Sold Date: April 8, 2021
Start Date: March 15, 2021
Final Price: $24.95 (AUD)
Seller Feedback: 4710
Buyer Feedback: 5

It’s no secret in the jazz community but for those who only know George Benson as the popular, suave crooner who racked up seven Top 40 singles between the years of 1976 and 1983 it might come as a surprise to learn that his career prior to that had very little to do with his smooth, radio-friendly voice and consisted primarily of his considerable talent as a master of the guitar. He’d been discovered in New York circa ‘65 by none other than the legendary John Hammond who signed him to the Columbia label as a mainstream jazz instrumentalist and surrounded him with some of the best studio pros around. While his album sales were never outstanding he still managed to build up a loyal audience, gaining a respectable reputation in the process. “Bad Benson” was one of the last LPs he released before jumping over to Warner Brothers where his hitherto unexploited vocal abilities were brought to the front for his “Breezin’” disc and suddenly he became a star. But this album is an important historical marker in his impressive body of work because it came out at the very end of his swashbuckling guitar-player phase and, as such, shows as well as any other the extent of his industrious work as a “serious” jazz musician.