woody herman

Woody Herman recorded Frank Zappa's 'America Drinks And Goes Home' on one of his "Thundering Herd" albums in 1974. The album got re-released on CD in 1995.

	woody herman: somewhere (1969, lp, usa, moon records mcd 030-2p) - featuring bruce fowler and ronnie cuber
	woody herman: corazon / america drinks and goes home (1974, 7", usa, fantasy f723) – incl. ‘america drinks and goes home’ (frank zappa)
	woody herman: thundering herd (1974, lp, usa, fantasy 9452) – incl. ‘america drinks and goes home’ (frank zappa)
	woody herman: caldonia (1994, cd, usa, four star) - featuring bruce fowler and ronnie cuber
	woody herman: light my fire (2002, cd, usa, fabulous 123) - recorded in 1969, featuring bruce fowler and ronnie cuber
	woody herman: blue flame (2003, cd, usa, lester recording catalog) - recorded 1969, featuring bruce fowler

From: Scott Yanow (All-Music Guide)
Of all the big-band leaders of the swing era, Woody Herman went the most out of his way to interpret current material and keep his orchestra young, enthusiastic and modern. For this Fantasy date (reissued on CD in the OJC series), Herman's band not only plays two John Coltrane songs, but material from Frank Zappa ('America Drinks and Goes Home'), Stanley Clarke ('Bass Folk Song') and even Carole King ('Corazon'). This is one of Herman's most successful efforts of the period, for the arrangements (by Alan Broadbent, Bill Stapleton and Tony Klatka) are inventive and generally swinging, with such soloists as Frank Tiberi on tenor, flugelhornist Klatka and electric keyboardist Andy Laverne keeping the music continually interesting. 'Blues for Poland', 'Lazy Bird' and the Zappa piece are high points."

From: Kevin Letts
Hey folks! Having read (some twenty years ago!) about the cover version of "America Drinks and Goes Home" on the Woody Herman/Thundering Herd album, I set off armed with the extensive catalogue/sleevenote details your website provided, and Lo! I finally stumbled over a copy of this slippery but tasty little sucker, last weekend at a record fair in Southampton (England, that is!) ...and it proved to be worth the wait! A really good arrangement which sheds new light on this Zappa "jazz standard", a fine job all round... I just don't know why they decided to fade it out at that point! Still, the album has other moments as well; for me the version of Stanley Clarke's "Bass Folk Song" is a major high point. Keep up the good work, your website is a most wondrous and enlightening thing!

Patrick Neve
I might only add that if you're in search of this album, don't do what I did and confuse it with another Woody Herman release called "Thundering Herds". I got that sucker in the mail, and not remembering having ordered it at all, was wondering how high I must have been. It's not even that good of an album as far as Herman goes. I'm not qualified to critique Woody Herman, but I like the rest of "Thundering Herd" just fine.