Just the facts

[Tom Storer]

Yeah, and he's definitely on the receiving end of the "this ain't brain surgery, folks" directive, especially since he totally misses the reality that the same reason the he records some of the shit he does is the same reason that some other people record some of the the shit they do.

It really ain't brain surgery. Really, it ain't. Cat talks about "do the math", well ok, let's start here - 1 + 1 = 2.

Does Iverson--or his bandmates, since that "no irony" post was a collaborative effort--dis other people for recording some of the shit they do?

[JSngry]

Yeah, and he's definitely on the receiving end of the "this ain't brain surgery, folks" directive, especially since he totally misses the reality that the same reason the he records some of the shit he does is the same reason that some other people record some of the the shit they do.

It really ain't brain surgery. Really, it ain't. Cat talks about "do the math", well ok, let's start here - 1 + 1 = 2.

Does Iverson--or his bandmates, since that "no irony" post was a collaborative effort--dis other people for recording some of the shit they do?

Well, I thnk you gotta look at the rip on "Surrey...." as being a somewhat implicit "the only reason to record this anymore is to mock it" or something like that stance. Which is kinda goofy, because there's no reason to record any of that stuff any more. :g

Ok, I support him for taking the "we record what we like because we like it" thing, but he's still overthinking the shit waaaaay too much, and as edc seems to be implying, what he's doing wouldn't even raise an eyebrow if the "jazz world" - including that part of it which TBP is a part - was even remotely mentally healthy.

[JSngry]

Sorry, I was trying to be funny and keep a straight face...

MG

OOPS! Sorry.

[clifford_thornton]

Yeah, and he's definitely on the receiving end of the "this ain't brain surgery, folks" directive, especially since he totally misses the reality that the same reason the he records some of the shit he does is the same reason that some other people record some of the the shit they do.

It really ain't brain surgery. Really, it ain't. Cat talks about "do the math", well ok, let's start here - 1 + 1 = 2.

Does Iverson--or his bandmates, since that "no irony" post was a collaborative effort--dis other people for recording some of the shit they do?

Well, I thnk you gotta look at the rip on "Surrey...." as being a somewhat implicit "the only reason to record this anymore is to mock it" or something like that stance. Which is kinda goofy, because there's no reason to record any of that stuff any more. :g

Ok, I support him for taking the "we record what we like because we like it" thing, but he's still overthinking the shit waaaaay too much, and as edc seems to be implying, what he's doing wouldn't even raise an eyebrow if the "jazz world" - including that part of it which TBP is a part - was even remotely mentally healthy.

Right, there isn't much reason to do "Surrey" these days (Newk took it there decades ago), nor do I see much reason to do "Iron Man" since even the Sabbath tune itself is a) not that great to begin with and b) most rock bands who would even dare to reference it do so totally ironically. That song is a joke at this point, and even if they claim to do it seriously, who listening to it at this point is going to think anything BUT irony?

And, that song sucks.

And Dave King is a basher.

[Jim Alfredson]

Wow.

It's just music, folks.

Criminey.

[Adam]

Face it: whatever you dig at 13, you will dig for the rest of your life.

thanks, MG... this is most definitely UNtrue; consider the difference in depth, tradition between Fats Domino &, let's say, the top 40 music of the 1980s. not edc but for plenty of people, that was it. what's the best you can do, Prince? that's not bad but hardly the whole story. depending on region, household aesthetics/mores, local values etc it's entirely possible for kids to be exposed to junk they will rightfully discard... i strongly believe that there are & should be MANY cases where one's refutation of environment x/y/z is not only possible but damn near mandatory for any sustained intellectual/aesthetic/genital/whore-to-cultural growth.

that-- dig it, daddy!!-- Iverson's taste in shitty covers is lousy & pedestrian (i.e. he's NOT listened as widely as he'd like ya'll to believe) makes him try to rationalize ig'nance & bad aesthetics. that he wants to sell his schtick by means other than musical doesn't make it any more persuasive. LESS in fact, just for being a "dipshit" as Empodocles might have called him.

or, let's say it wasn't top 40 american radio that was around but rather a combination of Sammy Hagar, Iron Maiden, Jim Croce & deep Men At Work album cuts. just cuz your trapped doesn't mean you can't-- should not-- escape later.

Iverson is given to grand pronouncement & bored people on computers mistake his loggorhea for eloquence but seriously, the guy is not very bright-- somewhere between the nut & the squirrel, who gives a fuck about his "chops"?

when he performs Johh Cage "Fontana Mix," the OKeh Laughing Record & or even "Help I'm a Rock" maybe i will revise-- & re-improvise-- this encyclical.

Just a note. In the interview on AAJ, Dave says that Ethan Iverson doesn't know and has never listened to rock music. Songs are brought to him by the other 2 guys in the band (Dave & Reid), and Ethan listens and decides if he also likes it enough for them to tackle. The concerns over what is/was pop or rock when Ethan was 13 are irrelevant, but it is relevant for Dave & Reid.

