Jazz for punks

It took me a while to get into jazz. Mostly, it was because I absorbed it thru my musical education in college. It was sorta forced upon me. I resisted for as long as I could until I was able to meet it half-way.

Being a fan of aggressive music, I thought jazz was easy-listening stuff. But if you seek it out, study its development in the 20th century, there are so many parallels of it to punk rock.

Jazz evolved from the blues in the early part of the century. White musicians - as usual - co-opted black blues and watered it down until it became rag-time, then swing and big band.

Just like how rock and roll came from the blues and became more and more sanitized as the 50s progressed to the over-indulgent 70s.

Along came be-bop. Derided as utter crap, just like punk rock 30 years later, be-bop became the counter to white jazz and eventually, the accepted true jazz form.

Be-bop begat modal jazz, represented by Miles Davis' amazing "Kind of Blue" album (released in 1959), which is the best selling jazz record of all time.

Miles eventually continued exploring modal jazz, taking it to something called "free-bop" which is some of the most aggressive jazz I've heard.

That said, here's a brief list of jazz tunes that should appeal to punks with an open mind:

John Coltrane

* "Blue Train"
* "Giant Steps"
* "Afro Blue"
* "My Favorite Things"
* "Syeeda's Song Flute"

Miles Davis

* "Seven Steps to Heaven"
* "Four"
* "Footprints"
* "ESP"

Charlie Parker

* "Bloomdido"
* "Now's the Time"
* "Yardbird Suite"
* "Chasing the Bird"

Thelonious Monk

* "Straight no Chaser"
* "Well, You Needn't"
* "I mean you"

Wayne Shorter

* "Speak no Evil"

Oliver Nelson

* "Stolen Moments"

McCoy Tyner

* "Passion Dance"