Vintage Ken Nordine "Word Jazz" albums set for reissue

You may not know Nordine, but you've likely heard him. He was the voice of Taster's Choice coffee and a zillion other ads. But, on his own time, he's a fascinating spoken word artist, putting down surreal word scenarios over a backdrop of music and sound effects. He had a long-running show on NPR and has recorded with Jerry Garcia and others.

Now Universal's limited-edition Hip-O label is collecting his complete 1950s recordings for the Dot label. You can order it here.

Details:

The Word Jazz Dot Masters contains all 49 tracks from the original albums, plus the bonus track from the Blue Thumb compilation, plus five previously unreleased tracks newly discovered in the vaults, on two compact discs. In all, 27 tracks make their CD debut.

Not only was Nordine involved with the project at every step, he also invited some of his celebrated friends to contribute; both Laurie Anderson and Tom Waits have authored notes for the release, as has Nordine’s long-time engineer, engineer, Jim Cunningham. Needless to say, Ken has also written some notes, and has provided some rare photos for the set.

For those of you unfamiliar with Word Jazz, you should give the samples a listen. You’ll dig ’em. As Frank Zappa once said, "Writing about music is like dancing about architecture," and that goes double about Nordine's intermingling of jazz and poetry. Maybe the closest audio-free approximation one could make is that, in these recordings, Ken Nordine has metaphorically given you the keys to his cerebellum and invited you out for a test spin. Or he's the coolest camp counselor ever, and he's telling stories around the campfire of our darkest night.

Painstakingly remastered in 2005 from the original master tapes, You’re Getting Better also contains all of the notes from the highly collectable and extremely rare original vinyl releases.


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