Nice Guys (album)

For the 2005 film of the same name, see Nice Guys

Nice Guys
Studio album by Art Ensemble of Chicago
Released	1978
Recorded	May 1978; Tonstudio Bauer, Ludwigsburg
Genre	Jazz
Label	ECM
Producer	Manfred Eicher
Art Ensemble of Chicago chronology
Kabalaba (1974) Nice Guys (1978) Live in Berlin (1978)

Nice Guys is a 1978 album by the Art Ensemble of Chicago, their first to appear on the ECM label. It features performances by Lester Bowie, Joseph Jarman, Roscoe Mitchell, Malachi Favors Maghostut and Don Moye.^[1]

Reception

The Allmusic review by Al Campbell awarded the album 4½ stars noting that "Nice Guys was the first Art Ensemble of Chicago album released after a five-year recording hiatus and the group's first for the ECM label. During those five years, the Art Ensemble toured Europe and continued to expand its compositional, improvisational, and theatrical jazz fundamentals, captured abundantly on Nice Guys... the album reveals how the AEC managed to turn individual compositions into a fully realized, surprisingly accessible, avant garde group collective".^[2] Down Beat critic Art Lange writes that Nice Guys, while not the Art Ensemble's best album, "is possibly their most representative, a variegated showcase illustrating much of what they do best."^[3]

Professional ratings
Review scores
Source	Rating
Allmusic	[2]
Penguin Guide to Jazz (8th ed.)

Track listing

1. "JA" (Bowie) – 8:43
2. "Nice Guys" (Mitchell) – 1:45
3. "Folkus" (Moye) – 11:03
4. "597–59" (Jarman) – 6:46
5. "CYP" (Mitchell) – 4:53
6. "Dreaming of the Masters" (Jarman) – 11:40

• Recorded May 1978 in Ludwigsburg

Personnel

• Lester Bowie: trumpet, celeste, bass drum
• Malachi Favors Maghostut: bass, percussion instruments, melodica
• Joseph Jarman: saxophones, clarinets, percussion instruments, vocal
• Roscoe Mitchell: saxophones, clarinets, flute, percussion instruments
• Don Moye: drums, percussion, vocal

References

1. ^ ECM Catalogue
2. ^ ^{a b} Campbell, A. Allmusic Review accessed July 27, 2011.
3. ^ Lange, Art (1994), Wynn, Ron, ed., All Music Guide to Jazz, San Francisco: Miller Freeman, p. 48, ISBN 0879303085