Jaco Documentary

[Owen]

 

[TheGreek]

Thanks....I'll have a watch later..

[Old Man Riva]

Thanks for posting. Really enjoyed it, brought back a lot of good memories. Had the pleasure/good fortune of seeing WR as a kid (at Birmingham Odeon) and it was like watching someone from a different planet.

Also hadn’t realised how close him and Peter Erskine were. 

[lowdown]

Thanks for the link. I will be watching this later tonight.

[silverfoxnik]

4 hours ago, owen said:

 

Fabulous - thanks @owen

I learned a lot from that and really enjoyed it! 😊

[Hellzero]

On the other hand, sorry, but I didn't learn anything and to be frank, the title should be "The *ss licking documentary".

The assertion that comes back all the time saying "no one can play like Jaco" is so stupid. Never heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou who plays Jaco better than Jaco and who has transcribed all Jaco's music...

Hatzi also played for years with Toots Thielemans who has been ignored in this documentary.

Maybe worth asking Hatzi (as he lived with Jaco for a few horrible weeks and simply run away) or Michael Manring who Jaco really was...

I love a lot of his work, for sure, but this kind of documentary is really useless and soooooooo incomplete.

Won't make friends, I know, but it's not the point.

[ambient]

9 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

On the other hand, sorry, but I didn't learn anything and to be frank, the title should be "The *ss licking documentary".

The assertion that comes back all the time saying "no one can play like Jaco" is so stupid. Never heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou who plays Jaco better than Jaco and who has transcribed all Jaco's music...

Hatzi also played for years with Toots Thielemans who has been ignored in this documentary.

Maybe worth asking Hatzi (as he lived with Jaco for a few horrible weeks and simply run away) or Michael Manring who Jaco really was...

I love a lot of his work, for sure, but this kind of documentary is really useless and soooooooo incomplete.

Won't make friends, I know, but it's not the point.

How have I never heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou? Thanks for sharing that.

[Barking Spiders]

6 minutes ago, Hellzero said:

On the other hand, sorry, but I didn't learn anything and to be frank, the title should be "The *ss licking documentary".

The assertion that comes back all the time saying "no one can play like Jaco" is so stupid. Never heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou who plays Jaco better than Jaco and who has transcribed all Jaco's music...

Hatzi also played for years with Toots Thielemans who has been ignored in this documentary.

Maybe worth asking Hatzi (as he lived with Jaco for a few horrible weeks and simply run away) or Michael Manring who Jaco really was...

I love a lot of his work, for sure, but this kind of documentary is really useless and soooooooo incomplete.

Won't make friends, I know, but it's not the point.

I've never bought into the Jaco myth and much prefer Neils Henning Orsted Peterson's and Joe Pass's take on Donna Lee. 

[mule71]

I enjoyed it - thanks for posting. It was nice to see the late Dave Carpenter amongst the interviewees.

[Bilbo]

The reason we haven't heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou is because he is a shade, a shadow of another artist. A fool's errand. He would not exist without Jaco. Jaco wasn't perfect but he changed the rubric. Michel Hatzigeorgiou just a fan who got lost down the rabbit hole dug by his mentor. 

[Hellzero]

Listen to Aka Moon @Bilbo and you'll hear that the student has surpassed the master. And don't forget Percy Jones who has always impressed Jaco Pastorius himself. Michel Hatzigeorgiou has all the recognition he deserves by Jaco Pastorius family including all the music scene and he also had this recognition by Jaco Pastorius himself who considered him like his son and as good if not better than him even when he was completely bipolar. Those things happen quite often in fact.

There is a before and an after Jaco Pastorius, of course, like for Jimi Hendrix on guitar or Esjbörn Svensson on piano or Jóhan Jóhansson on film score.

[Hellzero]

And I forgot to mention the great Biréli Lagrène who can play Jaco perfectly even if he's before all a (real) gipsy acoustic guitar player. He also played, toured and live with Jaco Pastorius. Biréli is an amazing fretless bass player like Hatzi, but they both play their own music, not just a copy-paste of Jaco Pastorius, they are just a step further having fully integrated Jaco's vocabulary and grammar in their playing and compositions.

What's bad with this, it's the way music goes.

[SteveK]

On 10/07/2021 at 19:38, Hellzero said:

Maybe worth asking Hatzi (as he lived with Jaco for a few horrible weeks and simply run away) or Michael Manring who Jaco really was...

Are you talking about Jaco the hugely influential, innovative,  bass player, or Jaco the person?

You only have to listen to Jaco with Weather Report, his solo albums or his various guest appearances to know who the bass player "Jaco really was".

I have never heard of Michel Hatzigeorgiou, but I'm always keen to check out any players who I may have missed, so did a quick Google. The first video result was Michel doing a Jaco. Michel's Wiki also states that Jaco was his "main influence".

To be honest Hellzero your posts kind of remind of the great Vim Fuego quote, "I could play Stairway to Heaven when I was 12, Jimmy Page didn't write it till he was 22. I think that says quite a lot"

[Hellzero]

I know Jaco by heart, but I hate the worshipping around him, like any other worshipping that is always a kind of bigotry blinding the worshipper himself.

We all have influences, that's a form of heritage that we accept. Jaco is the main influence of a lot of bassists, but they don't become bigots because of that, ... well some have.

