A Swing Toward the Middle
Mobley sounds constrained here, his presence strangely minimal except when the music lets him breathe.
Reach Out! is an odd record in Hank Mobley's catalog — a deliberate turn toward commercial accessibility that doesn't quite land. Recorded and released in 1968, it finds Mobley working with Woody Shaw on trumpet, George Benson on guitar, LaMont Johnson on piano, Bob Cranshaw on bass, and Billy Higgins on drums. The lineup is strong, but the direction feels compromised. Instead of the driving hard bop Mobley was known for, the album pursues lightly grooving soul-jazz with two pop covers mixed in. It's an attempt to reach a wider audience, and you can hear that calculation throughout.
The problem, according to AllMusic reviewer Stephen Thomas Erlewine, is that the band sounds constrained by the material and the commercial aim. No one sounds particularly enthusiastic, including Mobley himself. His tenor work feels oddly restrained across much of the session — present but not commanding, almost like he's holding back. The real problem is that softening the edges didn't make the record more appealing; it just made it less convincing. A jazz saxophonist of Mobley's caliber doesn't need to apologize for his identity to sell records.
There is one moment that breaks through: "Good Pickin's," a laidback bop original where Mobley comes alive. It's the best track on the album, and it shows what this session could have been if the constraints had been loosened. But that single track can't redeem an album that fundamentally works against its own leader's strengths. This isn't a record that found its audience later either. It remains a footnote in Mobley's discography — a commercially oriented detour that fans revisit mainly to understand why he made it, not because the music itself demands to be heard.
Who's playing
Bob Cranshawbass
LaMont Johnsonpiano
George Bensonguitar
Hank Mobleytenor saxophone
Woody Shawflugelhorn, trumpet
Billy Higginsdrums
Where next?
More by Hank Mobley
All 41 albums →
The musicians on this record
In Flight 1977
George Benson
plays guitar here
plays guitar here
♫
In the Beginning 1965
Woody Shaw
plays flugelhorn here
plays flugelhorn here
♫
The Oracle 1989
Billy Higgins
plays drums (drum set) here
plays drums (drum set) here
