Norman Connors - Slew Foot (1974)
We are gathered here for the last Sunday service of the year, with something to spread some serious cheer, in celebration of a departed dear. If you liked when we did the 72-track Danny Thompson tribute a few months ago, we've got another brahmin of the bass, and another 72 slices of nice that'll satisfy just the same if not better. And in a completely different vibe, as well.
Two months ago, today's instant saint left this rapidly disintegrating realm for higher pastures, but not before completely tearing up the rulebook for his chosen instrument and basically rewriting, rewiring and recalibrating its possibilities forevermore.
He began his impact in 1972 and 1973, when he played on -- you could say, completely recast in his image -- several iconic, smash hit songs, and then went out on tour with a Soul icon at the tender age of 21.
Seeking to reimagine the electric bass on his own terms, his frustration with what he deemed its limited range led him to begin to explore alternatives.
The session work came fast, furious and fulsome. Through the 1970s, he played on a zillion albums while he experimented with having different instruments built for him. Eventually he settled on a six-stringed custom, in of all things contrabass tuning. Which was totally unprecedented at the time for electric basses.
From then on until he passed away in October, he played on literally an unquantifiable number of recording dates across an unbelievable breadth of styles and sounds, the detail and scope of which would require an encyclopedia and not just a blog post to recount.
And Holy Santa Claus on six bicycles did he play. People have long since settled into the cliché that Jaco Pastorius is the greatest electric bass player ever to live -- and this is to take nothing away from him -- but if we wanted to know who holds that title, I'm afraid, to paraphrase Jimi Hendrix, that we just missed our last opportunity to ask Anthony Jackson.
As I was, over the last six weeks of research and audio toil, putting together what I am sharing here today, I couldn't help but be blown away and back by the sheer audacity of what he did, and the balance between face-frying technique and total support of the song that seemed to come as naturally as breathing to him.
If I were a bass teacher, the 6 1/2 hours of music across these six CDs -- 6 strings, 6 hours, 6 discs, how diabolical of me, right? -- would be the syllabus for the first 6 weeks of the course.
In doing this beast of a bass busload of bangers, I tried my best to feature an ample amount of unreissued, hard-to-find tracks -- good luck finding a lossless LP rip of Lou Courtney's 1976 disco funk crusher Buffalo Smoke, on which AJ just loses his mind! Somehow I did before I lost mine -- on which our hero goes crazier than Eddie Antar (look it up), until he's practically giving it all away.
You can see by the tracklist that even in his first dozen or so years -- before those 1980s digital candy keyboards infected music like an artificial, artisanal apricot aioli virus -- he worked with a whole slew of some of the hugest names in music, as well as a bunch of folks who made but one, killer album and then vanished into the ancestral annals of audiology.
Perhaps the hardest part of this was doing the grindwork to ensure that all 72 tracks are indeed him -- not as easy with bass players as say, singers or theriminists, for instance -- when there was ambiguity in Discogs- and Sessiondays-land.
Thankfully, Anthony Jackson -- being as prodigious and prolific a genius as shall ever exist upon his instrument -- had a tone (several, really), a six-alarm blazing technique and a sense of harmony so distinctively unique to himself, that I was able to determine it was he by the scree at the apogee of the tasty finger filigree. Wanna come see? Welcome to the Feast of St. Anthony, guaranteed to put your freaky booty in the sea.
