Tom Storer

I'm glad to know this, Out2. I'll send them an email and see what they have going.

?? Does this mean they'll sell you the booklets for out-of-print sets?

I know this is out of print - I ventured onto ebay for the first time looking for it, miraculously found it up for auction, saw that I wouldn't get it for less than $200, and regretfully slunk away. I have a couple of Thad & Mel albums that I got cheap, on the Laserlight label, about which I know nothing, entitled "The Groove Merchant" (recorded mostly 17-18 June 1969, four tunes from January and May 1970) and "The Second Race" (recorded 15-17 November 1970). Here's my question: does anyone know if any of this material is in the Mosaic set? For all I know there could be overlap between these Laserlight sets and the Solid State recordings that made up the Mosaic box. Thanks!

You mean the original version by Minnie Ripperton? Depends. It's a very catchy 70's pop tune, perhaps a bit cloying, distinguished by a rather startling jump in the melody to a note ridiculously higher than the preceding. It's kind of like she dances along and the next thing you know she reappears at the top of a high cliff, then gracefully comes back down again. Quite a range she had. I like it, but that's probably just because it's a pop hit from my adolescence. Still, that high note is a memorable hook in the annals of pop music history. I only know that song, but I believe she's still highly regarded by fans of soul and pop music, although she died at the end of the 70's.

Yeah, I saw them around the same time, '74 or '75, and remember quite clearly Herbie's snake-charmer number--as I recall he programmed the synth, then got up from his seat and walked around it, waving his arms at it like a magician and seeming to make it do his bidding from afar. Silly, but good clean fun. They rocked the joint, though - Carnegie Hall. The opening act was Minnie Ripperton. Remember her? Hitting that high note on "Lovin' You"--everybody was just waiting for that note, not quite believing it was real. But she sang it, all right. I saw Return to Forever around that time too, and Corea got up from his keyboard and danced for a little while, wiggling his hips. The crowd loved it.

One of my favorite early drummers is Vic Berton, who played with Red Nichols and Miff Mole and that crowd. He was a fantastic drummer and several examples of his work can be heard on the first couple of volumes of the Anthology of Jazz Drumming on Masters of Jazz (an indispensable series for fans of jazz drums, incidentally). Berton's extramusical claim to fame is that he was arrested with Louis Armstrong and Frank Driggs in Culver City, California, in 1930. They had been smoking a joint.

I can't hear a synth bass on this track. Both bass parts sound like Steve Swallow. Yeah, I guessed it was Swallow underdubbed, as it were. But since it was the liner notes that revealed to Jim it was Larry Willis on piano (thereby ruining his steamy fantasy and forcing him to construct a new one!), presumably they also reveal it was CB on synth bass. Which would just mean the spirit of Swallow lives within her when she does a bass part--not surprising!

Wow... that is pretty embarrassing. You listen to a record 30 times a day, think you really know the music... this was one of the only cuts I was sure I had down exactly. I was even ready to tell you the name of the track. You may not have had the name of the track right, chuckyd, but you'd probably have been right in most other particulars. See these sites: the record UK site to order it US site to order it

That's a great review, chuckyd!

Nate, I wanted to comment on your comment. I too was thinking Zappa before the vocal came in! But with the non-ironic vocal the background ends up working fine, I think. My first thought was Sly Stone, and I do think he sounds very Sly-like, but in the end I thought it was someone older but couldn't put a name on him. Others have guessed Percy Mayfield and I'll go along with that, without any particular degree of certainty. But it's the influence I perceive of this singer on Sly Stone that was most interesting for me, since I'd never particularly placed Sly in an inheritance tree before.

Have a gander at this site and scroll down.

At the risk of repeating myself... as the "Ask Me Now" controversy rages, here is how I explained my guess earlier in the thread. Maybe it isn't "Ask Me Now," but there's a bit of "Ask Me Now" in there!

