The Atomic Mr Basie

I always saw this album as swing’s last hurrah before rock and roll fully took over, and what a hurrah it was. All the players are top notch here. And what a ballsy move to put an atomic explosion on the cover barely a decade after WWII; ballsy, and fitting for the music here. It just edges into a 5 for me.

Yet another example on this list of how dance music used to be way cooler than it is now. Albums like this make me truly tired of getting packed into a small dark room with 18 dollar cocktails just so that I can gyrate in my allotted square foot of space. I also think that there is a really cool level of fatalism present in this album. The world could end any day now in nuclear Armageddon, let's have four martinis and swing! Our fatalism today is much more depressing. Let's make fatalism fun again.

On first listen, I was a little dismissive - yeah, yeah, Big Band, whatever, stuff my 80-something dad likes. On Listen 2 I realized: this album is pretty amazing! It only got better as I listened to it over and over. The word "frenetic" kept coming to mind. I liked learning that the arranger Neal Hefti wrote the Batman TV series theme (Bat Maaaaaan! Bat Maaaaaan! nah-nah, nah-nah, nah-nah, nah-nah Bat MAAAANN!!). To show how these things are generational, I had never heard of Hefti, but when I mentioned his name to my 80-something Dad his response was "of course I know Hefti!" His Wikipedia entry is pretty interesting. They quote Miles Davis saying, "If it weren't for Neal Hefti, the Basie band wouldn't sound as good as it does." Respect. Back to the album, I loved pretty much all the tracks. Flight of the Foo Birds, Double-O (what a sax solo!), and Fantail (drums!!!) really caught my attention. I also really liked the mellow tracks. After Supper had a nice opening piano part, a great tune throughout and I loved the walking bass line. Midnite Blue is clearly a song about a dame, y'know, the broad who came into your life and left it in shambles. The final "Lil' Darling" wraps it up nicely at the end of a wild evening at the club. Maybe you're even finally slow dancing cheek to cheek with the dame from Midnite Blue and all is right in the world. In an earlier review I said I'm simply not a jazz fan. This album (along with Keith Jarrett's The Koln Concert) shows me that I can definitely be a fan of some jazz. I want to dig in a lot deeper now. 5 star wham-bam-POW!

This big band record catches me in the right mood. Dude this album was great to sit and fill out a really angry company survey to.

The album that brought joy in the middle of this snow storm.

Big band music isn't generally my favorite - it's generally background noise to me - but this was surprisingly listenable. There are significant shades of harlem-esque jazz in here. I enjoyed it far more than I expected to.

Very enjoyable jazz, mostly falling on the "hot" side. (My mom categorizes all jazz as either "hot", "cool", or "what time does the tune start", heh.) Fave track - "Kid From Red Bank" for hot, "Lil' Darlin'" for cool!

I love putting this on walking around my neighbourhood built in the 50s and imagining I’m back in time. Simple yet beautiful. The melody on the last song is heartbreaking too.

girl no fuck this swing shit

“The Atomic Mr. Basie” by the Count Basie Orchestra (1958). Exquisite big band jazz and swing, this music places the serious listener smack in the middle of a Woody Allen movie, and then escorts him/her/them straight to heaven. These are beautiful and intricate arrangements, with disciplined and precise performances, featuring sublime solo work. Each soloist knows exactly what a soloist should and should not do. Rock, folk, synth, and hip hop artists should appreciate the value of the planning and execution of the big band style, perfectly exemplified by the CBO. Basie's piano playing is deft and sensitive, articulating the passion behind Neal Hefti’s visionary arrangements. Strictly professional. All music lovers should cultivate an appreciation of this contribution to American music—it helps to define the entire era of recording, from the 1930s to the present. That album cover, however, didn’t age well. The promo guys got a little carried away. 5/5

I’m sorry, I just can’t do jazz for long periods of time unless it’s low and slow like smoking meat. I can dig Kenny G. I bet that man can smoke some meat. Lucious, glorious meat. But enough about my Kenny G fantasy. This… well, this popped. But not in a good way. Very high pitched. Very staccato. Not unlike Flight of the Bumblebee or my recent sentence structure. However, Flight is a delicate piece on a violin that still soothes you as much as it makes you uneasy. But this… well, this was markedly more aggressive by virtue of the trumpet’s incessant blasting into my amygdala. I’m sorry, Count Basie, but I’m afraid I’ll have to count you out. Down for the count. More apropos to this review, a count of one. No recounts allowed.

