Destination ... Out!

chronology
Destination ... Out!
Studio album by Jackie McLean
Publication ; (s)	1963
Label (s)	Blue note
Format (s)	LP, CD
Genre (s)	jazz
Title (number)	4th
running time	35:09
occupation	Alto saxophone : Jackie McLean ; Trumpet : Grachan Moncur III ; Vibraphone : Bobby Hutcherson ; Bass : Larry Ridley ; Drums : Roy Haynes ;
production	Alfred Lion
Studio (s)	Rudy Van Gelder Studio, Englewood Cliffs , New Jersey

Destination ... Out! is a jazz album by Jackie McLean . It was recorded on September 20, 1963 in Englewood Cliffs , New Jersey and released on Blue Note Records .

The album

Alto saxophonist Jackie McLean recorded a large number of albums for the Blue Note label from the early 1960s, beginning with Swing, Swang, Swingin ' (1960) and ending with Demon's Dance in 1968. In 1963, alto saxophonist Jackie McLean was on heavily influenced by the jazz avant-garde of John Coltrane and Ornette Coleman . In this year the unusually cast quintet session with vibraphonist Bobby Hutcherson and trombonist Grachan Moncur III , who also contributed three of the four compositions, including the first title of the album, the ballad "Love and Hate" based on a simple theme. . Jackie McLean noted in the liner notes , in the piece “you discover abandonment, sadness and beauty;” every aspect “mixes and stands (at the same time) apart from the others, a true work of art.” Another Moncur composition is “Esoteric”. ; the title is due to frequent change of pace , the ³ / ₄ -Takt- to ⁴ / ₄ characterized ¯ clock. Hutcherson and Haynes create complex rhythmic figures here.

Bobby Hutcherson at a concert (2007)

McLean's compositional contribution to the session, "Khalil the Prophet", is more strongly influenced than the other titles by his hard bop origins; musically the easiest track on the album. The saxophonist notes that the piece is characterized by rhythmic variations: "The melody sections have a lot of drum breaks and Roy Haynes handles this with a skill that shows his mastery." The last piece on the album is again from Grachan Moncur III; “Riff Raff” is a “pretended blues ”, says McLean, “Moncur creates a mood with a simple line; Tempo and melody convey the feeling of complete relaxation. "

The cover of the Blue Note album, designed by Larry Miller, belongs to the so-called "Out" series of LP titles at the time such as Out There (1960), Out to Lunch (1964) by Eric Dolphy and Joe Henderson's In'n ' Out from 1964. However, the critic Robert Spencer objects that McLean, although McLean related such ambitious titles to his' 60s albums as Let Freedom Ring, One Step Beyond and Destination… Out! , after all , never crossed the line to free play by a Coltrane or Ornette Coleman.

Rating of the album

Richard Cook and Brian Morton , in their review of the album they awarded the second highest rating, highlight Destination Out! show in his significant title the influence of the free jazz movement of the time on the earlier orthodox bebopper McLean, who nevertheless did not break with tradition. So be Destination Out! a great album that combines both directions. Unfortunately it is one of the forgotten albums of this period.

The critic Thom Jurek gave the album the highest rating in Allmusic and judged that Jackie Mclean had with this album - like Eric Dolphy before him - his version of chamber music jazz in the combination of elements of the blues feeling and the groove of hard bop with an atmospheric setting . Through his work with Grachan Moncur III and Bobby Hutcherson he would have achieved this spiritual connection with Dolphy's music; the combination of the three musicians with the rhythm section from Roy Haynes and bassist Larry Ridley would result in a perfect balance of the elements; if there had been a successful Blue Note session after John Coltrane's Blue Train , here it is. What was new in 1966 was the opening of an album with a ballad; and McLean took advantage of Moncur's Love and Hate by exploiting all the tonal possibilities with this group; the interaction of the musicians consists in the increased feeling for form, breaks and rhythm changes.

As with the previous album One Step Beyond , it is the use of intervals that would form the basic motif of this ensemble and the basis of the Moncur compositions, Jurek continues. His brass lines are economical, impressive, warm and are used as textures by Hutcherson's vibraphone playing . Moncur's compositions are more edgy and are more reminiscent of Ornette Coleman's melodic ideas at the beginning of the 1960s than of Coltrane's modal considerations. Hutcherson's solo in Esoteric in the midst of the complex, intricate melodic framework is particularly terrific.

Khalil the Prophet , McLean's only compositional contribution to the album, shows a sense of changing the shape of the hardbop fundamentals through a harmonious interplay of Hutcherson, Moncur and McLean, McLean moves deep into the roots of the blues without focusing on the mere 4 / 4 constrain structures. Hutcherson accompanies his wonderfully dull solo with percussive playing and arpeggio figures. Moncurs Riff Raff is a strolling blues that uses the vibraphone as a counterpoint ; Moncur and McLean create sensual, funky shimmering blues groove . Thom Jurek sums up all of McLean's Blue Note recordings, many of which are classic jazz recordings, rage Destination ... Out! by expressing true soulfulness and the complexity of its compositions, the arrangement and its singing voices.

According to the critic Robert Spencer, the real head of the session was Grachan Moncur III; he compares the constellation McLean / Moncur with the Somethin 'Else album (1958) by Cannonball Adderley , in which Cannonball's "sideman" Miles Davis ultimately shoots the bird. With Destination… Out! For the theory that McLean gave his (better known) name to a project that was so completely different from the other Jackie McLean albums of the time, including One Step Beyond , which also featured Moncur. Nevertheless, it is outstanding like McLean albums like It's Time or Action that were created without Moncur .

For Spencer, Moncur's somber stalking "Love and Hate" alone makes up the importance of the album, in which McLean ( Love ) and Moncur ( Hate ) set contrasting solos. McLean played it extremely subtle. He succeeds in well-thought-out music with a greater breadth of communicative power than was usual in the music of that time: Destination ... Out! is not as sensationally unconventional as the work of contemporaries such as the avant-garde at the time, but follow these trends in integrating "out" elements into a higher-level musical framework, which is very satisfactory.