlimited is not at the level of historical importance of those albums³Of course, few are. but it is still a good album in it’s own right. Roach has a good lineup of musicians joining him here: Freddie Hubbard on trumpet, Roland Alexander on soprano saxophone⁴For one track only., James Spaulding on alto saxophone, Ronnie Matthews on piano, and Jymie Merritt on bass. All these players have quite a few sessions under their belt with other greats themselves and Freddie Hubbard⁵Who actually played with Art Blakey on a ton of albums. would be considered a jazz great himself.

By track count half of this album is actually a piece of solo work with all the odd number tracks being Roach and his drums all by their lonesome. Of course, he is a great drummer and is doing interesting things so these extended drum solo tracks are certainly not boring. Of the three such tracks the title track Drums Unlimited itself gets my nod for best listen.

As measured by actual listening time the majority of the album is more traditional ensemble work as the non-solo tracks are almost three-quarters of the run time. Included in this is an enjoyable rendition of the well-known standard “St. Louis Blues” where everyone gets their chance to bust loose after the familiar tune is established and it’s probably my favorite ensemble track here, though Hubbard’s work on “Nommo” is great and “In the Red (A Xmas Carol)” is a nice mellow album closer.

Now comes the time where I tell you the band leader for our next album and it’s going to have to be Freddie Hubbard, our first trumpeter featured on The Jazz Chain. We’re going to move forward a few more years to 1970 and listen to some soul-jazz fusion with Hubbard’s Red Clay.

If you’d like to see a list of all the posts for The Jazz Chain you can find them at this page.

If you’d like to listen to check out a playlist of all the albums featured on The Jazz Chain⁶Excepting those not available at Spotify, which is only one so far. you can check them out at this playlist here.