1. Wow, that piano!! Reminded me of Count Basie at first, but then in the solo it was kind of closer to Bud Powell. Could be Cecil Taylor paying hommage to Erroll Garner, or maybe some unissued Meade Lux Lewis trying his hand at modern styles? I'll have to say I just don't know. 2. Oh my God, as I was listening to this track the dog bit the baby! There's blood everywhere! Dog could be rabid. I'll have to return to this track tomorrow. 3. I hate this. That tenor player should be shot--all he's doing is rehashing the harmonic schemes and pet licks of Chu Berry in the period 1933-35. I mean, if he'd concentrated on Berry's 1938 work, that would have changed everything. Not only that, he came in on the wrong chord in bar 92! What an amateur. 4. Interesting Latin jazz percussion workout. Desi Arnaz? 5. DEFINITELY Stan Getz, probably with his quartet of Kenny Barron, Rufus Reid and Victor Lewis. The tune is "If I Wished Upon A Star." Brilliant. ************ (after answers are revealed): 1. I would never have guessed Lennie Tristano! I'll have to pick this up ASAP! 2. We had to put the dog down. 3. Wow, Steve Lacy's tone is so dark sometimes, I could have sworn this was a tenor! On listening to this a second time, I can hear now that it's "Blue Monk." Still, not my cup of tea. 4. Babatunde Olatunji? Is he an Afro-Cuban? 5. Pretty smooth performance, I wouldn't have expected this from Archie Shepp. It's interesting - I do think there are similarities between "If I Wished Upon a Star" and "Rufus (Swung, His Face at Last to the Wind, Then His Neck Snapped)," but they're pretty subtle.

What occurs to me now about the juxtaposition of Disc 1 #9 (the funky drummer with the grunting vocals) and Disc 1 #10 (the drum solo some have likened to tap dancing) is that #9, while clearly more contemporary by some decades, is in fact less modern than #10. While #10 may sound quaint and old-fashioned, it is jazz while #9, in its rhythms and general feeling, harks way back to pre-jazz days. #10 has that relentless bass drum on every beat, but it's all the fancy stick-work on top that shows how jazz elaborated on earlier African-American rhythms. It's no longer just about groove; the drummer in #10 is composing his improvisation in a much more deliberate, dare I say "artistic," way.

I'm finding these blindfolds a really nice way to get recommendations from the compilers, but not just any recommendations. People are always recommending one thing or another, but this is like a glimpse into what André Malraux famously referred to as the "imaginary museum" we all have in our minds, collections of things we feel deserve to be known not just because of their intrinsic quality, but because they mean something about, in this case, what we as "imaginary museum" curators think jazz is all about. It's a special way of trading our in-depth understanding of the whole shebang. We're looking into one another's jazz souls! Yikes! It's also a great way to embark upon the bracing enterprise of relying on one's ears. You learn how much you rely on hearing things in context: knowing before you listen who it is, when it is, and so on. Without those crutches you open your mind to creative listening: what do I really think of this? What connections can I really make between this and other music, just based on what I'm hearing? It makes an honest man out of you. Or woman. (Wait a minute - are there any woman posters here?) Finally, I find I can really benefit from the insights in other people's remarks. I find myself thinking, yes! I hadn't noticed that! Or else, "What the hey? Is he listening to the same tune I listened to?" and then going back to listen again and hear it in another light. And of course, the tunes are FREE.

I have good news for all those who hesitate to participate because they're afraid of looking like idiots. I just wasted time I shouldn't have been wasting in analyzing the results of Blindfold #1, and here are the results: Number of participants guessing: 15 Number of tunes: 14 Song titles: 11 of 14 were not correctly guessed by anyone. Musicians: Out of 210 total guesses (15 guessers x 14 tunes), there were 34 instances in which a poster correctly guessed ONE musician, 6 instances in which a poster correctly guessed more than one musician, and 11 instances in which the poster recognized the performance as one already known. 34 + 6 + 11 = 51 out of 210. This means over 75% of all guesses were incorrect or "I don't know." Each individual guesser had a clear majority of incorrect or "I don't know" answers. In other words, we're all bozos on this bus, so you might as well hop on!

I have a couple of CDs by this band, and like them a lot. It's swinging, mainstream big-band jazz with nice charts, good soloists and a purring engine of a rhythm section. Hard not to like!

I'm not bothered if someone throws in a couple of items that are not strictly jazz but have some tangential relationship. This forum being what it is, there is little likelihood of a blindfold test not having a large majority of items that are clearly "jazz." Therefore I think we should be cool and not start setting up rules when they're not really necessary.

Nate, Listening again to number 13, CD 1, after reading your comments, I clearly hear that it isn't Lee Konitz, and wonder how I heard it that way in the first place! Curious things, ears. Looking forward to your take on CD 2 so I can revise further. Funny you didn't hear "Ask Me Now" at all in the first tune on CD1, although you're probably right that it isn't. Listening again, I hear just what it is that made me proclaim it "Ask Me Now". It's the bit you hear at around seconds 10-13; 30-34; 1:10-1:16; 1:57-2:00. Not much, it's true, but I heard it as a fingerprint of "Ask Me Now." I don't hear the same thing at all once the horns come in, but the part as of around 3:27 also evokes "Ask Me Now" for me. It happens to me often enough that musicians disguise tunes until I don't recognize them, so I guess I just wasn't bothered that the evidence was fragmentary! I was probably assuming too much, but still, the bits whose timing I gave sound right out of "Ask Me Now" to me. That tenor player sounds soooo familiar. The name Ricky Ford came to mind as I listened again.

