A New York City Taxi Stand At Christmas

 

Bob James - Angela (Theme from "Taxi")

Here I am, back to rock you like a hurricane -- or maybe a lightly falling, crystalline snowfall on a quiet Christmas Eve -- with a holiday tale about a December 45 years ago, and a guy born on Xmas Day just about 85 years ago.

I could have done this one on the very day on Wednesday coming up, but I have something way weirder planned for the 25th, so we're doing this on the 45th anniversary of the main concert I'm sharing today.

Today's honoree has had a career that I can only think to describe as wildly eclectic, even though he is almost exclusively thought of for one, specific kind of sound.

I really can't come up with too many other guys who began in Free Jazz, got signed by Quincy Jones, scored TV shows that are still beloved to this day, essentially invented the genre called Smooth Jazz, and also recorded with Slick Rick.

One of the 10 most sampled artists in Hip-Hop history, a lot of his stuff funks way harder than the music with which he is commonly associated.

I guess with him, it all comes down to this one tune he wrote, the one at the top of the page here.

As the theme song to one of the most beloved and imitated TV shows of all time, it catapulted him into the stratosphere and made his 1979 tour - and the record they made of it -- kind of predicated upon the imagery of it all.

If I were to list my candidates for Live Albums That Need A Box Set Containing Every Single Note From The Tour, All Around The Town would be at or near the very top of my choices.

So in December of 1979, Bob James -- accompanied by several different, all-star bands -- played a bunch of concerts at several different iconic NYC venues, with the whole thing vigorously promoted to capitalize on the success of the then-massive sitcom, Taxi.

These included The Bottom Line, Town Hall and the big one you really have to practice for, Carnegie Hall.

The Town Hall stint was more straight-ahead fare, and the other two featured more electric flavors, with those supported on the drums by one of the funkiest cats ever to hit things.

The whole bag is on Wolfgang's Vault, albeit in a pretty lossy iteration.

Luckily I got in touch with the proprietor of the excellent Creed Taylor Produced blog, who apparently procured a bunch of raw mixdown reels that went into the production of the live album awhile back and made some incredibly delicious mixes out of them, almost like additional volumes to the original 1980 double LP.

He was able to supply me some of the raw materials to make this post, so I am guiding anyone reading this towards his excellent page, linked above.

So here we are, let's hail us a cab!

Bob James

Bottom Line

New York City, New York USA

12.18-19.1979

01 piano introduction

02 Night Crawler

03 Scat Talk

04 Diane’s Dilemma

05 Take Your Time

06 Song for My Daughter

07 Angela (Theme from "Taxi")

08 Heads

09 Westchester Lady

Total time: 1:11:32

Tracks 01, 02, 07-09 are from the 12.19 late set

Tracks 03-06 are from the 12.18 late set

Bob James - keyboards

Mark Colby - tenor saxophone & Scat Talk vocals

Wilbert Longmire - guitar

Hiram Bullock - guitar

Gary King - bass

Idris Muhammad - drums

Jimmmy Maelen - percussion

original 24/96 DVD audio of Mark Cathcart's mix from Creed Taylor Produced

converted to 16/44 CD Audio, denoised, edited, repaired & slightly remastered by EN, December 1979
427 MB FLAC/link below

Bob James

Carnegie Hall

New York City, New York USA

12.22.1979

01 Touchdown

02 Blue Lick

03 Big Stone City

04 Women of Ireland

05 Night Crawler

06 Kari

07 Love Lips

08 Angela (Theme From "Taxi")

09 We’re All Alone

10 Rush Hour

11 Farandole

12 Westchester Lady

13 Christmas medley incl. God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen/Comfort and Joy/Silent Night

Total time: 1:45:57

disc break goes after Track 06

Tracks 01, 10, 11 & part of 13 are from the early set

everything else is from the late set

Bob James - keyboards

Tom Browne - trumpet

Ron Tooley - trumpet

Mike Lawrence - trumpet

Jim Pugh - trombone

Dave Taylor - trombone

George Marge - woodwinds

Mark Colby - saxophone

Tom Scott - saxophone

Earl Klugh - guitar

Hiram Bullock - guitar

Gary King - bass

Jimmy Maelen - percussion

Idris Muhammad - drums

320/48k audio streamed from the "Creed Taylor Produced" blog  

converted to 16/44 CD Audio, edited, repaired & slightly remastered by EN, December 2024
648 MB FLAC/direct link to both performances

Whatever happens, I'd urge you to not miss out on these shows, which burn with funkatized fire and prove, as if any further proof were necessary, that there simply is no material way in this universe you can possibly miss with Idris Muhammad.

Once again, thanks so much again to Mark from CTP for helping me do this, and dealing with my insistent energy.

I'll be back on the holiday -- coincidentally the 85th birthday of Bob James -- with evidence to suggest that Christmas Music is the healing force of the universe, but I urge everyone reading this to hop in a taxicab and get after these shows while the farebox is set to Complimentary!--J.