Very few Booker Ervin Blue Note records to choose from
As you may know, there aren't too many vintage Booker Ervin Blue Note records available at all. The fact is, only the session The In Between is available as a regular vintage issue.
In the Mid 70's Michael Cuscuna of Mosaic Records fame produced a nice compilation unreleased music.
That re-issue series release Back From the Gig, featured albums that eventually ended up on a Blue Note CD called TexBook Tenor.
You can now get The in Between and Back From the Gig for about 20 dollars.
Booker Ervin is one of my favorite saxophonists. He has what I can best say a southern friend tone, hard boiled and drenched in blues vibrato.
He was born in Denison Texas, and that makes sense to me, his ballsy tone was as big as the Lone Star State.
Very unique indeed that tone, it worked well on those classic Charles Mingus albums Mingus Ah Um and Blue & Roots.
Do you ever see Booker mentioned on the best all-time lists? Pity when you think of all those Mingus albums as a side man, and all those great Prestige label albums like The Space Book and The Book Cooks.
Blue Note re-issue series double albums
It is worth mentioning, those mid-70's Blue Note vinyl re-issues can easily be found, even today January 3rd 2018 on eBay or in your local record shop reasonably priced. You can find them featuring artists like Ervin, Jackie McLean, Andrew Hill, The Jazz Crusaders, and many many more.
The secret of those re-issues, is the fact that most of that music ended up released in CD form, on the 90's or 2000's Blue Note Connoisseur Series CD re-issue program, or as bonus tracks tacked on to other original albums. Much of the music on those CD's have never been issued in any other vinyl form than those original 1970's gate-fold issues.
When I first started collecting, and learning about the the music, I was not too crazy about those gate-fold covers, I felt they were a little on the bland side and seemed too library old-school for me. I like the classic Blue Note Reid Miles covers, and these were pretty basic.
However: Over the years after collecting nearly all of them, they do look nice in their own little section on my shelf. Plus as stated before, you have that music on vinyl and not to mention the quality album notes and detailed session info.
I'm not kidding, I see these all the time for less than 10 bucks in my local shops. eBay is more about supply and demand. You'll find huge mark ups now and then, but once a listing or two pops up to compete with it, the price drops like a rock.
Except for an Andre Hill/Sam River issue, I don't think I ever paid more than 20 dollars for any of them, and most times it was less than 10. The Andrew Hill one was a nightmare for me, I paid $75. At least it was a sealed copy.
