Vinyl Wednesday: Lyn Collins - Check Me Out If You Don't Know Me By Now
The title is a whole mouth full.. and the album is, as you can see, produced by the "minister of the new new super heavy funk" himself, James Brown. Lyn Collins, famous for the infectious hit single "Think (about it)", worked with the James Brown band in the 70's. In the late 1980s and early '90s, Collins attempted a comeback as a dance/club diva, recording the house single "Shout" for Belgium's ARS label. In 1993, Collins' profile was given a boost by female dancehall singer Patra, who invited Collins to perform on her hit remake of "Think (About It)"; partly due to the resulting interest, her two official albums were reissued in England and the Netherlands. Collins continued to tour and perform, most notably at the European Jazz/Funk Festival (in both 1998 and 1999) and the Montreux Jazz Festival. In February 2005, Collins embarked on her first ever solo tour. For three weeks, she performed in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The tour was produced by the Soulpower organization. Sadly, shortly after returning from her European tour, Collins died aged 56 in Pasadena, California from cardiac arrhythmia.
Unfortunately, once again, the band isn't documented on the record sleeve. There are strings, hobos, flutes and a full funk band, all nameless. If you listen carefully you can hear Fred Wesley's trombone, St Clair Pinckney's tenorsax and also Maceo Parker on alto. Maceo has a solo in "We want to Parrty, Parrty, Parrty". This is Track five (bonus track, reissue only) of the album (1995 on P-Vine Records/Polydor K.K. in Japan). The album was released the first time in 1975 (with different track numbers). Actually I have a UK pressing from 1988, so this song isn't on my own copy but I found it on Youtube:
While youtubing, a bit off-topic, I came across this awfully funky video of one of my favourite JB songs:
The dancers are so funny.. and the band is tight! And all in full colour. Awkward audience, probably the tv producer told them to sit down, hard to understand..
This is the title track called Dark Horse. Just as in the album version it features sax and piano solos. It's a pretty wild performance, matching today's start of the Chinese New Year: THE YEAR OF THE FIRE HORSE!Live at Bimhuis, we added a drum solo. Afterwards, I decided to seperate it from the song and post it as an extra video below. Why not in one video?Because the video would become very very long and experience shows that people will not stick around for longer that 6-7 minutes. Yoràn's free drum solo is actually really great and in this seperate video, the true drum lovers can watch and learn from his drum story telling. Sometimes people ask me; What are drummers doing in their solos? To give you an idea of what Yoràn is doing in his solo: He starts with a pattern, an idea. He keeps the pattern going and plays variations over it. Then he combines it with soloing over it with call and reponse phrases and slides in new patterns. Technically it's interesting because he demonstrates a lot of independence and speed, as well as dynamics and sound colours, while telling a story, which means in musical context that the solo has certain elements which can be recognized by the (trained) listener. Many people in the Western part of the world miss the melodic and harmonic context during a free drum solo. It's fair to say a free drum solo without any accompaniment is like an abstract painting. Within the given context you can hear and see what you can manage, depending on your own frame of reference and expectations. In the end, it's about: does it resonate with you? Because both, the painting and the free drum solo, they lack a clear subject (no lyrics, no recognizable image), both forms are highly subjective and open to the interpretation of the audience. They function as a conversation between the artist's feeling and the viewer's/listener's perception.But you also can listen to it with a pure analytical drum ear and try to follow the patterns and phrases. As a musician and human I (try to) do both :-) Enjoy!More info:Susanne Alt: sax, Matthijs Geerts and Ike van Bergen: keys, Thomas Pol: bass, Yoràn Vroom: drums, Helene Jank: percussion Performed at 16th of January 2026 at Bimhuis, Amsterdam, Recorded by Onno Prillwitz Filmed by Robert Glass and Albert Nooij. - The title is a whole mouth full.. and the album is, as you can see, produced by the minister of the new new super heavy funk himself, James Brown.Lyn Collins, famous for the infectious hit single Think (about it), worked with the James Brown band in the 70's.In the late 1980s and early '90s, Collins attempted a comeback as a dance/club diva, recording the house single Shout for Belgium's ARS label. In 1993, Collins' profile was given a boost by female dancehall singer Patra, who invited Collins to perform on her hit remake of Think (About It); partly due to the resulting interest, her two official albums were reissued in England and the Netherlands. Collins continued to tour and perform, most notably at the European Jazz/Funk Festival (in both 1998 and 1999) and the Montreux Jazz Festival. In February 2005, Collins embarked on her first ever solo tour. For three weeks, she performed in the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Austria and Switzerland. The tour was produced by the Soulpower organization. Sadly, shortly after returning from her European tour, Collins died aged 56 in Pasadena, California from cardiac arrhythmia.Unfortunately, once again, the band isn't documented on the record sleeve. There are strings, hobos, flutes and a full funk band, all nameless. If you listen carefully you can hear Fred Wesley's trombone, St Clair Pinckney's tenorsax and also Maceo Parker on alto.Maceo has a solo in We want to Parrty, Parrty, Parrty. This is Track five (bonus track, reissue only) of the album (1995 on P-Vine Records/Polydor K.K. in Japan). The album was released the first time in 1975 (with different track numbers). Actually I have a UK pressing from 1988, so this song isn't on my own copy but I found it on Youtube:While youtubing, a bit off-topic, I came across this awfully funky video of one of my favourite JB songs:The dancers are so funny.. and the band is tight! And all in full colour. Awkward audience, probably the tv producer told them to sit down, hard to understand..
