AMG Review of Recorded Live! In Concert Around the World

Richie Unterberger
All Music Guide

Here's a very full and fine 70-minute collection of mid-'60s McDuff, recorded from 1963-1966 and taken from the Prestige albums Hallelujah Time!, The Midnight Sun, Recorded Live! In Concert Around the World, and I Got a Woman. Actually, it's almost like an expanded version of Recorded Live! In Concert Around the World, since seven of the 11 tracks come from that July 1964 recording. McDuff was leading an excellent group on these sides, with a young George Benson on guitar, Red Holloway on tenor sax, and Joe Dukes on drums (Pat Martino plays guitar on just one track, the sole offering from I Got a Woman). For the most part the tunes have a frenetic organ jazz charge, perfect for getting you up and going without a coffee, the eight-minute "Undecided" being a special highlight in that respect. Occasionally they get mellower, as on the ballad "Midnight Sun" and a cover of "The Girl From Ipanema." The McDuff originals "Another Goodun'," "Sokay," and "Spoonin'" (the last of which is the track with Martino) present the combo at their most down and bluesy, and Buddy Johnson's sultry "Save Your Love for Me" has some real unexpected high soul/doo wop harmonies at the tag.