Art Blakey & the Jazz Messengers: Shaw Theatre, London
Mark Sinker, New Musical Express, 12 April 1986
BLAKEY'S ZERO-degrees activity is so blazingly exciting that it transforms everything round it, even when he's laying out completely. And these Messengers, mob-handed in suits and fierce crops, owe respect (and know it) to no one. All of them are good, but Terence Blanchard and Donald Harrison (trumpet and alto respectively) match up to their legendary forerunners Lee Morgan and Wayne Shorter in everything but age and pervasive influence.
Total word count of piece: 225