Various Artists
The Feast of St. Anthony
sessions of Anthony Jackson
1972-1985
CD1
01 The O'Jays - For the Love of Money (1973)
02 Al Di Meola - Electric Rendezvous (1982)
03 Garland Jeffreys - Ghost Writer (1977)
04 Chick Corea - Nite Sprite (1976)
05 David Spinozza - High Button Shoes (1978)
06 Paul Simon - Oh, Marion (1980)
07 Barry Miles - The Big A (1977)
08 Stephane Grappelli - Uptown Dance (1978)
09 Maxine Nightingale - Get It Up for Love (1977)
10 Funk Factory - Next Please (1975)
11 Buddy Rich - Billie's Bounce (1974)
12 Chaka Khan - Move Me No Mountain (1980)
CD2
13 Charles Sullivan - Field Holler (1974)
14 David Matthews with Whirlwind - Shoogie Wanna Boogie (1976)
15 Lalo Schifrin - Towering Toccata (1977)
16 Jess Roden - Misty Roses (1977)
17 Carol Townes & Fifth Avenue - Bring Your Body (1976)
18 Grady Tate - Ain't No Love In the Heart of the City (1977)
19 Norman Connors - Slew Foot (1974)
20 Randy Crawford - I'm Easy (1976)
21 Masabumi Kikuchi - La Moca Esta Dormindo (1976)
22 Frank Weber - Complicated Times (1978)
23 Dave Grusin - Montage (1977)
24 Gato Barbieri - Gods and Astronauts (Errare Humanum Est) (1979)
25 Russell Morris - Superman (1976)
CD3
26 Jun Fukamachi - Neutrino (1977)
27 Carlos Garnett - Let This Melody Ring On (1975)
28 Doc Severinsen - Fernando's Fantasy (1977)
29 Lee Ritenour - Captain Fingers (1977)
30 Billy Paul - Am I Black Enough for You? (1972)
31 Catalyst - Catalyst Is Coming (1972)
32 Eric Gale - Ginseng Woman (1977)
33 Quincy Jones - Love, I Never Had It So Good (1978)
34 Sonny Fortune - Turning It Over (1978)
35 Dave Valentin - Patterns for the Sky (1978)
CD4
36 Pee Wee Ellis - Gotcha! (1977)
37 Sadao Watanabe - The Chaser (1977)
38 Phyllis Hyman - The Night Bird Gets the Love (1977)
39 Steve Khan & Eyewitness - Guy Lafleur (1983)
40 Earl Klugh - This Time (1977)
41 José Mangual - Black & Brown Boogie (1977)
42 William Eaton - Struggle Buggy (Characters) (1977)
43 David Sanborn - Heba (1978)
44 Joe Farrell - Disco Dust (1977)
45 Willy Bridges - Taking Care of Business (1977)
46 Donald Fagen - I.G.Y. (1982)
CD5
47 Michal Urbaniak - Chinatown (1975)
48 Tania Maria - Made In New York (1985)
49 Grover Washington, Jr. - A Secret Place (1976)
50 Gene Dunlap - Party In Me (1981)
51 Lonnie Liston Smith - City of Lights (1984)
52 Noel Pointer - Superwoman (Where Were You When I Needed You) (1976)
53 Ullanda McCullough - Time for You and Me (1979)
54 John Scofield - Who's Who (1979)
55 Thijs van Leer - Pastorale (1978)
56 Steely Dan - My Rival (1980)
57 Roberta Flack - Why Don't You Move In with Me? (1977)
58 Warren Bernhardt - Manhattan Update (1980)
CD6
59 Jeremy Steig - Ouanga (1975)
60 Teena Marie - Playboy (1983)
61 Deodato - Amani (1976)
62 Masaru Imada - Tropical Butterfly (1982)
63 William Salter - Lena (1977)
64 Gene Harris - Stranger In Paradise (1977)
65 Terumasa Hino - Hino's Reggae (1979)
66 The Writers - Star Black (1978)
67 Perry Botkin, Jr. - Lady Ice (1977)
68 Harvey Mason - Phantazia (1977)
69 Sergio Mendes & The New Brasil '77 - The Real Thing (1977)
70 Urbie Green - Mertensia (1977)
71 Wlodek Gulgowski - Soundcheck (1976)
72 Lou Courtney - Danger (Watch Your Step) (1976)
Total time: 6:41:18
compendium of sessions featuring the iconic bass player Anthony Jackson, covering his initial dozen years active
selected, assembled and remastered for unity by EN, November/December 2025
2.48 GB FLAC/direct link
2.48 GB FLAC/direct link
I have two more Teutonic taste treats on tap for the last two days of '25, so stay tuned to this channel for instructions on where to take shelter. And all the thanks to Anthony Jackson -- he's why there are basses with more than four measly strings, you know -- for a lifetime of rattling the cabinets of conformity. Happy Feastings!--J.
6.23.1952 - 10.19.2025