Each member had a rudimentary part to play, which repeated over and over. By the time eight or nine drummers added their parts to the mix, a dazzling set of interlocking poly-rhythms seemed to subdivide time in a way that made pop music sound like a toy money with a kettle drum. Over this, the master drummer would improvise, coaxing an incredible variety of textures and tones out of his instrument. It was, obviously, not a distant reach between that and the jazz ensemble. In addition to its fine music, I love the record's title, because it is as good a five-word definition of jazz as I've ever heard.
Truth is synonymous with great art.
No art is more abstract than music. And jazz is saturated with, born of, and steeped in the blues. Many people wonder where the blues end and jazz begins, and it's a great question that can never really be answered. The musical genre called the blues, from W.C. Handy to B.B. King, predates jazz, but not by much. It grew on a parallel track, but it has consistently fed the expressive spirit of jazz, offered jazz much of its repertoire, and, through its bent tones at critical parts of the scale, it has given jazz its most basic parameters for harmony.