(2-LP set) the very first edition of Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers was unfortunately short-lived, and as excellent as they were collectively, it was the beginning of a trend for the members of this group to come and go. Unknown to Blakey at the time, he would become a champion for bringing talent from the high minor leagues to full-blown Jazz-star status, starting with this band featuring Detroit trumpeter Donald Byrd, East coast tenor saxophonist Hank Mobley, and pianist Horace Silver, a Jazz legend ever after. This double vinyl LP version is an expanded edition, including five extra cuts. There's a first and second take of the calypso shuffle-to-bop Carol's Interlude, first versions of the original bopper Weird-O, standards Ill Wind and The Late Show, and the studio version of Mobley's Deciphering the Message, sporting a scattered, tangential melody that was never previously available, but now is on this recording. 180 gram mono vinyl.
