The We Are Busy Bodies of Toronto, Canada, in connection with As-Shams/The Sun Records of Johannesburg, South Africa, have indeed been quite active as they curate the As-Shams Archive Series of 1970s South African jazz sounds. The three newest entries, all available now, spotlight saxophonists Winston Mankunku Ngozi and Mike Makhalemele. Alex Express is Ngozi’s album (backed by The Cliffs), The Peacemaker is Makhalemele’s, and the two come together on The Bull and the Lion. Ears attuned to the mingling of jazzy expansiveness and funky groove flow should check out all three.
By my count, the records covered here are the seventh, eighth, and ninth entries in the As-Shams Archive Series, and it’s safe to speculate that folks into Creed Taylor’s CTI productions from the same era and Real Gone Music’s recent reissues of the ’70s indie Black Jazz label will find the sounds offered here of interest. Of the two saxophonists, tenor-man Ngozi was the first to record, so it’s with him that we’ll begin.
His debut was Yakhal’ Inkomo, cut in July 1968 (issued the following year) with the Mankunku Quartet, its four selections clearly influenced by John Coltrane, Wayne Shorter, and the mainstream heyday of Blue Note Records. This set was quickly followed by the Chris Schilder Quintet’s Spring, cut in November of ’68 (also issued in ’69) with Ngozi on sax, a very likeable dive into post-bop/modal jazz. After that emergence onto the scene, there was a sizable gap in recording until Alex Express was released in ’75.
Alex Express is a decidedly different affair, with its five tracks likely to hit soul jazz mavens right in their sweet spot. The Cliffs feature Ngozi, here on alto sax, alongside two trumpeters, Stompie Manana and George Tyefumani, organist Roger Khoza, guitarist Allen Kwela, bassist Philip Kiti, and drummer Peter Jackson, and they establish a template that’s grooving but thankfully lacking in slickness and more crucially, there are no flourishes of overplaying.
The big stylistic exception on Alex Express is “Ever Green,” which sounds like it could’ve been released in the late ’60s as a single by Blue Note. But even on the funkier numbers, Ngozi is exploring rather than vamping on his instrument, so that the record is consistently rewarding from a jazz standpoint, though it would’ve been nice if the band had stretched out on these numbers a bit.
The opening title track seems designed for release on a 45 that never happened, as does “Gu Gu Lethu.” Between them, “Over the Cliff” takes the same sort of infectiousness and cooking ensemble play and spends a little more time fleshing out the composition (all five pieces are by Ngozi). I’ll add in summation that closing track “Revelation” gets appealingly spiritual in orientation (without ever going “out”).
Described as the most prolific recording artist in ’70s South African jazz, Mike Makhalemele debuted with The Peacemaker in ’75, in a trio with electric keyboardist Jabu Nkosi and electric bassist Sipho Gumede. If Alex Express leans into soul jazz, The Peacemaker is bold in its jazz-funk sensibilities, but what it shares with Ngozi’s record is the lack of sheen and hacky explosions of notes.
Instead, the group lends their grooves a pop edge, especially in the standout “End of the Road,” a cut that manages, against the odds, to increase the set’s overall appeal rather that derailing it. We Are Busy Bodies mentions that The Peacemaker’s cover photo is a direct homage to the sleeve shot of Ngozi’s Yakhal’ Inkomo. But I’m also thinking that Makhalemele was thinking of Sonny Rollins when he named the album’s opening cut “Going West.”
As heard on numerous recordings by Rollins, Makhalemele’s playing is consistently robust, if lyrical, even in this undeniably commercial context. Make no mistake; The Peacemaker is the sort of thing (electric instruments and jazz-funk) to give a jazz purist hives, though there doesn’t seem to be many of that breed left these days.
Both “15th Avenue” and “My Thing” (the only track not co-written by Makhalemele) are loaded with powerful, assured soloing. And throughout the set, Nkosi (who co-wrote three selections) and Gumede bring the bedrock while eschewing the rudimentary. The final track “Peace Train” (a Makhalemele original) is a bonus on this edition taken from a ’75 compilation; it is the handiwork of a different band (featuring guitar) and an even higher quotient of commercial swagger.
Don’t get the idea these albums sound like they were recorded via 4-track in your uncle’s basement. The Bull and the Lion, cut in ’76 and teaming Ngozi and Makhalemele with the South African band Rabbit and jazz pianist Tete Mbambisa, is a bright, full-bodied, and undisguised jazz-rock affair. That Rabbit’s lineup included guitarist Trevor Rabin, later of Yes, is exactly the sort of thing to trigger a purist into a dyspeptic rant, but his clean-toned playing avoids the gratuitous.
The Bull and the Lion begins with a funky mover, “Togetherness” and follows it with the mid-tempo “Snowfall,” a pleasant enough ditty where I suspect Rabin might’ve been under the sway of George Benson’s “Breezin.” But the guitarist smartly hangs back, understanding that he’s participating in a blowing session. “Rainy Day,” the long cut on side two, takes a turn for the laid back, though the lung power counterbalances the tendencies for the mellow. I do prefer both Alex Express and The Peacemaker to The Bull and the Lion, but the latter is far from a blunder.
GRADED ON A CURVE:
The Cliffs featuring Winston Mankunku Ngozi, Alex Express
B+
Mike Makhalemele, The Peacemaker
B+
Mike Makhalemele & Winston Mankunku Ngozi, The Bull and the Lion
B
