Sonny Rollins - Way Out West

Mastered off the original 2-track tape recorded with a tube AKG-C12 microphone on a tube Ampex 350 machine. Features Ray Brown on bass and Shelly Manne on drums. Over his long and distinguished career, Sonny Rollins has made many dozens of albums. Among those recorded during the fifties, Prestige's Movin' Out and Colossus, Blue Note's A Night at the Village Vanguard, Riverside's The Sound of Sonny, and Way Out West on Contemporary qualify as all-time Rollins classics.

The session for Way Out West, Rollins' first ever in California, was called for 3 a.m. to accommodate everyone's busy schedules. Sonny, who could never be accused of overstatement, announced after four hours of recording: "I'm hot now."

Mastered by Doug Sax.

"Way Out West is a piano-less trio - another va-va-vivid Roy DuNann production - with Rollins spinning quirky geometric patterns through odd standards like 'I'm an Old Cow Hand.'" - Fred Kaplan, The Absolute Sound, December 2005 (included in Kaplan's "Best-Sounding Jazz LPs")

Recorded in 1957.

Sonny Rollins, saxophone (tenor)
Ray Brown, bass
Shelly Manne, drums

Fred Kaplan's Best-Sounding Jazz LPs
Click here to see more Analogue Productions titles on Kaplan's list.
Click here to see Kaplan's entire list.