Charles Gayle Trio

2012 release. Born in Buffalo in 1939, Charles Gayle had hit New York City by the early '70s. He almost made his mark with an album on ESP-Disk' in 1974, but the label shut down before it came out. When he next recorded in 1988, he had been homeless for a while, sheltering in an empty Brooklyn storefront. The Knitting Factory gigs and concurrent CDs from Swedish imprint Silkheart, the Knit's own house label, the Italian label Black Saint, and a particularly well-received-in-Europe album on FMP, Touchin' On Trane, all boosted his profile and to a lesser extent his finances. He moved up to an East Village squat, then finally a small apartment. Further fame came when he collaborated withHenry Rollins in the mid-'90s, and the European festival circuit helped as well. Charles Gayle's first release for ESP-Disk is this 1994 high-energy performance recorded live in Santa Barbara, California. Total fire music. Charles Gayle: tenor saxophone, bass clarinet, and vocals;Michael Bisio: double-bass; Michael Wimberley: drums.