1984 Greg Adams “Gemini” on Jazz Beat Records

Follow up to yesterday’s “Koolin’ Out” and basically more of the same, track after track of top improvisatory modal jazz that looks like it should be funk at first glance, although good luck finding any information at all, let alone a clip, about this bad boy anywhere. Which is strange for a number of reasons, one of which is that Gemini is also a Nimbus West reunion, with Dadisi Komolafe spinning predictably lovely flute runs, and Nate Morgan Retributing and Repartating his way to Nigrita across the keys. We also get Kafi Larry Roberts on alto, just after an outing on Horace Tapscott’s brilliant “Flight 17”. There’s three covers and an Adams og, plus one track of pretty slick musical backing to a spoken word/empowerment thing, which I generally don’t dig (does anyone really want to listen to a “Last Poets” side more than they want to simply own it?) but do appreciate as an historical document, and as usual feel that a great deal of music in general, and jazz to the extreme, are political by simply existing, so all iterations are part of the whole and awareness is not a la carte. As you likely know if you’re still reading this sentence, “Gemini” is not a casual score, which in certain instances feels like an essential part of the work, because if the shit was easy it wouldn’t reward in four dimensions. Oh yea, killer stuff.