The Nimbus Collective

"Trying to play serious music in an area as shallow and fad-driven as Los Angeles were too much for this band to deal with." So reads the liner note epitaph for one of the most potent ensembles to emerge from the UGMAA constellation. One hundred minutes of music. One night in Santa Barbara. July 1987. Then silence. The Nimbus Collective assembled six of the scene's finest: Nate Morgan on piano, Jesse Sharps on reeds, Danny Cortez on trumpet, Rickey Kelly on vibraphone, Joel Ector on bass, and Derek Roberts on drums. Veterans all, musicians who had passed through Horace Tapscott's orbit and absorbed the lessons of collective improvisation, compositional rigor, and spiritual commitment.

Morgan's "Retribution, Reparation" opens with that unmistakable McCoy Tyner-like seventies ensemble vibe - spirited piano and Coltrane-inflected tenor sailing over churning rhythm. The sextet is ultra-tight, swinging furiously throughout. Ector's "Big Spliff" features one of those unforgettable themes that leaves you grinning, Sharps stretching out on soprano while Morgan provides kaleidoscopic piano commentary. Thelonious Monk's "Well You Needn't" receives an exuberant reading - the only cover in a set dominated by original compositions. Kelly's vibraphone textures shimmer throughout, while Cortez's trumpet reaches its apex on the ballad "A Bientôt." But everyone shines here. "The Goat And The Ramjam," "Distant Vibe," "Mrafu," "Mfaconi," "Journey Into Nigritia" - the titles alone suggest the Pan-African consciousness that informed everything this community touched.

How musicians this incredible escaped notice remains one of jazz history's enduring mysteries. Lotusland - the old nickname for Los Angeles, that land of lotus-eaters and dreamers - proved inhospitable to their vision. But the tapes survived. Another buried treasure, another gift from the gods of South Central.