“He said ‘who the fuck are you?” so I said, “I’m the bass player”. And all he said was “Well, we’ll see about that, won’t we?” When Tubby Hayes arrived at the Hopbine, Wembley’s popular jazz pub, one evening in the spring of 1965, his career was in a state of flux; still topping polls and casting an impressive shadow over the British jazz scene, he nevertheless remained frustrated. The elongated free-flights of John Coltrane and Sonny Rollins now held his fascination and although actively searching for musicians who matched this enthusiasm he was drawing blank after blank. Yet on this night a young bassist, just turned twenty-one, unexpectedly caught his attention with playing as precocious as it was inventive.

Then a sideman with the mainstream Alex Welsh band Ron Mathewson had been booked to ‘dep’ for Hopbine’s regular bassman Len Skeat, and knew full well how demanding Hayes could be. But on this night, he ticked every box the saxophonist could imagine – time, taste, tone, but above all a driving swing that might otherwise have been simply another backroom boozer blow into a session for the ages. And it was caught on tape too, Mathewson treasuring a reel which captured a genuine moment of UK jazz history. Oft-bootlegged and commercially issued in incomplete form back in 2005 (an album long since out of print) this historic set now receives the characteristic Jazz In Britain treatment in this new limited edition deluxe double-CD release.

Featuring all the music taped that night – including two explosive encounters between Hayes and fellow tenor (and Hopbine host) Tommy Whittle – newly transferred and restored from the original tape reel and complete with an extensive booklet note by Hayes’ biographer saxophonist Simon Spillett, this is the definitive issue of this material, issued to mark the milestone of fifty years since Tubby Hayes’ death.