Brand New ; Ossie Scott at His Best is a compilation which has been around for some years now, and is different from the similarly-titled Ossie Scott - Brand New.
It is available as a CD or a download I believe. As far as I know there is no vinyl issue.
For anyone who doesn`t know, the excellent Ossie Scott was a Jamaican saxophone player who, despite the impeccable reggae credentials of himself and his sidemen* , nearly always produced straight jazz when performing as a solo artist.**
Although I have some of the tracks on vinyl I bought this as a download so I can listen to it if I`m away from home. Also, by downloading it to my tablet I`ll still have access to Ossie`s mellifluous melodies even if I have no wi-fi access.
That`s enough about me, how does it pan out ? This compilation contains all of the albums Brand New and The Wonderful Sound of Ossie Scott and a handful of tracks from the My Way album.
The only real reservation I have is that for me personally the backing tracks on some of the tunes from the Brand New album are not as interesting as they might be. A bit of a disappointment as half the fun of Ossie`s recordings is the very high standard of the musicians he worked with.
Still, any shortcomings are more than compensated for by his own playing and by some fine musicianship from others on the collection as a whole.
Overall at 7.99 for 25 tracks that`s got to be value for money !
* Ossie was a past member of Byron Lee and the Dragonaires and The Ska Kings, as well as performing as a backing musician for many reggae artists. Musicians who appear on his albums include Sly Dunbar, Aston Barrett, Harold Butler, Leslie Butler, Willie Lindo, Lennox Gordon
** In case anyone`s wondering I would class Ossie`s jazz outings as `middle jazz`, i.e. not too traditional, not too experimental. Some have classed his music as a form of easy listening, which I think is a half-truth. Certainly it is very easy on the ear.