A rock'n'roll guy at heart, which is why he's blowing shit up on the cover and in the music.

An exceptional jazz big band album. From the opening track, you know what to expect for the rest of the album: A large sound, vibrant solos, and upbeat compositions. The dynamics between Count Basie's orchestra make the album a classic. The feeling of the album is in the name, and you can't help but move when listening to it. Favorite tracks: The Kid From Red Bank, Duet, Double-O, Midnite Blue, Splanky

A great jazz music album. This is going on top of my list for great jazz albums. Double-O is an amazing song, with an running bass line which contrasts very nicely with overlying horns and piano. My only critique might be the overused horns, however, this kind of sound is typical in 1950s music

Been waiting for this one 🙏 this list needs more jazz

Really felt this one. Hard to think of a better sounding big band recording and the feel is spot-on. Somehow arrives in that perfect moment when this style of music felt essential and yet recording technology had caught up enough to make it really sing. Favourite song: Midnite Blue

The Atomic Mr Basie Nice cover. Interesting one this. I think had I listened to this back at the start of the year I would have really struggled with it, but now there’s quite a bit I do like and can appreciate, but I would also still say that I’m not yet a fan of the more frenetic dancier Big Band numbers. Luckily on here they are counterpointed by some slightly more lower tempo tracks The Kid from Red Bank is a case in point - the slightly fraught tempo, piercing horns and rinky dink piano isn’t really my cup of tea - but I can see the skill and I can admire the energy. With something like this you can almost feel the breath of Rock’N’Roll on its shoulder. Duet is a bit more palatable, at a nicer tempo and the horns seem to be used more melodically rather than rhythmically and forcefully as on the opening track. After Supper is even better, you can still hear the Big Band-ness but it’s so gracefully performed, the piano is great and the horns have a restrained and tasteful feel. Pure 1950s black and white US sitcom theme music feel to Flight of the Foo Birds. And pure 1950s US chat show theme music feel to Double-O, despite the great piano intro. Teddy the Toad is good though, kind of similar to Duet, and very nicely arranged. Whirly-Bird would be my favourite of the uptempo dance numbers, there’s a real punch to the drums and the horns. Midnight Blue is probably my stand out, it feels more cinematic and widescreen than some of the others and despite sounding jazzy, the arrangement seems more like a mid 60s pop song - replace the horns with a guitar and it would sound pretty cool. Splanky has a nice sophisticated feel, again the horn arrangement has a nice restraint and the piano is great. Fantail doesn’t quite do it for me, not sure why, but it probably just falls too close to the franticness of the first track. Li’l Darlin is rather lovely though, a real softness and delicateness to it, definitely one of the standout tracks. I rather enjoyed this, although I think that's more enjoying it for a late 50s jazz album, rather than as an album in its own right, but I certainly wouldn't be averse to hearing it again. I’m not into it enough to go 4, so it lands as a solid mid to high 3. ⚛️⚛️⚛️ Playlist submission: Midnight Blue

I’m not sure what I was expecting off this. But not what I got, that’s for sure. Awful.

Probably the best something like this can be, but not my thing at all. Technically very good, very proficient, great production etc but with this style of music, if it doesn't have a crooner singing, it's just not my thing Between a 1 and a 2 1/5

Better than Coldplay

some may say the album cover is more fit for free jazz than this record, and idk maybe theyre right but more likely theyre underestimating The Power Of The Swing....it exists all around us....it changed the world!!! tasty and awsom album, its hard to imagine a bad time to listen to something like this....swing (the genre) is not at the forefront of my musical vocabulary but swing (the concept/sensation) absolutely is so its clearly only a matter of time! the less energetic tracks here are also clearly golden cuts, tho im worse currently at parsing a big band/swing band than later types of jazz ensembles. but its as seasoned and gratifying as i could want from a guy who just Never Stopped Doing Big Band for decades and decades, just continually honing his craft and collaborators, and hey sometimes u get lil tastes of bebop and onwards too it aint totally backwards looking...fine fine work

The most interesting big band music I've ever heard - way ahead of its time, really good! [EDIT: Sounds like a bunch of soundtrack themes to exciting yet unmade films thrown together. "Duet", in particular is great. Extra points for the cover art. Boom]

Love this album!! Still seems fresh even though it goes back to 58. Every song is great. I particularly like the fact that the first half of the album is super upbeat and then about half way through slows down and changes the mood completely. Favorite track: Lil' Darlin. 4 stars

I never knew Count Basie was making music like this well into the 1950s. There's a lot of creativity, energy and vitality to these songs, and I can even hear a bit of rock mixed in with the jazz. Count Basie's horn section really feels like an atomic bomb here. Works really well together, no favourite track, rather listen to the album as a whole!