Here are my guesses and comments for DISC TWO: 1. I'm not sure if this is vintage electronic experimentation in jazz from the early 70's (sounds like Stanley Clarke on bass), or contemporary nostalgia for that sound from someone like Christian McBride. The possibility of Stanley Clarke had me briefly consider the Stan Getz quintet he worked in with Chick Corea, Tony Williams, and Airto, since it seems to be that instrumentation. And it could be Corea, and it could be Williams. But naaaah. It would be just like Jim to serve us up Getz in such uncharacteristic clothes, but I don't hear it. So I just don't know. Musically speaking, I think it's an honest, creative effort to deal with those sounds, not a commercial sell-out (thank God it doesn't have a funky backbeat - would have killed it). I think it works pretty well, but the new sounds part has definitely dated. The ideas were not bad--I like the layered texture at the beginning--but you can't help but hear the technology as primitive nowadays, when the same thing could be done so much more smoothly. That's if it's from the 70s. If it's contemporary it's just retro trendy. Oh, and I think it's "Nature Boy." 2. Tenor sax, french horn and... djembe? Recent vintage. I'd guess Tom Varner on french horn and Tony Malaby on tenor sax, but that's all it is, a guess. I dug it. 3. Marvin Gaye, and a great track. I don't know this song at all. Marvin had his heart on his sleeve, all right. "Why did you turn me in to the police"? That must have been a turbulent relationship! 4. The only bass guitarist I know who plays melody like that is Steve Swallow, and I think it's him, overdubbed for the second bass part, probably with a Carla Bley band. Interesting - a slow, intense, almost Booker T vibe in there, but in jazzier clothes. It's like Jim is pointing to something shared between the soul singers he's been programming and jazz... for me it has something to do with the lyricism and body heat of the blues added to more subtle sentimentality. Or something. 5. Very nice! This is what I think is referred to as the Chicago school of New Orleans playing, but relatively late in the day. From the sound I'd guess it's from no earlier than the mid- to late 50's. I think I recognize Bud Freeman and Pee Wee Russell. No clue about the others, but the trumpeter is good and very much up front--maybe it was his date. 6. I'll guess Lee Konitz with a European big band - I couldn't begin to guess which one it is. Metropole? NDR? The tenor player sounds very familiar, too, but I'm not sure who it is. This is another one I'm going to seek out. 7. I know what album this is from, but I'm not sure about the title, and even if I were I couldn't reproduce it on a keyboard. ;-) I believe it is this album. And damn it, I was planning on putting something from this album in my blindfold! That makes two! 8. Basie with Lester. We can draw our own connections - clearly the bandleader for number 7 had heard Basie. But what would Basie have thought of that bandleader? 9. A live Sonny Rollins trio date. Of the bassists he did trios with, I'd say that would be Henry Grimes, which would put this in the late 50's. He goes way outside for a bassist at that time, I'm impressed! 10. Everyone knows who this is, of course. Except I can't think of his name. One thing that did come to me is that Sly Stone listened closely to him. Nothing earthshaking, but very warm and hip. I enjoyed this thoroughly. 11. The instrumentation and the characteristic alto sound lead me to say confidently that it's Henry Threadgill and one of his bands. I love it when he plays flat out like this. There's a thing in his sound that seems to come right from Earl Bostic. I like this better than his more recent records. Very joyful. The island rhythms remind me of when Threadgill played with Olu Dara's lyrical, lilting Okra Orchestra - the first version, with Craig Harris, Jean-Paul Bourelly, and Coster Masamba, before it got louder and funkier. Good show, Jim. I'll be coming back to discuss further, since I think this one will engender a lot of discussion!

Come on, Dan, don't be such a grump. Give us some juicy details on why you hate some of those things. In your DKDCs (don't know, don't care), the vast majority of us will share the DK part, but try to care! Seriously! Jim did say it wouldn't all be jazz. I haven't listened to CD2 yet, but maybe jazz does have some relationship to other music? Maybe the connection between those tunes and jazz would be interesting to consider? Maybe the juxtaposition of one tune to another is trying to point something out? I dunno. Just my two cents.

