Hugh Masekela - Home Is Where The Music Is (1972)

Dayam... Home Is Where The Music Is begins with one of the smoothest classic funky grooves I've heard in a while. I'm guessing I'm in store for a treat. Do I need to tell you again that the 70s were without question the best period for high quality studio music? Whether it's that the recording equipment improved enough that everyone could afford to sound amazing, or everyone just realized recording and production were an artform that was just as important as writing and performing, by 1972 most people knew how to make a perfect sounding record. The opening song "Part Of A Whole" is a bit crunchy, which gives it a smoky feel perfect for any wood-paneled shag-carpeted dive bar.

I'm pretty sure, based on the album cover, that Hugh Masekela is a trumpet player. If that's the case the guy can absolutely shred- can you shred on a trumpet? What's the appropriate term for "playing trumpet really well"? This guy can absolutely BLOW! ... No, that's got to be wrong.

This is a jazz album, which isn't all bad for obvious reasons. Jazz always involves people who not only know what they're doing, they're really awesome at playing their instruments. Also Home IS Where The Music Is adds plenty of funk influence, which on the up-tempo tracks means lots of explosive energy, even if the song is close to 9 minutes long. But the slower songs really drag on and on, particularly "Unhome". The bassline in that song is basically 3 lazy notes played over and over for about 5 minutes. It's so slow and grating that I completely forgot what the rest of the band was doing.

Drum solos almost never work, and "Blues For Huey" isn't one of the exceptions. Not that the drummer isn't incredibly talented, it's just that when jazz drummers do ridiculously fast fills it sounds completely random. In "Blues For Huey" the band plays on top of the drummer doing a solo, and it's impressive they are able to keep time with the drummer going completely nuts and just hitting stuff. It's possible he is playing in tempo with the rest of the band, but it really sounds like he's just playing as hard and as fast as he can.

I have a lot of the same complaints with Home Is Where The Music Is as I do with other jazz music I've listened to. The songs tend to be long and repetitive. Almost every song features several extended solos that sound way too similar, as if in each solo the soloist is checking of boxes of things that must be done for a solo to be awesome. One thing that really sets Home Is Where The Music Is apart is that the music is firmly planted in funk as well as jazz, which gives the proceedings stability and structure that more free-form jazz recordings don't have. I quite enjoyed it. 4 stars.