Un poco sobrevalorado, pero buena onda.

The album was cozy, it was fun, but it all felt the same, i would not be able to tell you about a single number from the album. But if I was in need for some background noise that most people wouldn't mind, this one could be put on

Very enjoyable listen, but I also struggle with picking any one track out. They all flow together very well and that becomes a bit of their downfall. I'd happily have it on in the background while sitting around relaxing or enjoying a good time that isn't necessarily focused on the music. It's nice jazzy and I enjoy the contrabass quite a bit. A very cohesive listen where no one track stood out to me as particularly above or below the others Standouts - 3/5

Yes important in a musical education - along with a few paragraphs of the Wikipedia entry.....Look for the 1994 remaster - previous version either ripped badly to YT music or is a bad recording, despite its importance. Not forgetting how important his innovations and influence are he is one of many who changed music, creating many "standards" - the track "Li'l Darlin" standing out to me as something I first heard on "Come in Spinner" on ABC in 1990 when first discovering the swoons and joys of jazz and the voices the orchestra can play. Whichever way you discover a love for Jazz, I hope you find it. But this album is more history that joy for me. But a great reminder of the debt owed to the passionate innovative genius of the first half of the 20th century I music. They were exciting rule breaking and standard setting times.

Smooth! That’s how I think of Count Basie - both as a pianist & a band-leader. This album might be a Count Basie album, but the music here has a lot to do with Neal Hefti, who both composed & arranged the music. Hefti was hot in the 50’s & 60’s. I was a kid but I knew his name. He composed & arranged music for the Woody Herman & Harry James Orchestras, before connecting with Basie in the early 50’s. The emphasis is on the brass. No strings here, which was Hefti’s want. He had started as a trumpeter, after all. He’ll always be best remembered for two compositions - his theme song for the TV show, The Odd Couple, but most of all for the title track to the TV series Batman. This album moves at a pace that hardly gives you time to breathe. And, as one critic has remarked, it was probably The Count’s last great album.

More concentration than I possess is needed to lift me away from the noir cinema association this brings me, but it's a fine example of this sort of formation flying. I kept thinking of scenes from Touch of Evil, among others.

5/10 That's nice. 5-2-2024

not my style at all

No

A bit too "old" for me. Audio quality was low by modern standards. Too brassy.

Не представляю как это можно серьëзно слушать, всë время ловлю флешбеки с опенинга Гриффинов. Не зашло

Vomit

Very nice, probably inspiration for Cuphead OST

Nice!

This is a wonderful album that had me smiling and tapping my foot from the jump. While I’m not the biggest fan of swing jazz (it can feel quite dated), this album is a wonderful example of Basie demonstrating that there was still some life left in this style. This fact is made even more impressive when one considers how Jazz had begun to dramatically shift towards small groups led by men like Rollins, Davis etc.

Love this album! Fantastic energy and melodies. I'm not the most knowledgeable about Jazz and its many forms, but the way a big band nimbly positions itself in such a high energy arrangement is awe-inspiring.

I really appreciated the album's nuanced discussion of the ethical concerns of using a weapon of mass destruction to end a war and how it has changed the legacy of Japanese involvement in WWII from aggressor to victim. Lol jk, this album was excellent though. I thought about going song by song in my review, but honestly I think "an incredible and genre-bending combination of soft, hard bop, and big band jazz that jumps out of the headphones." The interplay between piano and plungered trumpet is just what I need. 5/5

This album is pretty great! When im all done with this journey, I might start my mornings off with this. I like the whole style of it, especially the frenetic horns on Double-O

Loved the instruments on this album, made me wish I knew how to play piano. His talent! I loved After Dinner, such sultry vibes. When the album finished I was surprised because I wanted to hear more!

