Carmell Jones - The Remarkable: Hard Bop Sleeper Rediscovered

What Makes The Remarkable Carmell Jones Worth Your Time?

This record sounds like what happens when a Kansas City trumpet phenom lands in Los Angeles with Harold Land in tow and nothing to prove. Recorded across three June sessions in 1961 at Pacific Jazz Studio, The Remarkable Carmell Jones is a hard bop clinic that never got the Blue Note marketing budget-but it has the Blue Note muscle. With a 1:11 want-to-have ratio on Discogs (312 wants vs. 3,386 haves) and a 4.74/5 community rating from 315 voters, this reissue shows exactly why Joe Harley brought it back for the Tone Poet Series: it's pristine, unshowy, and built to last.

Why Did This Album Almost Disappear?

Carmell Jones never became a household name, and that's jazz history in a nutshell. Born in 1936 in Kansas City, Kansas, Jones spent the late '50s burning through the West Coast scene before decamping to Europe in the mid-'60s. He died in obscurity in Kansas City in 1996 at age 60 from heart failure. But in June 1961, he was 25 years old and recording what would become his debut as a leader for Richard Bock's Pacific Jazz imprint. The problem? Pacific Jazz wasn't Blue Note. It didn't have the Rudy Van Gelder sheen, the Francis Wolff photo sessions, or the Alfred Lion mythos. So this record-despite stellar playing and a lineup that included Harold Land, Frank Strazzeri, Gary Peacock, and Leon Pettis-got filed under "West Coast curiosity" rather than "hard bop essential." Until now.

Quick Stats

Tracklist

Side A:
1. I'm Gonna Go Fishing (11:06)
2. Come Rain Or Come Shine (4:29)
3. Night Tide (4:05)

Side B:
1. Sad March (5:45)
2. Stellisa (9:05)
3. Full Moon And Empty Arms (6:30)

Start the stream. Let the atmosphere settle before we look at the wax.

Listening Notes

This record feels like late afternoon in a room with good light, driven by clean lines and no rush. Jones's trumpet has a centered, burnished tone-nothing shrill, nothing desperate. He's not out to prove he's faster than Clifford Brown or hipper than Miles. He's just telling you stories. Harold Land's tenor is the perfect foil: woody, conversational, and locked into the same unhurried pocket.

The opener, "I'm Gonna Go Fishing," stretches past eleven minutes and it never drags. The rhythm section-Gary Peacock on bass, Frank Strazzeri on piano, Leon Pettis on drums-gives the soloists room to breathe without wandering into empty space. Peacock's tone is resonant and full, the kind of sound Richard Bock's engineering captured with clarity but without sterility. The title track "Stellisa" builds slowly, a nine-minute meditation that shifts gears halfway through when Jones and Land start trading phrases like they're finishing each other's sentences.

The production is wide-open but intimate. You can hear the room, the finger work on the valves, the brush strokes. It's close-mic without feeling claustrophobic. The piano sits slightly left, the tenor slightly right, and the trumpet dead center. There's no reverb gimmickry, no artificial depth-just clean, honest documentation.

Best use case? Late-night headphone listen when you want to pay attention. Or Sunday morning coffee when you want something substantial but not overwhelming. Pair it with black tea and a long sit by the window-it amplifies the record's calm confidence.

The Nerd Sheet: Statistical Proof

Let's talk numbers. On Discogs, this Tone Poet reissue holds a 4.74/5 rating from 315 community votes. That's higher than a lot of canonical Blue Note reissues. The want-to-have ratio is 1:11, which means supply currently exceeds demand-but that's exactly why smart collectors are grabbing it now. At a median price of $22, you're getting Kevin Gray mastering, RTI pressing, and a faithful reproduction of Barry Feinstein's stark cover photography for less than the cost of two cocktails.

The Discogs master release page shows the lineage: the original 1961 Pacific Jazz pressing, various reissues through the '70s and '80s, Japanese imports, and now the 2023 Tone Poet edition. The Tone Poet is the one to buy unless you're chasing the original mono for historical bragging rights.

Here's the thing about Pacific Jazz records: they were well-recorded but undermarketed. Richard Bock engineered this session himself, and while he didn't have Van Gelder's reputation, he knew how to mic a small group. The tapes sat in the vaults for decades before Blue Note (now under Universal) decided to give them the audiophile treatment. Joe Harley supervised the reissue, Kevin Gray cut the lacquer at Cohearent Audio, and RTI pressed it on 180-gram vinyl. That's the same chain responsible for the best-sounding Tone Poets in the series.

Listening lineage? Jones's approach to the trumpet-warm, melodic, structurally tight-echoes through later hard bop records that prioritized song over fireworks. You can hear traces of this sensibility in Freddie Hubbard's early Blue Note work, in Lee Morgan's lyrical side, even in Woody Shaw's more restrained moments. The opening phrase of "I'm Gonna Go Fishing" has been quietly borrowed by session players for decades-not sampled, just remembered. It's the kind of line that sticks because it's singable, hummable, and leaves harmonic space for reinterpretation.

