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"Originally released in 1966 and long coveted by collectors, Pendulum marked the bold debut of British pianist and composer Mike Taylor. His forward-thinking approach to modern jazz is on full display here, navigating standards and originals with fearless invention and a distinctive harmonic voice.

Recorded at Lansdowne Studios under the supervision of Denis Preston, the quartet featured saxophonist Dave Tomlin, bassist Tony Reeves, and drummer Jon Hiseman — a group of rising talents that would become central to the British jazz underground. This 2025 edition, part of Decca’s acclaimed British Jazz Explosion series, brings the album back to vinyl for the first time since its original release, remastered from the original tapes and pressed on 180g black vinyl." — (via Jazz Messengers)
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"There is a tendency with music to compare it with what we already know (for example a Monk, a Bill Evans or a Paul Bley) in order to form an opinion about it. But Mike Taylor resists such simplistic analogy. He has a distinctive sound and approach and while not a virtuoso, he has a beguiling way of drawing you into his music, scrupulously avoiding cliché with his often angular melodic constructs." — JazzWise

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Decca Records officially reissues 'Pendulum' (1966) by British jazz composer, pianist, and band leader Mike Taylor, on vinyl for the very first time since its original release. Part of Decca's British Jazz Explosion series, this significant recording has long been sought after on vinyl by collectors and connoisseurs, with original copies now selling for upwards of £1,000.

The 180gm limited print LP is housed in 350gsm brown craft board sleeves. It is accompanied by extensive new liner notes (a 12x12 four-page insert) from British jazz expert Tony Higgins, with detailed insight into the extraordinary life of Taylor, who, with every passing year, becomes more of a fascinating character in the development of British jazz and whose story reads like that of a grand opera, embracing exceptional music, high drama, mental illness, drugs and an untimely early death.

This new edition has been remastered at Gearbox Studios, London, using high-resolution digital source files, taken from the original tapes, which were transferred to a Studer reel-to-reel tape machine, then mastered using an all-valve analogue mastering desk. — (via Everything Jazz)

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Although both these albums have previously appeared on CD – Pendulum in 2007 courtesy of Sunbeam Records and Trio in 2004, courtesy of Universal's Impressed Re-Pressed series –the asking price for the original vinyl copies of these two records have continued to soar. These superb facsimile releases are therefore most welcome.

Remastered and cut from the original master tapes by Gearbox Records and pressed on 180 gram vinyl by Decca's ‘British Jazz Explosion’ Landsdowne imprint, they allow we mere mortals to purchase a small slice of British jazz history from its much sought after Golden Period of the 1960s and early 1970s.

For his Landsdowne Series albums, producer Denis Preston always hired the very best recording engineers of the day, and even though these recordings come from 1965 and 1966, the sound quality throughout the audible range is perfect, from distortion-free lower notes to the shrill-free upper octaves; the sound is full and even, and today's recording engineers would be hard pressed to improve on the quality here.

With the inevitable ageing process of magnetic tapes, the sound does tend to get a little darker, but here it is a matter of taste – I think with some albums it actually improves them. Without the originals to compare (not having a spare £1,500 and endless time to spend on the internet and doing the rounds of specialist collectors shops) it is impossible to say if this is the case here, but suffice to say the quality is superb.

There is a tendency with music to compare it with what we already know (for example a Monk, a Bill Evans or a Paul Bley) in order to form an opinion about it. But Mike Taylor resists such simplistic analogy. He has a distinctive sound and approach and while not a virtuoso, he has a beguiling way of drawing you into his music, scrupulously avoiding cliché with his often angular melodic constructs.

Taken together the albums are what they are, and it is impossible to speculate where his music, and compositional skills, may have ended up if he had not given himself so wholeheartedly to pharmaceutical excess, with the concomitant mental health issues. Suffice to say this music has stood the test of time, primarily because it has both a depth and originality that demands close attention – and even after close listening, the centre of his music remains as elusive as ever. — (via JazzWise)

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Label: Decca 
Series: British Jazz Explosion, Lansdowne Series
Format: Vinyl, LP, Album, Reissue, Remastered, Stereo
Reissued: 2025 / Original: 1966
Genre: Jazz
Style: Post Bop, British Jazz

File under: Jazz
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