Scott Dolan

Which I do not. While I can sometimes appreciate over-intellectualism for the sake of it when done right, I just don’t think he does it right.

No, he’s not particularly wrong, but as you and Brad already noted, the trappings. Comes across as a first year philosophy major that has read way too much Adorno/Marx/etc., but is still to young and inexperienced to fully comprehend any of it.

You held out for five minutes?! I allowed some leeway for the first paragraph, that’s your hook, he just baited it with a healthy helping of hyperbole. But he mercifully put me out of my misery with the second paragraph. Sold high, fucking bailed. My tolerance for general batshittery is at an all time low these days.

Well then, it sounds like Facebook must be the place for you, Chick. The insolence of all the members here not showering you with praise and delight after you were gracious enough to give us all 33 minutes to do so sends a clear message. You deserve a far higher quality of online acquaintences, IMO.

Where I lived on the Gulf Coast of Florida we didn’t have any college stations within range. Though I will admit that we did have a really good public station that played Classical weekdays, had an outstanding Jazz program at night, and often had three to four hour weekend programs that would play a pretty eclectic, non mainstream mix of music. Hell, even mainstream Rock stations were relatively eclectic back then until Clear Channel snapped them up and gave them a playlist of about 20 songs.

I hear you, Clifford. But FM radio pretty much is the mainstream. Well, from 94.9 upwards, I guess. The lower numbers will have more Jazz and Classical. And those names may have been somewhat big locally, but I’m not sure they were nationally, Sonic Youth being the lone exception.

Hell, my team needs an entire bullpen. 6.06 collectively, and 8 blown saves already this season.

I wonder if 80’s Heavy Metal was correlated with Reaganite Cinema. kind of aggressive, but ultimately happy-go-lucky and all about life being one endless party. Then Desert Storm happened, souring the mood of the country, which was perfectly encapsulated by the rise of Grunge, and the almost overnight death of 80’s Metal.

You’ll love them when you do. They played some of the tunes straight up, but altered many of them. Most notably their horn-less version of Action, which I found superior to the original. And their amazing coda jam they added to Medication, which Jay introduced as a song they’d not done live in six years. Wildest part is the final number of the night was a very interesting cover of the Stones Monkey Man. Highly recommended show!

Very well said, Steve. And I’ll certainly grant you the Bebop example. Fair enough. But I’m also thinking we can both agree that if that isn’t the only example, there certainly aren’t many more. You also help solidify the point I’ve been getting at with the last sentence of your post. In a roundabout way it reminds me of a buddy of mine whose deepest dive into Jazz was Najee. I remember I once asked him why Najee plays such simplistic sounding music. My friend stated quite matter of factly, “because that’s the kind of music he likes to play.” Airtight logic. And that’s exactly why I believe Wynton and Branford play the way they do. BTW, this same friend was over once and I was playing Coltrane’s First Meditations (tied with Sun Ship as my favorite Jazz album). When it was over my friend asked, “can we listen to real music now?” Ouch... But, those kinds of interactions seem to be the kind that people like Chuck and Jim have never had, or else they’d clearly see how fallacious their “Marsalis roadblock” arguments are.

I think there may need to be a distinction between underground and avant garde, to be honest. Everything was underground at some point, but that doesn’t mean it was avant garde. Not in my mind anyway. Just take Grunge as an example. It was underground in the Seattle scene, but hardly avant garde, by any stretch of the imagination. Bebop was underground, but hardly avant garde or inaccessible. It mayhave seemed more inaccessible at the time, I don’t know. But it certainly isn’t now. ‘60’s Free Jazz was likely inaccessible then, and still inaccessible now for the average listener.

“Subjectively inaccessible”? The Beatles vs Frank Zappa. Which is accesible, which one not so much? Miles Davis vs Peter Evans. Which one is accessible, which one not so much? There may be a borderline of subjectivity, a sort of accessible prime meridian. But those artists will be very few. As for genre’s/artists that were avant garde at the time that we consider mainstream now, can you provide some examples?

