At a time when the traditional "gatekeepers" of the record business seem to be giving way to a D.I.Y. free-for-all in the digital Internet era, the Universal Music Group (ironically through its Verve imprint) here boxes the first six LPs released by Impulse Records, then a newly formed jazz label, in 1961, all produced by initial label head
Creed Taylor, who departed the company (for Verve, then part of rival MGM) just as the last of the six was coming out.
Taylor, as annotator
Ashley Kahn and
Taylor himself make clear in the liner notes, was the auteur of these half-dozen albums, even if he didn't actually play on them. Unlike Blue Note or Prestige, Impulse was never a true independent; it was formed as a jazz subsidiary of ABC-Paramount to be
Taylor's custom label, after he had demonstrated an ability to make commercially successful jazz records. And he did that with the first Impulse albums, particularly
Ray Charles'
Genius + Soul = Jazz, with its hit single "One Mint Julip." (The box set includes the first CD release of the mono mix actually heard on the 45 rpm single.) He also introduced some excellent straight-ahead jazz with the trombone collections
The Great Kai & J.J. and
Brand New, Swinging Together Again by
Kai Winding and
J.J. Johnson, and
The Incredible Kai Winding Trombones. Progressive big-band jazz was heard on the
Gil Evans Orchestra's
Out of the Cool and
Oliver Nelson's
Blues and the Abstract Truth. And
Taylor's last album for Impulse was
John Coltrane's first:
Africa/Brass. (The only previously unreleased tracks on the box set are three brief rehearsal tidbits from before the
Africa/Brass sessions.) All credit for the music itself redounds to the musicians, of course. But this collection poses the question whether the music would ever have been made if it hadn't been for visionary record executive/producers such as
Creed Taylor (and
Bob Thiele, who succeeded him at Impulse, not to mention Blue Note's
Alfred Lion and Prestige's
Bob Weinstock, among others). Certainly, it wouldn't have been made in the same way, and these albums demonstrate what a loss that might have been.