Blues & Roots

It is rare to find an album that can find one musical and completely manipulate the idea to the point that by the time the vinyl stops spinning the listener has already been pulled in 17 different directions. This is the album that does this to the listener. In Mingus' tempo-less, rule-less world, any idea that is not able to be manipulated and looked at in a million different ways is not an idea worth exploring at all. It is for this reason that Blues & Roots is a seminal album in both Mingus' career and for blues music in a more general sense. The album expanded the full scope of blues music and, in Mingus' own words, showed the world that “blues can do more than just swing”.