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Did a lot of push-ups in my teen years to the soundtrack of Taxi Driver... No 'Eye of the Tiger' for me.

Kenneth Williams was one of the great British comedians of the sixties/seventies - the only one who was in EVERY Carry-on film. Apologies for being a pedantic newbie :blush2: but he wasn't in Carry on Cabby - he turned the script down.

Elijah Wald's new page on the speed theory. (for benefit of anyone who doesn't visit the Blindman's forum)

thanks guys - after more searching all I can find is a quote from Tommy McCook: “Don came on the scene initially about ’52. He became very popular and was playing with good bands at the time. He was a member of the band that backed Sarah Vaughan when she came to Jamaica and performed at the Glass Bucket club. She heard him for the first time and told the Jamaican public that she figured that he was rated in the first five in the world. From then on Don lived up to what Sarah said – he was even thought of at one time as being the best in the world. His tone on the trombone, his approach, everything was so perfect. I considered him a genius on his instrument. Even other players of the instrument expressed this, and they should know.” Also mention that he was friends with Dave Brubeck after playing with him in Kingston. And a memory from Jamaican ex-Prime minister PJ Patterson of a cutting contest between Drummond and ex-bandmate Ernest Ranglin: "Ernie sent for his instrument and as the band played a tune called "Indian Summer," they dueled for nearly an hour, Don on trombone and Ernie on guitar as each matched the other’s portion. Everybody stopped dancing and retreated to the side to applaud this battle royal as neither would give up." Not that these endorsements from more internationally known 'stars' add anything to his worth, which speaks for itself, but I think it's interesting ...

The great Jamaican trombonist and composer, and Alpha Boys’ School alumni and teacher Don Drummond, who before he helped establish ska as the national music was regarded as one of the most intelligent jazz musicians in Jamaica, is one of my longest standing musical loves. Anyway... On the back of one of his Studio One lps it says that he won the praise of JJ Johnson, and all over the place you can read that Sarah Vaughan, with whom he apparently performed in the early fifties rated him very highly, as did George Shearing. Does anyone have any information (like actual quotes) on what these musicians said about him? Or is anyone else a fan? These Jamaican produced lps are charmingly scant on accurate information, correct spellings, correct track listings etc etc and a lot of the online texts inevitably dwell more on the tragic and sensational aspects of his short life.

How Low Can You Go? : Anthology of the String Bass (1925-1941) - Dust to Digital Dug this out and am hearing it with fresh ears. A nice genre bender...

Melrose brothers? Frank Melrose - piano, Lester melrose - music publisher/A&R etc, Walter Melrose - music publisher.... McCoy brothers - Charlie & Joe of the Harlem Hamfats (et al)

I just finished my first full listen through Devilin Tune this week - still reading the book - fabulous stuff (understatement). Thanks for confirming my suspicion that I might like jazz. (you can quote that on the front of your next box if you like, just above Greill Marcus and Gary Giddens ) Looking forward to part 2 of the blues one. If only there was a gospel set like this...

How about Clarence Williams' washboard bands? Also the Louisville Jug Bands - 'Philips' Louisville Jug Band' is a good 'un (on Document but probably on Frog too?)

The Justin Yap produced ska stuff was always great - especially the instrumentals. Also the pre-ska Jamaican R&B - people like Theo Beckford. Vocal groups through the rocksteady years - The Maytals, Heptones, Paragons, Sensations etc. Favourite solo vocalists - Ken Boothe (love the way he does vowels) and Laurel Aitken (love the way he does consonants)... Roland Alphonso on tenor sax - love his records right through the reggae years LOVE that beatboxy stuff they did - Baba Brooks' Vitamin A a classic for this

I think he was also really creating music for records - I mean with Patton you get the feeling that these discs just captured something that was there already - sort of a snap shot of a larger reality, but with Johnson you get a sense that he had the three minutes all worked out and that the drama was totally contrived (not a criticism). At the end of Malted Milk, when he sings “.. the hair rising on my head” - it actually makes the hair rise on my head (although I have none to speak of). Even that photo of him with the cigarette seems to indicate that he was totally aware, after the fact (the few years he has on the older guys is crucial), of this myth of the ‘Mississippi Bluesman’ as some kind of existential wanderer... maybe he wasnt but it sure looks like it to us now, and the fact that he never grew old means that younger listeners today never have the image 'spoiled' by seeing him on stage in footage from the sixties as an old man. In fact, all the other legendary Mississippi bluesmen, are, in the subconcious maybe, older men - even Patton, though he died was already older - or had something of the ‘lived’ about him... Johnson is a convenient stepping stone for modern listeners, because he was in some ways a few years behind, and therefore stands in relief against the background of mid-late 30’s Chicago blues singers like Bumble Bee Slim, Bill Gaither, Joe Pullum etc... so people tracing a line back through Muddy Waters to Mississippi or ‘country’ blues can avoid ‘urban’ blues by going directly through Johnson and then back to Son House, Patton etc...