George Cables - Phantom of the City (Contemporary, 1985)

This post is by Scott

George Cables (p); John Heard (b); Tony Williams (d)

Recorded on May 14 & 15, 1985

In an interview with Ethan Iverson on his Do the Math blog, George Cables discussed the making of Phantom of the City:

GC: Oh yeah, I was so thrilled that Tony would do this record with me, and John Heard.

EI: How did you get Tony involved?

GC: I just asked him. I was going to ask Billy Higgins or Tony Williams, and I said, let me ask Tony first. I just asked, him, you know said I had a date coming up. And he sounded great: I was thrilled. He put that introduction on “Phantom of the City” that was great. He did a rehearsal at his house, and “Phantom of the City” we almost forgot to do it on the date, and Tony said “Didn’t you have another piece?” “Oh yeah, ‘Phantom of the City’!”. I was the producer on this, so I had a lot of other things on my mind, but I forgot about the main song! Tony had a thing on there [sings drum intro], I remember, he worked that out, it was fascinating at the rehearsal to see Tony Williams work out this [sings drum beat]. I thought that really kind of made the piece.

EI: One thing about this record is you can hear how much Tony is swinging in that style, playing in a piano trio so beautifully, you know?

GC: Oh man, and his sound, we got in the studio, it was Ralph Kaffel’s [president of Fantasy Records] son Phil Kaffel who was the engineer and he was so good, he had Tony’s sound down like that. Tony had a sound that was easy, voom, there it is. “You got it already?!?” That was great, I loved it. Loved working with him.

EI: That one needs to come out on CD, that’s a great record.

GC: I wish it would.

One should also note that four of the seven cuts on the LP are Cables' own compositions.  

He's a terrific composer, and this is a terrific album.