Although the sessions for "Live at Club Mozambique" have long been listed in Blue Note discographies there were two things hampering its release. First, there was the problem that by the mid-1970s, Green's stock had declined and he was virtually forgotten until young jazz fans rediscovered his funky works, leading Blue Note to reissue his string of fine records and start digging in the vaults for more.
Secondly, the original session tapes have been lost, forcing Blue Note to create this reissue from mono reference tapes made at the Motor City club during the sessions.
Accompanying Green on the 1971 dates were his regular sidemen saxophonist Clarence Thomas (not THAT Clarence Thomas!) and organist Ronnie Foster. But also on the disc are soul jazz sax master Houston Person and funky drummer extraordinaire Idris Muhammad, who also fueled Green's "Alive" a few months earlier and was flown in from New York to take part in the Detroit live recordings.
The result is a high-octane, funky soul jazz combo firing through pop hits like "Walk On By," "Patches" and "More Today Than Yesterday" and 10 killer minutes of "Jan Jan," which would have you up and dancing around the room, if you could hear it right now!
Born in Brooklyn, N.Y., where he lived until he was 17, Bobby received his BA-Mass Communications from UWM in 1989 and has lived in Walker's Point, Bay View, Enderis Park, South Milwaukee and on the East Side.
He has published three non-fiction books in Italy – including one about an event in Milwaukee history, which was published in the U.S. in autumn 2010. Four more books, all about Milwaukee, have been published by The History Press.
With his most recent band, The Yell Leaders, Bobby released four LPs and had a songs featured in episodes of TV's "Party of Five" and "Dawson's Creek," and films in Japan, South America and the U.S. The Yell Leaders were named the best unsigned band in their region by VH-1 as part of its Rock Across America 1998 Tour. Most recently, the band contributed tracks to a UK vinyl/CD tribute to the Redskins and collaborated on a track with Italian novelist Enrico Remmert.
He's produced three installments of the "OMCD" series of local music compilations for OnMilwaukee.com and in 2007 produced a CD of Italian music and poetry.
In 2005, he was awarded the City of Asti's (Italy) Journalism Prize for his work focusing on that area. He has also won awards from the Milwaukee Press Club.
He has be heard on 88Nine Radio Milwaukee talking about his "Urban Spelunking" series of stories, in that station's most popular podcast.
