Lost In Tyme Blog

It was requested and here it is @ 320.

A severely underrated player during his lifetime, Grant Green is one of the great unsung heroes of jazz guitar. Like Stanley Turrentine, he tends to be left out of the books. Although he mentions Charlie Christian and Jimmy Raney as influences, Green always claimed he listened to horn players (Charlie Parker and Miles Davis) and not other guitar players, and it shows. No other player has this kind of single-note linearity (he avoids chordal playing). There is very little of the intellectual element in Green's playing, and his technique is always at the service of his music. And it is music, plain and simple, that makes Green unique.

Green's playing is immediately recognizable — perhaps more than any other guitarist. Green has been almost systematically ignored by jazz buffs with a bent to the cool side, and he has only recently begun to be appreciated for his incredible musicality. Perhaps no guitarist has ever handled standards and ballads with the brilliance of Grant Green.

Label: Blue Note
Catalog#: BST 84373
Format: Vinyl, LP
Country: US
Released: 21 May 1971
Genre: Jazz -Soul

Credits:
Bass [Electric] - Chuck Rainey
Congas - Ray Armando
Drums - Idris Muhammad
Drums, Percussion - Harold Cardwell
Electric Piano - Emanuel Riggins
Engineer - Rudy Van Gelder
Guitar - Grant Green
Vibraphone - Billy Wooten

Tracklisting:
A1 Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is? (5:10)
A2 Maybe Tomorrow (4:54)
A3 Mozart Symphony #40 In G Minor, K550, 1st Movement (4:06)
A4 Love On A Two Way Street (4:43)
B1 Cantaloupe Woman (5:29)
B2 We've Only Just Begun (5:09)
B3 Never Can Say Goodbye (5:04)
B4 Blues For Abraham (2:31)

Grant Green's early-'70s recordings for Blue Note are continually attacked by jazz critics for being slick, overly commercial sessions that leaned closer to contemporary pop and R&B than hard bop or soul jazz. There's no denying that Green, like many of his Blue Note contemporaries, did choose a commercial path in the early '70s, but there were some virtues to these records, and Visions in particular. Often, these albums were distinguished by hot, funky workouts in the vein of Sly Stone or James Brown, but that's not the case here. On Visions, the guitarist crafted a set of appealingly melodic, lightly funky pop-jazz, concentrating on pop hits like "Does Anybody Really Know What Time It Is," "Love On a Two Way Street," "We've Only Just Begun," and "Never Can Say Goodbye." Supported by minor-league players, Green nevertheless turns in an elegant and dignified performance — after stating the melody on each song, he contributes typically graceful, memorable solos. Simply put, he sounds fresh, and his playing here is the best it has been since 1965's His Majesty, King Funk. Ultimately, Visions is a bit laid-back, and the electric piano-heavy arrangements are a little dated, but Grant Green never made a commercial pop-jazz album as appealing and satisfying as Visions.