Ronald Shannon Jackson

Ronald Shannon Jackson is an incredible drummer from Ft. Worth, and is the only musician who can claim to have performed and recorded with three of the greatest revolutionaries in all of jazz: Ornette Coleman, Cecil Taylor, and Albert Ayler. While these men clearly defined jazz in the late 1960's and into the late 1970's, Benny Goodman this ain't. He has played with literally hundreds of musicians, some of which include Charles Mingus, John Zorn, Charles Tyler, Power Tools, Last Exit, and even fronted his own group, Ronald Shannon Jackson & the Decoding Society. The tracks posted here share the common thread of being unabashedly intense, and all are fueled by Jackson's propelling drums.

This music is raw, noisy, emotional, abrasive, chaotic, and above all, human.

MP3: Albert Ayler - Truth Is Marching In (Live 1966)
MP3: Charles Tyler Ensemble - Lacy's Out East
MP3: Ornette Coleman - Midnight Sunrise

One of my favorite groups of late, and really the reason for posting any of this, is Last Exit. Last Exit formed in the mid-1980's, and were somewhat of an avant-jazz supergroup, featuring the great Peter Brötzmann on reeds, the late Sonny Sharrock on guitar, Bill Laswell on bass, and Jackson on drums. They were truly electrifying live on and on record, a sort of improvised free jazz for metalheads. Or maybe not.

MP3: Last Exit - Discharge
MP3: Last Exit - Pig Freedom


YouTube: Last Exit Live

Buy the CD: Albert Ayler - Slug's Saloon - May 1, 1966
Buy the CD: Ornette Coleman - Dancing In Your Head
Buy the CD: Charles Tyler - Charles Tyler Ensemble
Buy the CD: Last Exit - Last Exit (this one is out-of-print and ridiculously expensive)
Buy the CD: Last Exit - Köln (this one is not)