Mike Makhalemele - 1982 - Blue Mike

Mike Makhalemele

1982

Blue Mike

01. Coming Home 06:30

02. I Remember You (Dedicated to Henry Sithole) 07:46

03. The Roaring Lion 05:25

04. Blue Mike 09:11

05. Spring is Here 06:13

Tenor Saxophone - Mike Makhalemele

Piano/Organ - Jabu Nkosi

Bass - Zulu Bidi

Drums/Percussion - Nelson Magwaza

Composer: Ratau M. Makhalemele

Produced by Rashid Vally

Blue Mike is an accomplished and polished outing that leans heavily into a nostalgic yet modern take on swing peppered with virtuosic sax swag. An unrelenting Cape Jazz odyssey with Latin flair, "I Remember You" is dedicated to Drive saxophonist Henry Sithole, who died in in car accident 1977. The album also takes a mesmerising slow funk journey on the closer "Spring is Here."

Released in 1982, Blue Mike turned out to be a bookend for As-Shams, bringing an end to the imprint's golden age, which had started with Dollar Brand's Mannenberg - 'Is Where It's Happening' in 1974. Following its release, As-Shams shifted focus onto keeping back catalogue in print, later returning with the MANDLA and Roots imprints in the late 1980s and the Kalamazoo and African Echoes releases of the 1990s. Owing to the discovery of a lost batch of deadstock in the 2000s, Blue Mike is the most accessible original pressing to source from the As-Shams catalogue.