285: Learning How to Fly, by Tuck & Patti

Tuck & Patti (USA)
Learning How to Fly (1995)
13 tracks, 55 minutes
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Most jazz is cool. In fact, jazz is clearly the epitome of cool. Tuck & Patti’s Learning How to Fly is jazz, but it’s not cool. But that’s okay. It’s still a Good Album.

It’s a brave album to make. The sound is sparse. For 12 out of the 13 tracks, it’s just Tuck Andress on clean-toned electric guitar and Patti Cathcart on vocals. It’s not just song and accompaniment either – these are the duets of two highly accomplished musicians. Tuck’s guitar is incredibly intricate and technical without becoming robotic and Patti’s deep soul-infused voice gives echoes of Sarah Vaughan. Together they approach a variety of styles from jazz funk (‘Live in the Light’) to bossa nova (‘Learning How to Fly’)

The covers here are some of the highlights. Jimi Hendrix’s ‘Up From the Skies’ is turned into a fun bounce-along with Tuck playing a different crazy jazz chord every beat, and ‘Yeah Yeah’ (made famous by Georgie Fame) is a smooth groove with nice – although miniature – solos from both musicians. It’s ‘In My Life’ that is my favourite. It’s a very poignant song however it’s played, but Patti’s rich, soft voice brings out so much more emotion, elevating it into a temple of the bittersweet – it maybe even gets to me more than the Beatles’ original. Is that sacrilege? To top it off, Tuck’s classical-style guitar provides beautiful backing and manages to perfectly recreate the original’s harpsichord solo with astonishing technique.

So for all that, why do I say it’s not cool? It sounds really dated. Not in Tuck or Patti’s performances (although that smooth soul-jazz certainly had a vogue), but the production. There is so much reverb on it all, and it doesn’t even sound like a natural reverb either. It puts the whole thing incredibly squarely in the 1990s, and not really in a good way. Tuck’s signature long perm doesn’t do many favours in terms of datedness either.

If 12 tracks are just Tuck & Patti on their own, then what is the other? Well, that’s the last track on the album, a remix with incredibly reverby drums, keyboards and saxophone. It’s achingly cheesy. I’d say the additional instrumentation means that this track doesn’t fit with the rest of the album, but its atmosphere actually does. It’s just that the cheesiness is more apparent with more musicians. It’s less impressive than the duets though.

If it’s at all possible for you to listen past the 90s production values, please do. There are some captivating performances here from two great musicians. It’s just a shame that the intervening years have added a substantial amount of mustiness to it all. Ah well. We’ll all sound like that looking back in 25 years’ time.