A Dewey Redman record I especially enjoy is "The Struggle Continues," on ECM, now no doubt out of print. It's a quartet with Charles Eubanks (piano), Mark Helias (bass), and Ed Blackwell on drums, from the early 80's. It takes "Joie de Vivre," which was on "Ear of the Behearer," and gives it a much more swinging, mainstream treatment. Beautiful album.

Hmmmm. Would one say "had a serious mojo" or "had serious mojo"?

Got mine yesterday and, gulp, looks like I'll be the first to give my guesses! Well, what the hell, here goes. This is for DISC ONE only of this 2-CD blindfold: 1. Monk's "Ask Me Now." Can't identify the musicians, although the whole thing sounds very familiar. The arrangement of the theme for the trumpet and tenor has a very young-lion sound to it, especially at the beginning and end, and I can easily it imagine being played by Marsalisites. But the musicians sound more seasoned than that. I recognize the horns, and I keep coming back to individual phrases they play that are familiar to me; I know I've listened to these guys, but can't put a name on them. I like it, though. Something about the trumpet player's cool, very clean and controlled playing over the YLish arrangement reminded me of Wallace Roney. 2. No idea. Cute but trivial. Some kind of ironic, kitschy novelty item, I'd guess. Is this "lounge"? 3. My first, perhaps odd, thought was that this sounds like a 60's version of what the David Murray octet gets up to nowadays. Then it struck me it was very much like a Mingus Workshop performance, but the tune doesn't sound like Mingus to me. Somewhere between Mingus and a more standard 60's multi-horn thing, nice and comfortable but leaning towards greater freedom. 4. Spunky! Sounds like the late 60s, when a lot of jazzers quite naturally incorporated the bass guitar and the rock/soul backbeat since it was so much of the times. It sounds that bit dated to me from this vantage point, and one can prefer a lighter, more swinging rhythm, but it fits. I especially like it when the clarinet comes in after the guitar. I know the Thad & Mel band did that kind of rhythm a lot back then, but I don't know if they had a guitar like that. 5. James Brown! I knew he did more standard stuff before he invented The Funk, but I didn't know it sounded like this! I love it! I'll have to hunt this down. 6. I don't know who this singer is, but she's good. 7. Am I the only one who has trouble matching Monk's tunes with their names? With a handful of exceptions, I know the tunes but I'll be damned if I can remember if a given composition is "Green Chimneys," "Ba-lue Bolivar Ba-Lues-Are," "Shuffle Boil," "Gallop's Gallop," or one of the dozens of others. Anyway, I finally twigged that this was in fact a Monk tune being performed by the piano/tenor sax duo. I immediately thought of this album, but I don't think it's the right tune, and am too lazy to verify. 8. Dunno. I was surprised by the bass guitar solo! Don't often hear bass solos on these organ/tenor things. 9. Had no idea, but the lyrics make this easy to search for on the web. It's a drummer I dug a lot back in the 80's, but he did a bunch of stuff that interested me less and I kind of lost track of him. This is great! 10. I know *exactly* what this is, so as per Jim's request I will reveal nothing. I've been amassing material for my own upcoming blindfold (#20!), and amazingly, I had picked this very piece to start it with. Back to the drawing board! 11. I'll make a wild guess and say Jim Europe, during or immediately after WWI. 12. Great transition from the previous piece! Gotta be the AEC. I love the contrast between the previous one, a patriotic glorification of trench warfare, and this one: "Get in line!" shouted ineffectively over wild and uncontrollable movement... and then that nostalgic, corny ending. Brilliant! 13. Meanwhile, back home... the war is over and bebop is getting the big band treatment. Now here's some discipline for you. Very nice. The clarinet made me wonder if this isn't Buddy De Franco and the Metronome All-Stars. Just a guess. 14. Beautiful Lesterian performance. I'll guess early Stan Getz, with Johnny Smith on guitar (I don't know Johnny Smith at all, but I know Getz recorded with him in the early 50's, so it seems like a good guess). This performance reminds me of Miles Davis's praise for Getz, saying he had the patience to really get the beauty out of a melody. That's what's I hear here, the patience needed to concentrate on that particular, laid-back melodic/rhythmic vein and keep mining it, without succumbing to any temptation to give a few dramatic flourishes or go for some easy effects. (And that's so even if I'm wrong and it's not Getz.) 15. I love this kind of stuff. It's so jaunty, so proud, so upbeat and fun. This is music that shines its shoes and combs its hair because it's going out on the town. I'll guess Lionel Hampton.

Has any heard his 4-CD set, "Six Compositions (GTM) 2001"?