Caught Son Volt at Rose Music Hall in Columbia, MO Thursday night. Just an oldschool honky tonk, for the most part. Place was packed, probably around 275-300 in attendance. Son Volt killed, as expected. It was the opening night of their tour, which means I’ve attended three opening nights. And will be attending my fourth in June when I see Phish kick off their 2019 summer tour.

Not to my ears, but then again I grew up listening to The Beatles (mostly the more psychedelic stuff) and KISS. My sister always had Elton John or Hard Rock playing. My brother listened to the whole Chicago, Chuck Mangione lite-Jazz/Rock thing. My father loved Classical, and my mother was big into old school Country as well as Gospel. So in ‘77 I’d already developed a pretty eclectic ear. Frank Zappa sounded weird as fuck, the Talking Heads did not. Very insightful, as always. You always bring a wealth of knowledge to the table in every conversation.

Quoted for truth. I had a while other diatribe in response, but ghost presented the perfect summation. The Talking Heads were anything but avant garde. They were certainly ahead of the curve, but they also wrote incredibly catchy, and easily digestable tunes. Psycho Killer and Burning Down The House were FM radio ready.

If anyone avoided the avant garde because Wynton told them to (of which no evidence exists), then that person didn’t possess the intellect understand that kind of music to begin with. And as TTK alluded, if the Marsalis brothers never existed, folks like Pete Brotzmann, Evan Parker, and Roscoe Mitchell would be no more popular, working for major labels, or be more famous than they are now. Name one avant garde genre that gained and sustained ANY level of mainstream appeal. Music, tv, movies, any artistic medium.

Mark, your points are valid, but I do have a question. If I’m pro-Marsalis, but haven’t heard the newer material, why would it change my mind? It’s not like it’s going to change the music I already like from them. ???

My pleasure! I would say that's a hard call, personally. But I think Branford is the superior musician to Wynton, so I guess I'd have to also say that Garrett is as well. But Wynton has Black Codes (From The Underground), Think Of One, and the Village Vanguard box which are also excellent.

The symbol for greater than.

Trio Jeepy, Requeim, Contemporary Jazz, Eternal (my personal favorite), and Footsteps Of Our Fathers are all outstanding albums, IMO. His earliest albums do absolutely nothing for me, and I’ve haven’t heard any of his recent material. Kenny Kirkland was excellent, but I actually came to appreciate Joey Calderazzo even more. Although, I think it’s only fair to note that between Wynton’s Big Train, and Branford’s Romare Beardon Revealed, they may have released the two worst album in Jazz history.

Well, yeah. I’m not saying everything they do sounds exactly like the Coltrane Quartet influence. Just that their catalog by and large does. And even on Beyond The Wall you still clearly hear the influence. Or let me use Coltrane as an example. Things like Africa Brass, Om, and Ascension are well off the beaten path as far as his 60’s catalog is concerned, but it’s still Coltrane playing as Coltrane did. Does that make more sense?

Last I heard from him was Beyond The Wall, also from 2006, oddly enough. I think that’s when I’d finally had my fill of the 60’s Coltrane school and started looking for something fresh and new to my ears.

Yeah, I would have to say the same thing, because I’ve not listened to any of his music since Braggtown, and that was released in 2006. It just seemed that his group had reached some kind of weird stasis, similar to Masada in the way that once you heard two or three of their albums, you’d pretty much heard them all. But at the same time, those two or three albums were pretty damn good!

Nah. Contemporary Jazz is just as adventurous. As is Footsteps Of Our Fathers. The latter was actually the first of his quartet that I heard, and was amazed how free it was. I’d only ever heard him play with Sting and on the Tonight Show. Been a long time since I’ve listened to any of his music, but I think I recall Requiem and Braggtown both being rather adventurous as well. As I said, it wasn’t meant as one. But when I hear similar musicians, what am I supposed to do, not note it? But, at the same time I wouldn’t walk up to any musician and say, “you know who you sound a lot like?”

Hope you have a great B-Day, brother!