Cory Weeds

Nick Hempton & Cory Weeds Horns Locked (Cellar 2025)

- Francois Leave a comment

NEW RELEASE – NICK HEMPTON & CORY WEEDS

Let your hair down baby and have a natural ball.

Personnel

Nick Hempton & Cory Weeds (tenor saxophone), Nick Peck (organ), Jesse Cahill (drums)

Recorded

on October 23, 2023 at Frankie’s Club, Vancouver and June 1, 2024 at Aero Studio, Vancouver

Released

as Cellar Music Group in 2025

Track listing

Last Train From Overbrook / Change For A Dollar / Soy Califa / Conn Menn / Polls Dots And Moonbeams / The One Before This / When You’re Smiling / Loose Ends

Blowin’ ain’t no rocket science. Then again, it isn’t as easy as it looks. To carry on the flame of classic hard bop and soul jazz, in order as not to make it sound superficial and forgettable, and as not to make it a financial disaster, you gotta know your stuff, you gotta have a no-guts-no-glory mentality, you gotta live and breathe the music.

Nick Hempton, Australia-born tenor saxophonist, and Cory Weeds, Canadian tenor saxophonist and owner of the hip Cellar label, live and breathe the music. Nick Hempton blows in from New York City, Cory Weeds from Vancouver, Canada.

They join forces on Horns Locked, a smokin’ exhibition of sassy tunes. An uninhibited reenactment of tenor battles, think: Gene Ammons-Sonny Stitt, Dexter Gordon-Wardell Gray, Johnny Griffin-Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis. A revival also of tenor-organ groups, featuring the sophisticated and greasy organ of Nick Peck and the in-the-pocket drums of Jesse Cahill.

How it came about was, Hempton was playing at Frankie’s Club in Vancouver and Weeds joined proceedings for a couple of tunes. Positively saucy, so they decided to release live material ánd record new tunes in the studio. Hence, Horns Locked. Don’t you love a friendly battle.

Hurricane tenors sweep away the Last Train From Overbrook, James Moody’s unforgettable melody, close to the vest of the great Don Patterson/Houston Person rendition. The Latin touch of Dexter Gordon’s classic Soy Califa is laced with plenty groove and grease.

Hempton and Weeds fervently bop the blues on Gene Ammons’ The One Before This. Same sources, different stylings: it’s really nice to hear two simpatico approaches mingle, Hempton’s big sound, husky sermonizing, bossy bopping, and Weeds’ sinuous lines, middle-weight-champion-Mobley-ish. Another reference: David “Fathead” Newman and James Clay, the strong sounds of the wide open spaces. All good.

When You’re Smiling is like sitting in momma’s lap in a rocking chair on the porch, you’re lightly being moved back and forth, you’re feeling swell, happy, full of expectations. Polka Dots And Moonbeams is a meaty ballad feature for Hempton. Change For A Dollar is a hip cooker penned by Hempton, Loose Ends a blues-drenched shuffle also written by Hempton, both finding the quartet in fiery mode, and Nick Peck at his sizzling best. Weeds’ sprightly Conn Men (great pun) is all about Horace Silver-ish blues, convincingly so.

Nuff said, except that you can’t have enough of the lilt and swagger of the good-time high-quality jazz that these tenacious tenor sparring partners provide in generous doses.

Find Horns Locked on Bandcamp here: https://nickhemptoncoryweeds.bandcamp.com/album/horns-locked

The Nightcrawlers Do You Know A Good Thing? (Cellar Live 2021)

- Francois Leave a comment

BEST OF B3 2021! #3 – THE NIGHTCRAWLERS

Oldies but goldies from Canada’s finest soul jazz outfit.

The Nightcrawlers - Do You Know A Good Thing?

 

 

Personnel

Cory Weeds (tenor saxophone), Dave Sikula (guitar), Chris Gestrin (organ), Jessie Cahill (drums), Jack Duncan (congas)

Recorded

on November 8, 2020 at The Armoury Studios, Vancouver, BC

Released

as Cellar Live in 2021

Track listing

1974 Blues
Do You Know A Good Thing When You See One
Devilette
These Foolish Things
Soulful Kiddy
Movin’ Out
New Crawl
Greasy Spoon


If there’s one group and album that fuels the desire to get back into little packed clubs and together with friends and lovers or future lovers enjoy good-time organ combo music, it’s The Nightcrawlers and their latest outing Do You Know A Good Thing?. The quintet of drummer Jesse Cahill, who started this thing with tenor saxophonist and label owner of Cellar Live, Cory Weeds, masters the art of soul jazz exceptionally well. They nail that great warm and resonant sound and style of the classic organ groups of John Patton, Brother Jack McDuff and Lou Donaldson down to the last detail.

