I'm gonna review a CD!

I've been a big fan of tenor sax player Tom Scott since I was in middle school. It's because of some of his recorded performances in the 1970s, which were pretty exciting stuff! When I was going through my recent phase of buying jazz disks (because I didn't have any interesting pop CDs I wanted to buy), I remembered my excitement back in the day and on a whim, bought Tom Scott's Bebop United.

It's a live recording featuring some big-name musicians like trumpeter Randy Brecker and alto saxophonist Phil Woods. The band is four or five horns (Mr. Woods isn't playing on every tune, I gather) plus rhythm section and Mr. Scott arranges a grab bag of well-known tunes in the style of the late 1950s plus some originals. The arrangements are good quality, but hardly sublime, and the rhythm section is a bit stodgy, weighed down by drummer Willie Jones III's leaden timekeeping and Mr. Scott's pal, Gil Goldstein doesn't improve things with some rather ordinary playing. Hey, at least the tunes are engaging.

None of the soloists generate much excitement, but everybody is competent and Mr. Scott remains an ingratiating presence. Perhaps his tone and style have faded since his glory days, when he had a bright, searing tone and was willing to extend the climaxes of his solos with intense upper-range work. Instead, this disk features a mellower tone and approach from Mr. Scott (and no soprano sax work), that doesn't serve him well. His improvisations are suspiciously well thought-out, making me wonder if he wasn't doing much on-the spot creation. The rest of the group follows suit, and nobody rises above a generally pleasant kind of jazz--frequently, it's not even pleasant. This is a simple, pat outing with little to recommend it besides a good professional band that is incapable of stinking.

3 out of 10

CDs listened to today:

• Alban Berg: Lyric Suite for String Quartet
• Marshall Crenshaw: Life's Too Short
• Gyorgy Ligeti: Requiem
• Elliott Carter: Variations for Orchestra
• Kenny Wheeler: Music For Large & Small Ensembles
• Garbage: Beautiful
• Lightning Bolt: Hypermagic Mountain