Having pared his band down to six pieces, one of the most agile alto saxophonists in the world sailed through 1948 on a wave of hot recordings that were designed to entertain. You know how beboppers would quote from dozens of melodies during the course of one three-minute tune?
Earl Bostic made a funny routine out of this tendency on his 1948 Gotham recording "Disc Jockey's Nightmare." Touching upon one familiar lick after another, he runs rampant as the band fires off hasty quotes from commonly known songs. "Tiger Rag," dating back to the early '20s, gets the dizzying
Bostic treatment at a modest 60 mph, and trumpeter
Roger Jones, while singing "Bar Fly Baby," proves that "beer" rhymes with "beer." None of these records were meant to be profound, but simply entertaining. "Artistry By Bostic" is a wild ride, as are most of
Earl's performances. He was a dazzler and he knew it. He also correctly estimated the preferences of the record-buying public. Each selection proved to be remarkably accessible to the average listener. "Temptation," in fact, proved irresistible, climbing to number ten on the Billboard R&B chart. Some of these tracks resound with dynamic reverb -- the question remains, was this effect part of the original recording, or was it added later in one of many reissues? The question is relevant -- there's so much reverb on "Apollo Theater Jump" that
"Shep" Shepherd's drum solo seems to collide with itself in the audio equivalent of a hall of mirrors. In 1947, King Records began leasing
Bostic's recordings from Gotham. Eventually, King purchased his entire contract and in January 1949 he found himself in Cincinnati leading a slightly modified version of his sextet, now fortified with
Tiny Bradshaw's tenor sax man
Lowell "Count" Hastings and a young pianist by the name of
Jaki Byard. Ten years later,
Byard would be a cardinal member of
the Charles Mingus Jazz Workshop. Ironically, the first number chosen to inaugurate
Bostic's rocket-to-stardom rise to fame with the King record company was "Watch Where You Walk, Boy," a ridiculous cornball skit involving a staged tussle between an unidentified female and singing trumpeter
Roger Jones. The public ate up this kind of entertainment, mingled as it was with
Bostic's patented brand of lightning-quick alto saxophone, pretty and conspicuous as a Roman candle.