Also, the repertoire looks smart at the (prayer) meeting. Its diversity should delight both laymen and soul jazz freaks. The Nightcrawlers get a good groove going with Eddie Harris’s 1974 Blues, make the most of Ben Tucker’s Latin-ish Devilette and swing Donald Byrd’s catchy melody Soulful Kiddy to the ground. Weeds, who has a lovely ‘lazy’ tone (the shuffle groove of the title track would literally have sufficed as bonus track on Harold Vick’s 1963 Blue Note album Steppin’ Out), is especially hot during Don Wilkerson’s catchy Movin’ Out. Not only hip contemporary soul jazz stuff, but also valid as a reminder of the soulfulness of unsung heroes like Don Wilkerson. A lot of that classic stuff featured pioneering soul jazz drummer Ben Dixon, who must’ve been a great influence on Cahill. Guitarist David Sikula’s fuzzy sound meshes well with the group and Sikula’s playing is spicy and balanced throughout.

While New Crawl features drum and conga intermezzos that stoke up the fire on the corner somewhere in the bowels of Spanish Harlem, Hank Marr’s Greasy Spoon, a classic blues line and minor hit in the chitlin’ circuit of black clubs in the 1960’s, features organist Chriss Gestrin, whose punchy and crunchy patterns and sultry sound combine with Cahill’s bossy and nifty playing to make this record such a pleasurable affair. Greasy Spoon is taken at an extra-leisurely tempo, which adds to the enormous groove and grease that The Nightcrawlers cook up. Indeed, it will be very likely to hear someone say to his pal over the music at the end of the bar: “Man, these cats really cook.”

The Nightcrawlers

Find Do You Know A Good Thing? here.

Cellar Live

- Francois Leave a comment

RECORD LABELS – CELLAR LIVE

If you’re not already familiar with it, you need to take a look at Cellar Live, one of the freshest independent jazz labels out there.

Cellar Live was formed in 2001 by tenor saxophonist, impresario and club owner Cory Weeds, who began taping the performances of visiting artists in his Cellar Club in Vancouver, Canada.

By now, his label consists of Cellar Live, Cellar Music and ReelToReal, subsequently focusing on live records, studio projects and archival releases. The latest historical release was Johnny Griffin/Eddie “Lockjaw” Davis’s Ow. See review here.

Cellar Live’s aesthetic of honoring and extending the mainstream jazz tradition is expressed through recordings of, among others, Grant Stewart, Joe Magnarelli, Jeb Patton, Emmet Cohen, Scott Hamilton, Mike LeDonne, Adam Shulman, Louis Hayes, Cannonball Adderley and Cory Weeds himself, who among other endeavors lauds one of modern jazz’s greatest stylists, Hank Mobley, both in the studio and on stage. His record label’s organ combo roster features Ben Paterson, among others.

Steve Kaldestad - New York Afternoon
Roll On cover idea 15 001
Speak Final Cover 001
Ben Paterson - Live At Van Gelder's
Pureum Jin - The Real Blue
Cory Weeds - Up A Step
Adam Shulman Septet - West Meets East
Joshua Bruneau Septet - Bright Idea
Phil Stewart - Melodious Drum
Cannonball Adderley - Swingin' In Seattle
Louis Hayes - Live @ Cory Weeds' Cellar Jazz Club
Johnny Griffin & Eddie "Lockjaw" Davis - Live At The Penthouse

The newest release in Cellar Live’s ReelToReal division will be George Coleman’s In Baltimore – due November 27, Record Store Day Black Friday. The statement of Zev Feldman, producer and collaborator of Cory Weeds, reads as follows:

“The George Coleman Quintet “In Baltimore” was captured live at the Famous Ballroom on May 23, 1971, presented by the Left Bank Jazz Society, and featured a stellar band with trumpeter Danny Moore, pianist Albert Dailey, bassist Larry Ridley and drummer Harold White. The limited-edition 180g LP includes an elaborate insert with beautiful photos by Francis Wolff, intros by Cory and I, a main overview essay by the great jazz historian/archivist Michael Cuscuna, plus interviews with “the Big G” himself George Coleman, John Fowler from the Left Bank, and the self-described Coleman disciple, tenor man Eric Alexander.”

George Coleman Quintet - In Baltimore
Win Pongsakorn - Yes, It Is!
Mike Melito Dino Losito Quartet

Top-notch jazz and the roots-y vibe of the label, which gives meticulous care to detail in the presentation of its hip record covers and includes a number of endearing references to classic sleeve art, makes rummaging through its recordings a very joyful experience.

Check out Cellar Live’s website here.