great big band sound

When I first got into jazz, I bought a copy of The Penguin Guide to Jazz on CD and gradually supplemented my couple of Miles Davis LPs and Charlie Parker cassettes with selections from their recommendations, largely '50s and '60s post-bop and Blue Note classics. I am still not an expert on swing and big bands but two albums stood out enough to make my collection - Ellington at Newport and The Atomic Mr Basie. Immediately, from the first notes of "The Kid From The Red Bank", the arrangements, by Neal Hepti, stand out, the horn section popping and pulsing sinuously over the rhythm section of drums, walking bass and the Count's piano. Eddie 'Lockjaw' Davis's tenor wails above it all, great stuff. The whole album is excellent but that opening track, "Flight of the Foo Birds", "Splanky" and closing ballad, "Lil' Darlin'" really stand out.

This is the way I think jazz should sound. Earlier I listened to the Dave Brubeck album which was fine, but this is more my speed. Really liked this, and liked it a lot. If I'm going to play jazz, this is what I want to hear.

Awesome! When I was just out of high school my friends dad would talk about swinging to Count Basie. At that time we only listened to classic rock, Led Zeppelin, Jimmy Hendrix, Pink Floyd… We poo-pooed my friends dad about his old music. To use that days vernacular, what dicks we were.

Very horn heavy, bright, zooming! An excellent swing album with a modern sound for the genre and time.

Que álbum de Big Band! Estupendo. Celest x Versekeys Ultra-Sense Planet.

Bass player deserves a raise

Very representational of Big Band jazz: maestro-level musicianship, swingin' charts and arrangements, basically the 20th century version of a symphony, and Count Basie and Duke Ellington were the sine qua non acts to see and hear. After the war, these big bands really dwindled--it got too expensive to tour, and audience tastes changed to small-combo jazz acts like trios, quartets, etc. and rock 'n' roll was on the horizon.

As the title suggests the album starts at breakneck pace and is an awesome example of big band jazz.

Smooth!

Perfection. Love love. Favorite album we’ve gotten so far. The instrumentation was flawless.

Some real fun and catchy swing. If you like this genre this stuff is fire.

It’s the bomb

On of the all-timers...

There are not many that can swing as hard as the Count

It's truly criminal that this is the only Basie album on this whole list. No April In Paris? No This Time By Basie? No Straight Ahead? Psychotic.

Hadn’t heard before and loved it

4.5/5

Amazing classic!

Love this!

The best Jazz!!!

Really enjoyed, loved the compositions and instrumentation. The big band swing vibe is always so fun and just such high energy playing and solos. The solos were really strong and felt written, even if they were not.

I LOVE ATOMIC JAZZ

Monsters inc. A very relaxing and chilled half hour. I really didn't think I would enjoy this, but happy to be proved wrong. Another victory for the list. I asked a friend what decade he would put the album cover "80's punk album"

Amazing, amazing, amazing. What a goddamn treat to listen to, I could put this on repeat for an entire day and not get sick of it. Full of such emotion and energy... it's SO good. Going to have so many of these melodies and motifs stuck in my head now.

After three plus listens I'm finding it difficult to identify anything I don't like about this album, especially that name and cover. That's the 2025 equivalent of a band releasing the album "Saddam's Bunker Busters" it's just so damn American. Good shit, Count Basie.

Smooth and bright jazz at its pentacle. Perfect dinner cooking album

This site never misses with its jazz picks, I swear. It's a major compliment to a jazz artist/band to make a face like you just smelled moldy vegetables from their playing, and this whole album made me look like my tongue was about to go flying out of my head. Beyond amazing.

Big band jamz.

scho laaaang kei rchtige jazz me gha uf dere liste. und uiiii het das drive und isch geeeil arrangiert (neal hefti geile siech). duet meeega groovy und suuuper geils trompetesolo super bluesy aaah i liiike. super super geil. after supper no ruhiger aber d harmonie gebed gnueg spannig dases interessant bliibt. flight if the foo birds isch huuuuuere geil sooo geili block harmonies sie sind soo tight fuuuck. aso double o und teddy the toad hend s staubsuuge gad zu eiiiinere freud gmacht fuuuck huuuere geil. midnite blue wieder so wieni de neal hefti kenn eig langsam sanft schön schnuufigi arrangements. uiiii es chan dynamisch aber schono abgoh oyeeeeaaah. lil darlin sooo schön RIESE FÜFI.

