Charlie Hunter's 'Gentlemen, I Neglected To Inform You Will Not Be Getting Paid'

So here’s something for those out there who prefer something with a groove and no lyrics. It’s a strange and exotic style of music that requires the composers and performers to actually really know what the hell they’re doing on their instruments. It hardly seems to get much attention anymore, but it’s called…..JAZZ!

Jokes aside, Charlie Hunter is probably one of the coolest artists in any genre currently performing. At some point in his 20’s, it seems that he sold his soul to the devil to gain the ability to play his custom-made 8 string guitar, which features 3 bass strings on the bottom and 5 strings on the top. As one can imagine, this allows him to be the guitarist and bass player at the same time. Combined with hours of practice and a skill for both improvisation and composition, Hunter has been creating some really exciting sounds for almost two decades because of his sheer versatility as a musician. He was a member of the jam band/jazz group Garage a Tois before recently leaving last year, and has also collaborated with drummer Bobby Privette in their on-and-off again group Groundtruther (my favorite being their super-weird record with DJ Logic). As a bandleader he has released around 15 albums, ranging from more straight-ahead modern jazz on Blue Note Records (like Ready, Set...Shango! and his 1993 debut Charlie Hunter Trio), to funk (a trio record called Return of the Candyman featuring one of the coolest covers of ‘Fly Like an Eagle’ featuring a vibraphone, bassguitar, and drummer you can imagine) and more recently a blues/rock oriented sound (his last two records Mistico and Baboon Strength especially). My favorite record of his was one of the earliest, a track-for-track jazz interpretation of Bob Marley’s Natty Dread. If you haven’t heard it, go out and get it. Now.

A fine example of the scary stuff Hunter can do. He's said that one of his goals was to imitate the sound of B3 organ on the guitar, and I think he more then does it here.

His most recent release, the fantastically titled Gentlemen, I Neglected To Inform You Will Not Be Getting Paid sees Charlie return to his roots as a jazz player with serious chops and a love for writing great arrangements. The album was recorded completely live to two-inch analog tape and was not mixed or overdubbed whatsoever. Together with some incredible playing and a nice batch of new tunes, this record sounds like something that could have come out of 1960. The first track, ‘You Look Good In Orange’ could have been on a George Benson or Grant Green record. The addition of a horn section allows Hunter and his powerhouse rhythm section to do what they do best: groove like there’s no tomorrow. The slower ballads like ‘High and Dry’ and the achingly gorgeous ‘Everyday You Wake Up New York Says No’ show that the band can do something other then just groove and treat all tunes with the same amount of reverence and top-notch work. The live-feel of the record is no better summed up then on the final/title track, where Charlie Hunter lets his inner blues man come out and start kicking ass and taking names. Overall, this record is awesome and I highly recommend it to anyone who enjoys their music with a large dash of soul.

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