Patricia Barber - Cafe Blue

Newly Remastered 24k Gold Collector's Edition HDCD!

"This recording has never sounded better." - Jim Anderson, original recording engineer

Once in a blue moon, there might emerge a particular recording which is so special that it outshines its peers. Cafe Blue is such a recording! This recording of an outstanding female vocalist, won more than 15 awards of best reviews from international major magazines of music institutions.

When the night grows thin and the thoughts jangle, you can call on Patricia Barber. She's been there. More important, she has returned from there, with mementos: the songs on this album, drawn from the inner scrapbook of her journeys.

If this strikes you as an unusual way to introduce a jazz recording, fine, because this is one unusual jazz disc. It doesn't do anything by the book. It contains sparkling, indelible improvisations - but they derive as much from Barber's interest in classical music (both ancient and modern) as they do from jazz. It features Barber, a critically acclaimed and respected jazz artist, singing tunes from outside the traditional jazz repertoire, some you will recognize immediately - yet she has found something new in them, placing each in an innovative frame to show it off. And in the case of "Nardis", one of the certifiable jazz classics on this album, she has combined her dark pure voice and the lean strength of her trio to transform the song utterly, from something mildly mysterious to a piece both intimate and alien, and wildly powerful.

But the most important aspect of this disc, one that informs all the music mentioned above, crystallizes in the two songs for which Barber herself has written the lyrics. The down-and-out sophistication of "What A Shame" and the self-effacing wonderment of "Too Rich For My Blood", show a serious jazz musician exploring the emotional domain normally occupied by pop and rock artists. Along with the rest of this album, they represent the unique syncresis that occurs when an accomplished artist turns her gaze beyond the expected confines of jazz.

"Café Blue has seduced everyone for whom I have ever played it--jazz people, rock people, Medicare people, even computer people. Some call from record stores, sounding slightly desperate: 'That album you played for me the other night! What was her name again?' If you have a voice that's a dark pure whisper straight up from the soul, and if you've lived it yourself, you can sing to people of their innermost anxieties and they will not only love it, they will need it." - Thomas Conrad, Stereophile.

"Top Ten Albums of All-Time by a Female Jazz Vocalist." - CD Review

Features:

• 24k Gold Collector's Edition HDCD

• Newly Remastered

• Recorded & mixed by Jim Anderson at Chicago Recording Company

• 24K Gold disc mastered by David Glasser at Airshow Mastering, Boulder, Co

Musicians:

Patricia Barber, vocals, piano

Michael Arnopol, bass

John McLean, guitars

Mark Walker, drums, percussion

Selections:

1. What a Shame

2. Mourning Grace

3. The Thrill Is Gone

4. Romanesque

5. Yellow Car III

6. Wood Is a Pleasant Thing To Think About

7. Inch Worm

8. Ode to Billy Joe

9. Too Rich For My Blood

10. A Taste of Honey

11. Nardis

12. Manha de Carnaval

Recorded at Chicago Recording Company, Studio 5, Chicago, IL, June 28-30 & July 1, 1994.