The Cookers - Look Out! (September 24, 2021 Gearbox Records)

Look Out! is the triumphant sixth album return of jazz supergroup The Cookers, due out on September 24th on double vinyl, CD, and digital. Recorded at the iconic Van Gelder studio in Englewood Cliffs and cut using a Van Gelder-era '67 Haeco Sculley lathe at Gearbox Records, the 7-track release comprises original, fresh pieces written by Cecil McBee, Billy Harper, and George Cables which channel the heady, aggressive post-bop era of the mid-60s.

Whereas the majority of the jazz tradition’s elder statesmen head their own groups, this is one of the few jazz bands to contain legacy musicians of this calibre functioning as an equitable, long-standing ensemble. Billy Harper, Cecil McBee, George Cables, Eddie Henderson, and Billy Hart all came up in the heady era of the mid ‘60s: Hart and Henderson were members of Herbie Hancock’s groundbreaking Mwandishi group; Cecil McBee anchored Charles Lloyd’s great ’60s quartet alongside Keith Jarrett and Jack DeJohnette; Billy Harper was part of Lee Morgan’s last group, as well as being a member of Max Roach’s Quartet and Art Blakey and the Jazz Messengers; while George Cables held down the piano chair in numerous bands including groups led by Sonny Rollins, Joe Henderson, Freddie Hubbard, Dexter Gordon and Art Pepper. David Weiss and Donald Harrison, from a more recent generation and the youngest members of the band, are experts in this forthright lingo, having gained experience performing with Art Blakey, Bobby Hutcherson, Freddie Hubbard, Charles Tolliver, Roy Haynes and Herbie Hancock.

After 14 years together, again the incredibly high level of musicianship has only increased with the revisiting of their fresh, challenging, boundary-pushing music from these legendary, revered, veteran improvisers. 

1. The Mystery of Monifa Brown

2. Destiny Is Yours

3. Cat's Out The Bag

4. Somalia

5. AKA Reggie

6. Traveling Lady

7. Mutima

Billy Harper: tenor sax

Eddie Henderson: trumpet

David Weiss: trumpet

Donald Harrison: alto sax

George Cables: piano

Cecil McBee: bass

Billy Hart: drums

Produced by David Weiss

Executive Producer: Darrel Sheinman 

Recorded at Van Gelder Recording Studio by Maureen Sickler

Mixed by Katherine Miller

Mastered by Caspar Sutton-Jones and Darrel Sheinman at Gearbox Records

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The Cookers - The Call of the Wild and Peaceful Heart (2016) SMOKE SESSIONS RECORDS

by GERALDINE WYCKOFF / offbeat

Hard bop supreme is served up by the Cookers, a truly all­-star ensemble that includes veterans who helped develop and shape the sound. In order to understand the scope of these musicians’ experience and magnitude it’s imperative to call out their names: bassist Cecil McBee (trumpeter Miles Davis, saxophonists Pharoah Sanders and Wayne Shorter), trumpeter Eddie Henderson (lessons from Louis Armstrong, pianist Herbie Hancock), drummer Billy Hart (Davis, Hancock), tenor saxophonist Billy Harper (pianist Randy Weston, drummers Art Blakey, Elvin Jones and Max Roach) and pianist George Cables (saxophonist Sonny Rollins and trumpeter Freddie Hubbard). Trumpeter David Weiss, the youngest member, came up with the idea of putting these hefty musicians together with little notion that nine years later they would remain a unit. With the release of The Call of the Wild and Peaceful Heart, which, like 2014’s Time and Time Again, includes the band’s newest member, alto saxophonist Donald Harrison, the Cookers have put out five outstanding albums.

The name of the album—also the disc’s first cut—tells a lot about the music. Penned by Harper, it rhythmically opens ever so slowly and peacefully. Later it explodes with the wild excitement of Harper’s tenor.

It’s Harper’s pen at work again on the lovely ballad “If One Could Only See.” Cables’ gentle piano sets the soft mood with the purity of Henderson’s trumpet leading, as if singing, the tune. All of the original material is written by members of the Cookers, enabling each composer to bring that side of his musical personality to the project.

Diversity defines the spirit of The Call of the Wild and Peaceful Heart as it runs free while referencing musical touchstones from the past. The Cookers continue as master chiefs of the bandstand.

Beyond Forever