Hatzi, as he's nicknamed, has never been afraid to say that Jaco has been his main influence over a long period, but he integrated this influence in his composing, just like his Greek roots as well as Pygmies (the Aka tribe) music or Indian music and classical music too. The result being his band called Aka Moon.

Of course, you'll see lots of videos of him playing Jaco as it's what people retained, but better listen to Aka Moon to hear what they did and if you check recent stuff, you'll notice that he's now playing a fretted bass...

He had a tribute band for a one-off in 1999, just after finishing the transcriptions of Jaco's material, but that was to spread Jaco's music and it was a real homage. Nothing more.

This summarises more who Jaco the musician and Jaco the man were :

 

To loop a loop, here is Hatzi playing a well known Jimi Hendrix tune, Little Wing, on the ... bouzouki :

 

And here a recent solo piece :

 

As I wrote, it's all about influences.

And to end up with this usual derailing, didn't I also wrote that Hatzi can play Jaco better than Jaco, and simply because he has integrated his vocabulary and grammar in his playing and composing.

I'll let you seek for Aka Moon music or you can push the ignore button if you don't like my posts. That said, even if it's an interesting feature, I don't use it.

[TheGreek]

I just finished watching the video - a great acknowledgement to "the greatest bass player in the world".

Jaco's an enigma - a genius yet fragile man who was destroyed by Cocaine and relationship breakdowns. He, like Hendrix and Jim Morrison, has left his mark on the world. The fact that musicians are still debating his contribution to music shows how powerful his work is.

Imitated but never surpassed....to many still "the greatest bass player in the world". 

RIP sir...

[Owen]

It is just as well that music is not a competition

[TheGreek]

Agreed, however it doesn't hurt to acknowledge greatness...

[Owen]

Without a doubt. Sorry, I was referring to the thread as a whole. 

[StickyDBRmf]

Oh you sorry donkey Jaco bashers it is about the the spirit.

[visog]

Not really a documentary as such but still very watchable. I found the end very moving acknowledging all the Jaco influencers, contributors and commentators who had died including the heavily featured Dave Carpenter.

[visog]

On 12/07/2021 at 21:44, TheGreek said:

Jaco's an enigma - a genius yet fragile man who was destroyed by Cocaine

I think most sources cite alcohol exacerbating his bi-polar disease as the main factor in his demise.

 

[bamboscha]

@Hellzero I don't want to get involved in any argument about Jaco. I completely understand what you're saying. Certainly, Percy Jones knocked my socks off the first time I heard him (Brand X - Nuclear Burn!) but I still think Jaco was unique and maybe deserves a bit of donkey licking. After all, it's not often us bass players get our asses licked!

I'm so glad you mentioned Toots. He's my hero. I unashamedly lick his donkey as I present the following video which I think demonstrates that Jaco understood the mechanics of music very deeply, and with sensitivity, and fully deserved to be on stage with Belgiums greatest export - yes, even better than Leffe and even Chips 

 

[drTStingray]

On 10/07/2021 at 12:47, owen said:

 

Thanks for posting this - what a positive documentary.

Jaco suffered from what we would now call bipolar disorder which, for anyone who is a relative or close friend of someone with this, will know that, as for all forms of mental illness it can be supremely hard work with that sort of relationship. I’m afraid that people complaining about this is really discriminatory in the same way as complaining about other disabilities or people’s sex, age and other illnesses. I’m sure if it were now there would be far greater support for someone like Jaco. 
 

That he was a genius on bass should not be in dispute - I learned so much from him (and Alan Spenner, Leo Lyons, Jack Bruce, Louis Johnson, Bernard Edwards - more recently Jamerson, Dunn, Babbitt - in fact an absolute mammoth of a list right up to the current day - but Jaco’s work (also as a writer) really moves me - when Two Views of a Secret was played on the video attached it almost moved me to tears - fabulous! 

I also am a great fan of Henning (and was from first seeing him at the beginning of the 70s on DB with Oscar P - usually on the tele) - there have been many jazz players I’ve admired - but Jaco taught me to groove on electric bass (as did most of my other influences), followed by the note selection and patterns, voicings to make things interesting (even the most mundane) - there’s a mass of truth in Zawinul’s input to the documentary about his view of Weatyer Report - I have heard other stories of Jaco idolising him and finding it hard to gain praise from him - especially with his solo stuff - so good to hear Zawinul say in such positive terms what he thought of Jaco and his music. 

Jaco’s tone was pretty well unique at the time and his accuracy staggering on fretless (Pino - another influence - took this approach as well but added his own flavour). I can say in 1980 I was really after copping some of Jaco’s tone and groove (and Pino’s)!! Though I didn’t own a fretless (yes a Stingray) till 2010!!!  

Edited July 15, 2021 by drTStingray
Consistently erroneous auto correct programme

[TheGreek]

Don't forget to thank Mr Zawinul for introducing Jaco to Cocaine which caused his downfall.

[bamboscha]

9 minutes ago, TheGreek said:

Don't forget to thank Mr Zawinul for introducing Jaco to Cocaine which caused his downfall.

Indeed. Horrible stuff. Although I’ve no room to talk. I clearly have problems of my own to sort out.....according to the BC swearing filter, I lick donkeys.