Track Listing

1. My Baby
2. Original Sin
3. What Time Is It?
4. Confessions of 349-18-5171
5. Hunger Is From
6. Vidiot
7. Reaching into In
8. Adult Kindergarten
9. Sound Museum
10. Bury-It-Yourself Time Capsule
11. Anytime, Anytime
12. Whistler
13. Flibberty Jib
14. Faces in the Jazzamatazz
15. I Used to Think My Right Hand Was Uglier Than My Left
16. Looks Like It's Going to Rain
17. Down the Drain
18. You're Getting Better

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #122403 in Music
• Released on: 1990-11-27
• Number of discs: 1

Amazon.com
You've heard Ken Nordine before, his immediate baritone resonating like the voice of God in countless radio and TV commercials, hawking everything from Taster's Choice to Murine. In the late 1950s, though, Nordine created "word jazz"--a combination of storytelling, sound painting, and pre-beat improvisation--as a less commercial, more personal outlet for his natural speaking talents. Best gathers the brightest of his four initial albums--material that found him somewhere between the prosody of Jack Kerouac and the arch satire of Nichols & May. As the title suggests, there's a light jazz backing behind Nordine's incantations--ranging from the lighthearted "Hunger Is From" to the disturbing, absurd scenario "Flibberty Jib" to the harrowing memoir "Confessions of 349-18-5171." Good, curious stuff. --Michael Ruby

Customer Reviews

Jazz art from one of advertising's most familiar voices
To those just finding Nordine's 50s recordings, his incredible voice will be surprisingly familiar. His work as a voice-over announcer over the past several decades has made his resonant baritone a fixture on TV and radio. What's really amazing is that the quirky presentation he uses in his commercials - the inflections and pacing - is equally, if not more, effective in this poetry/spoken word context.

Backed by the Fred Katz group, Nordine tells spellbinding stories and recites beat-era oddities in a style that is unduplicatable. Whether it's the outsider tale of "Flibberty-Jib" (which was reused years later as the soundtrack to a groundbreaking animated commercial for Levi's), the social commentary of "The Vidiot," the Twilight Zone tale of "What Time is it?," or just the 'wonder wanderings' of "Adult Kindergarten" or "The Sound Museum," Nordine always has something interesting to offer.

Katz recorded a few very hard-to-find LPs of his own, as well as appearing in the film "Sweet Smell of Success" as a member of Chico Hamilton's band. His group backs Nordine here with light jazz that supplements the 50s beatnik/downtown atmosphere. This collection cherry-picks tracks from several volumes of Word Jazz recordings, all of which are tough finds on the collector's market. These are truly one-of-a-kind recordings that capture an artist's singular vision of spoken-word art.

Astral Projection Without Trying!
Listening to Ken Nordine is an experience similar to that sleep stage when you can't really tell if you're dreaming, or actually visiting a mysterious fantasy land. Ken takes words where you don't expect them to travel -and you wonder if you're hearing music, a short story, an angel lamenting, or colors you can actually see. All via a CD. I first heard Word Jazz years ago, and yet it sounds like a new born baby every time I give it another listen. I shut off the lights, put on some head-phones, sit back, and listen. It's a jazz concert though a mind's eye I never knew I had . . . all through the literally hypnotic voice of our ol' pal, Ken Nordine.

Andre Breton Vs. Miles Davies
Well not really. But Ken Nordine has opened a portal to a whole new and different musical space. This is Jazz-Rap. There are some great reviews on this page for this extraordinary album and I'm just another voice to endorse this work. Whatever you might expect - DON'T. There is humour here, pathos, and total dis-orientation. This album is way out in left-field, like the little schitzophrenic voice that torments all our souls from time to time. Give in to it! Take time-out from whatever you are into to get a whole new perspective of what music is capable of. This is Jazz not because of the sax stabs but because there is an improvisational logic to Nordines crazy stories. It is surrealism for the same reason. There is a stream-of-consciousnees feel to these tales. The net effect is slightly unnerving but great fun nevertheless. Highly recommended!