Track Listing

1. Sagg Shootin' His Arrow
2. For Everyone Under the Sun
3. After Hours
4. Root Down (And Get It)
5. Let's Stay Together
6. Slow Down Sagg

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #31159 in Music
• Released on: 2000-07-18
• Number of discs: 1
• Formats: Extra tracks, Live, Original recording remastered
• Dimensions: .23 pounds

Amazon.com
Root Down captures the king of the Hammond B3 organ, Jimmy Smith, playing down and dirty R&B. It isn't that Smith had forgotten that he was one of the jazz greats for this 1972 live concert, but with an LA rhythm section, there is definitely a groove here. A damn funky groove, at that. The album includes two versions (one previously unissued) of Smith's "Root Down," a song covered by the Beastie Boys in 1994. There is also a hypnotic reading of Al Green's pleading "Let's Stay Together," which yet again proves that Jimmy Smith is a man with a lot of soul. But it is when he ups the pace that the album really comes alive, such as on his "Slow Down Sagg," released here in its entirety for the first time. With Arthur Adams accompanying on fat-back guitar, its raw funk would impress James Brown. With Root Down, dancing shoes are essential. --Phil Brett

Customer Reviews

A perfect intro. to soul-funk-jazz
This is the one that introduced me to jazz. One of my so-called island discs. I especially love the rhythm section with bass-drums-conga and Arthur Adams funky wah-wah guitar. You have to hear this album no matter what your flavor is. I grew up listening to skate punk and classic rock and once I heard this funkified goodness i was hooked. Now I listen to guys like Grant Green, Idris Muhammad, Lonnie Smith, Melvin Sparks, The Head Hunters, and the list goes on and on and ends with FUNKADELIC oh yeah!! Eddie Hazel is the man, but thats another review. Check this out- it's good for your soul!!

Amazing one-time groove session for the ages!
I'm pretty sure that this is the only time these guys ever got together to play, and it might as well have been that way......this album is one of those sessions that seems to flow so seamlessly and make sense that it could not have happened if for the fact that five talented musicians got together and decided to "play" in the most simple sense of the word. My introduction to Root Down came by way of my love of Steely Dan - Wilton Felder and Paul Humphrey, two Steely Dan session players, are on this album. After hearing them in the infamous, carefully controlled Steely Dan studio environment, hearing them here made real the suspicion that these guys could REALLY cut loose if they were given the right opportunity. It was also great to discover Arthur Adams' guitar playing with this purchase as well. I'm never been that much of a Jimmy Smith fan in terms of jazz organ (Larry Young holds that honor - Unity is amazing) but the contrast in terms of background between the (up to this point in his career) jazzy and R&Bish Smith and the forward-looking "side men" (even going on into the future after this recording - Paul Humphrey playing with Frank Zappa) makes for a great album. It's perenially described as funky - and this it certainly is - but there are other gems to be found here than just "Root Down". "For Everyone Under the Sun" and the version of Al Green's "Let's Stay Together" sound paticularly good to me, even though normally I don't listen to songs with such lyricism and melody. Again, it's the combination of the players that make the takes on the more standardish cuts on thtis album special. Also, the alternative version of "Root Down" is amazing - it's not quite as happy and polished as the first version, but it more than compensates with some viscerally funky moments as well as some fairly noisy ones that show Smith thriving in an area for which he is not known. Superimposing the excellent, warm, breathing live sound of the recording makes these performances even more of a special album.

Pure Fun
There's one reason why Jimmy Smith is one of the greatest Organplayers of all time. A very simple reason. Pure Fun. This album demonstrates just that quality of Jimmy Smith. Seldom has a live album managed to get the atmosphere of the show accross as well as this album does. Sweat will be oozing out of your speakers.

Interesting enough this record is something of an oddity for Smith. It is the only album I know of where he's being backed by a bass player. Smith usually plays bass himself on the organ and thinks of bassplayers as being too much of a good thing. Maybe the presence of the bassplayer is what makes this album so much more alive as your average Jimmy Smith album. Although Jimmy Smith is an excellent organplayer his albums had just one weakness, uniformity. Root Down is a rare Smith item in the fact that it doesn't really repeats a formula. As a result of that it was one of his more dynamic albums in years, maybe his whole carreer.

Two tracks on the album require special attention. The title track Rootdown is a bonafide funk classic. The Beastie Boys later lifted the entire intro for their version of the song. And then there is After Hours. A fine and sexy blues that manages to move time after time.

Enjoy.