Local Color was recorded to follow up on the success of Mose Allison's acclaimed Back Country Suite (OJC-075), his debut as a leader. It contained a piece that has been indelibly associated with Allison ever since, the mordant and ironic "Parchman Farm." Although "Parchman Farm" was the real launching pad for Allison's career as a singer, when he made this album he was still known primarily as a fine pianist who drew upon the example of Nat Cole and the inspiration of early blues forms. There is plenty of his emotionally direct, harmonically ingenious piano improvisation here, a telling vocal on Percy Mayfield's "Lost Mind," and a reminder that Allison deprived the jazz world of a unique stylist when he abandoned the trumpet.

Carnival, Parchman Farm, Crepuscular Air, Mojo Woman, Town, Trouble in Mind, Lost Mind, I'll Never Be Free, Don't Ever Say Goodbye, Ain't You a Mess

with Addison Farmer, Nick Stabulas