Then, in 1974, my brother had come from a year stint in my father’s home in Chicago, Illinois, and (I and he are brazilians, from Rio) he brought many records when he got back: a 3 record Ted Nugent Live, Isle of Wight/New York rock festivals, and Jack Bruce At His Best, an excellent 2 disc compilation, with Jack as a comics illustration on the cover. It was different from just everything I knew, Harry Shapiro. The day by day routine life was in Jack’s lyrics, very very poignant I thought. If you woke up in the morning, walk on by a park and drive your car to downtown, feeling happy because it’s raining and it’s springtime… you might feel that this experience is meaning, because you could write a song with this single experience…that’s what Jack does. Not spotlights in dancehalls, but the life as rough and beautiful as it have always been. Fantastic. Songs like One and Into The Storm are these kinds of tunes where he tells all these tales.

But it was his bass playing that more makes you listen. His piano, Monk-based chords and short solos are perhaps his tour-de-force, but the bass, with that crunch tone and unstoppable creativity is what makes his music much remarkable, beyond the down-hearted vocalizings.

I’ll buy the book as soon as it sells here in Rio; I’ll buy the Milkway cd as soon as it sells here.

Best wishes Harry! Congratulations for this bio, man…

Carlos Bill, bass player, composer.