D'apparence simple, mais beau et complexe, véhicule des émotions nuancées.

hell yea. atomi pommi baybe Tsar Bomba (1961): 50 Mt, Neuvostoliitto, Testi 219 (1962): 24,2 Mt, Neuvostoliitto, Testi 147 (1962): 21,1 Mt, Neuvostoliitto, Testi 173 (1962): 19,1 Mt, Neuvostoliitto, Castle Bravo (1954): 15 Mt, Yhdysvallat, Castle Yankee (1954): 13,5 Mt, Yhdysvallat, Testi 123 (1961): 12,5 Mt, Neuvostoliitto. omggg neukut.. neukkupojat hävisi suomen.. the line of finland you know the border.. 2 feet of bodys under ground.. graveyard of bodts. kuvassa toki operation plumbbobin jälkeinen yksi nevadan räjähdyksistä nimeltä hood.. eihän siellä lähellä ole ihmisiä... eihän tästä mitään negatiivisia vaikutuksia voi tulla.. the ki d from red bank

ok now we're fucking cooking with gas. listened to it 3x.. what a treat

This is truly an atomic album. I need this album. BOOM!!!

Thanks to a certain circumstance (married to a trumpet performance major) this one hits for me from the opening and just keeps rolling. Can't say how many times I've thrown this one on, but any time I wanna see my wife get transported to her former life, this one does the trick. Love the vibe, and the musicianship is as good as it gets in the genre. They just don't make em like this anymore.

Oh yeah! The energy on this album is fantastic. It's light and playful but with a big, full sound. The drums have a great thump-a-whump style to them, the horns are spectacular and theatrical, and the piano from Count Basie is a joy to listen to. When I'm writing, I like to make playlists of albums that fit the mood of the story. Depending on the project, that might be ambient electronica, or maybe something more industrial. Lately I've had a need for upbeat jazz, and this album is going right into my current project's playlist.

This album is just flat-out excellent. No filler, no fluff. Every track is tight, clean, and built to move. Some of the best tracks, like “The Kid from Red Bank,” “Splanky,” and “Whirly-Bird,” don’t drag or meander. They snap, swing, and stay out of their own way. Basie’s piano barely says a word, but it still leads with total authority. The brass section is razor sharp, the rhythm section feels effortless, and Neal Hefti’s arrangements know exactly when to hold back and when to punch. It’s not loud for the sake of it. It’s precise. Confident. Stylish. I played a few of these in jazz band, which partly explains why I connect with this album so much. That experience adds something personal, but even without it, this is a clear 5 out of 5.

Reminds me of 10th-12th grade Jazz Band. :-) Slappin!

sehr nice! definitiv positiv überrascht.

Wonderful!

I have adjusted my rating, this is the first album I listened to for this project and I have come back and listened multiple times since then, it deserves 5 Stars Fav songs: literally all of them!

Unbelievable

Amazing album! Every song is a masterpiece!

Beautiful, chaotic, wild

Count Basie Live at the Sands was one of my first and favorite jazz albums. Flight of the Foo Birds always blows me away, and found some new favorites this time through. This whole album just rips. The horn section is so tight. The rhythm section is blazing - Freddie Green was drilled into me as the king of subtle jazz comping - I think our band played Splanky at some point too. I honestly don't love Big Band music all that much, but everything is dialed to 10/10 on this album, it's hard to look away. Count's piano work seals it for me.

Beautiful work

A great introduction to big band jazz that reveals more of itself as you return to it.

Count Basie! No need to say more.

Incredible jazz record. It's played with so much precision that I cannot not like it.

This was amazing! I'd always meant to listen to Count Basie and now may have to do much more listening!

Nice

I felt like i'm in 1958, driving a Jaguar Mark IX while listening to this... wonderful! 5 stars.

This album gave me LIFE today

I love when these cats be cooking, especially on that sax dammmnnnn boi 🤤🫱

Very fun high tempo swing. I'm not sure what it was about the 90's that Swing and Big Band music suddenly became popular again, but I always enjoyed it.

Fav songs: Duet; After Supper Big band is enjoyable music. I prefer the slower songs.

Fantastic jazz album. I can't believe I had never listened to Count Basie, but he's here to stay in my repertoire!