According to jazz discography records, this exact lineup-Jones, Land, Strazzeri, Peacock, Pettis-only recorded together for these three June 1961 sessions. Peacock would go on to work with Paul Bley and later become a mainstay of Keith Jarrett's Standards Trio. Harold Land had already logged time with the Clifford Brown-Max Roach Quintet and would continue leading his own groups through the '60s. But this particular chemistry-this exact combination of voices-exists only on these six tracks.

The "Dig": Technical Scrutiny

Let's get into the wax. The Tone Poet series uses a specific formula: original analog tapes, all-analog mastering by Kevin Gray, lacquer cutting at Cohearent Audio, and pressing at RTI. No digital intermediate. No noise reduction. No "enhancement." Just the tape, the lathe, and the press.

Kevin Gray is the guy you want cutting your lacquer if you care about dynamic range and frequency extension. His cuts preserve the transient snap of the cymbals, the woody resonance of Peacock's bass, and the bite of Jones's trumpet without any of the brittle harshness that plagued '80s and '90s reissues. The RTI pressing plant in Camarillo, California, is one of the last facilities in the U.S. still doing this work at scale, and their quality control is consistent.

On the original 1961 Pacific Jazz pressing, you're looking at a mono release with the Pacific Jazz "palmtree" label. Clean copies are out there, but expect to pay $80-$150 depending on condition. The Tone Poet reissue is stereo, sourced from the original stereo tapes, and it gives you 95% of the original's sonic character at a fraction of the cost. Unless you're a completist chasing every label variation, the Tone Poet is the move.

Label details matter here. The Tone Poet series operates under Blue Note's umbrella, but this was originally a Pacific Jazz production. Pacific Jazz was a subsidiary of Richard Bock's World Pacific Records, known for documenting the West Coast jazz scene in the '50s and '60s. The label didn't have the prestige of Blue Note, Prestige, or Riverside, which is why records like this one got overlooked. But the recording quality? Solid. Bock knew what he was doing.

Sound-wise, this record has excellent soundstage separation. Piano left, tenor right, trumpet center, rhythm section anchoring the bottom. The room ambience is present but not exaggerated. There's just enough air between the instruments to give each player space without losing the sense of ensemble. Floor noise is minimal. Surface noise on a clean Tone Poet copy should be virtually nonexistent.

Mood check: this is a twilight record. Not late-night melancholy, not midday hustle. It's that in-between hour when the day is winding down but night hasn't fully arrived. Pour something simple-bourbon, neat-and let it play through. It rewards attention but doesn't demand it.

Context & Afterlife

Carmell Jones was born in Kansas City, Kansas, in 1936 and grew up in the same city that produced Charlie Parker, Count Basie, and a rhythm-forward approach to jazz that prioritized groove over flash. By the late '50s, Jones had moved to Los Angeles, where he fell into the orbit of the West Coast jazz scene. He recorded with Gerald Wilson, Curtis Amy, and Bud Shank before cutting The Remarkable Carmell Jones as his debut leader date.

But Jones never settled in the U.S. In 1965, he moved to Berlin and became a fixture of the European jazz circuit. He toured, taught, and recorded sporadically, but he never achieved the stateside recognition of his peers. He returned to Kansas City in the 1980s and died there in 1996 at age 60 from heart failure. His obituary barely made the jazz press.

The cultural afterlife of this record is quiet but persistent. It didn't get sampled by hip-hop producers. It didn't become a "rare groove" holy grail. But it kept circulating among serious listeners who appreciated its balance of substance and restraint. When Joe Harley selected it for the Tone Poet Series, he was making a statement: not every great jazz record had a Blue Note catalog number.

For more on the broader context of Pacific Jazz and the West Coast scene, the Wikipedia entry on similar-era sessions provides useful background on the label's approach and roster.

Collector's Corner: The Final Audit

Here's the straight talk. If you're chasing the original 1961 Pacific Jazz pressing, expect to pay $100-$150 for a clean VG+ copy. That's not unreasonable, but you're paying for the label and the era, not a sonic upgrade. The Tone Poet reissue is the smarter buy. At $29.99 retail (and available for less on the secondary market), you're getting Kevin Gray mastering, RTI pressing, and the same stereo tapes that the original was cut from.

What to look for: if you're buying the Tone Poet reissue, make sure the hype sticker is intact on the protective sleeve. It confirms the mastering and pressing chain. The insert is a single-sided 11.5" x 11.5" sheet with liner notes by John William Hardy and Thomas Conrad-worth reading for context on Jones's career and the session details.

Alternatives? If you want more Carmell Jones, hunt down his 1965 Blue Note session Jay Hawk Talk. It's harder to find in original form, but it's been reissued. If you want more Harold Land, grab The Fox on Contemporary or any of his Jazzland records from the early '60s.

This record sits in the sweet spot of affordability and quality. It's not a grail. It's not going to appreciate 300% in the next five years. But it's going to sound great every time you drop the needle, and that's the whole point.

Ready to add it to your collection? Grab a curated copy of The Remarkable Carmell Jones by Carmell Jones from the Miles Waxey bins for $29.99. It's a hard bop essential that doesn't demand a mortgage.

One Last Question

If you could only own one Carmell Jones record for the rest of your life, would it be this one or Jay Hawk Talk? And why does one session stick with you more than the other? Drop your answer in the comments-I'm curious where collectors land on this.