magnum coltrane price, the first time i heard that name was in the 90's and probably on ztv but i hadn't heard much material from him besides a few songs. thing was that i really liked his full name. i found out a few years later the origins of his awesome name in fredrik strage's book "mikrofonkåt" where he talks to his younger brothers mingus & marcus of fattaru.
according to that their father mr. melvyn price, originally from detroit and a jazz musician himself, named his sons after his favourite jazz musicians (i.e. john coltrane, charles mingus & marcus miller?). sidetrack, i do recommend melvyn price's 1974 album "rhythm & blues" which was reissued in '08 by wax poetics. "voodoo love dance" is the track that is most known thanks to kon & amir but i think "happiness is..." is the best track on that lp.
anyhow so the first track i really remember hearing by magnum coltrane price was "when love begins" and that was from the 1994 acid jazz compilation called "totally wired sweden". that is a great song and that compilation also featured an all-time favourite song being fatima rainy's "love is a wonderful thing" and other groovy music from blacknuss, stakka bo and gordon cyrus amongst others.
but after that i haven't consciously heard a lot of his music but i do know that he's been active doing music during the years. mostly solo material but he's also been part of jazz-funk act nils landgren funk unit and done session work playing bass on a few records most notably on janet jackson's "all nite (don't stop)". but he's also done vocal work over the years and one really good song that i've played in sets countless of times is "i want you" which is his collaboration with danish house act filur.
but he slipped into my conciousness a few months ago when i was listening to melvyn price's record and then dropped a shoutout to marcus price on twitter and then for some reason magnum coltrance started following me on twitter. i still found that weird but i'm grateful because he's a cool person with nice ideas and thought.
he mentioned that he was doing a record with finnish orchestra umo jazz and he sent a link to a song from the album on soundcloud and i liked it. it gave me the buzz to hear more and when i bought & listened to the record in full it was pleasing and really worth a second, third and umpteenth listen. it was a collection of funky music with some of price's own compositions and some funk & jazz standards.
including a really good version of lee dorsey's "everything i do gohn be funky (from now on)" but also a version of d'angelo's "brown sugar". that on the first glance had me going red since the original is perfect on so many levels and i think it's still a bit early to start working as a standard but they proved me wrong.
i do have to say while it's not on d'angelo's level and neither on the level of the new funky live version that he's been doing on his latest tour, it holds up. when i listen to it now after the initial listen i don't put it up the comparison of d'angelo because it'll just be stupid and petty in the end to constantly compare it to the original.
it's obviously a tribute but when i talked to price he said something in the lines of "i wouldn't have done it on my own record but i wouldn't have put it out if i didn't feel that we made a good version" and he is right on both counts and it's well worth the attention. but so is the rest of the record and i recommend it deeply so i well recommended and i'll keep supporting it.
buy here (itunes)
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