[Simon Weil]

Someone should perhaps point out that Iverson's quote about "what you dug at 13 you'll dig for life" or however he phrased it was just a way of saying "early loves have a lasting influence on one's taste." Certainly edc can understand the lure of exaggeration?

Well, isn't it that we start to develop our own identity as teenagers - and in this society, for the past several decades, that identity has been mediated by listening to music. That is we start to see ourselves as individuals, separate from our families, and part of that individuation process is listening to music which we take to be "our" music. I mean the whole music industry is based on that process, in large part.

The thing is, of course, you might not like the music you came up with that much - or maybe it's love that music. Like I liked Rock but never really loved it. So here I am in Jazz.

I just think Rock is about feeling triumphant.

Simon Weil

[Tom Storer]

A wise person once said to me, "To tell the truth, you have to exaggerate." I guess the Bad Plus bloggers could have said, "In many cases, what you dig at 13 you dig for life, although perhaps in not quite the same manner, and with numerous exceptions--sometimes you dig for life only some of what you dug at 13, and there are also those who stop digging altogether what they dug at 13." At least then they would have avoided all this sniping.

[AllenLowe]

I return to some of my original post on this - the key to doing the music right is knowing it, and I don't necessarily mean sociologically, though that helps - and on this I am something of a fey aesthete; play that hillbilly music after you've locked yourself in a room for 5 years with nothing but hicks and other country boys on the stereo (or really the mono) and when that music comes out of your pores than play it. That's what I did. There is limit to what irony can do as a technique, and I think that we, as a creative society, have hit that limit. It's the reason that I don't really like Chadbourne's country stuff, or Camper Von Chadbourne; and interestingly enough, for all his alleged superiority to the material, Zappa did rock and roll brilliantly, because he really knew it and understood it, and I really believe he loved the music no matter what he said about it. When I saw Zappa at Columbia University in 1968 he summoned Sam the Sham to the stage from the audience. He and the band huddled and they did a letter-perfect version of Wooly Bully. For Zappa, that was real truth, no matter what he professed to think of his audience and the music they listened to.

So it might be with Iverson, and Bad Plus. I did hear Iverson play solo about 6 years ago and he was excellent, as a matter of fact he reminded me of Jaki Byard at times. and he did a very nice version of The Windmills of Your Mind.

Edited October 4, 2007 by AllenLowe

[ghost of miles]

Dave Douglas weighs in.

[clifford_thornton]

Dave Douglas weighs in.

He certainly does. Clear and lucid thoughts from an interesting cat, even if his music isn't always to my taste.

[Tom Storer]

I went and saw the Bad Plus at the New Morning in Paris on Tuesday night and quite enjoyed it. A couple of things struck me:

• Their whole thing is about tightly crafted arrangements, which I found distinctive--they have a group sound that is obviously the result of a lot of work and thought. They improvise at a high level of abstraction from time to time, but always inside the arrangements--no lengthy solos.
  
• There's no "pop/schlock l@@k at me game" going on at all when they play. They clearly believe in their music, love to play together, respect the audience (that is, they're not trying to pull the wool over anyone's eyes with pretense and pseudo-hipness), and don't coast.
  

As for the arrangements, it's not like they don't take any chances, either. They did one tune featuring a quiet bass vamp that in my opinion went on far too long, but I could see what they meant. They were asking the audience to go along with them on a certain mood--I think it worked for many in the crowd, even though I became impatient.

It also strikes me that they're part of a long tradition in jazz with regard to piano trios with an identity based on original arrangements, the root being perhaps Ahmad Jamal's early 50's trio. Before anyone jumps in with scathing sarcasm, no, I'm not saying the Bad Plus is equal to that Ahmad Jamal trio, but the similarities are evident: the whole focus on arrangements that shift in and out of various grooves and repetitive vamps, with a relatively minimalist piano style, clear and central bass lines to hold the thing together (as opposed to walking), and although King is a lot more instrumentally varied and active than Vernell Fournier, both primarily keep those grooves going.

I even bought their new CD, "Prog," and am enjoying that too. As a steady diet, TBP would be too narrowly focused for me, but that's true of so many groups. They make a fine meal, though.

[danasgoodstuff]

Yes, of course, they (bad+) are in some ways in the trad of AJ3, Ramsey Lewis, the 3 sounds, etc. But it's just that for my $, not to mention clem's, they ain't that fucking good at it (yet?) - nothing I've heard surprises and delights me like "But Not For Me", "The In Crowd", or "Walking the Floor Over You", much less Sonny doing "Surrey With the Fuzzy Dice and Hydraulics"...

Studies Rule, Dana

Edited October 14, 2007 by danasgoodstuff

[Tom Storer]

I think they have their own thing, honestly arrived at, and do it very well. They might not be to everyone's taste, but I strongly disagree with the notion, which some seem to hold, that they're just a bunch of lame poseurs.

I have yet to hear the spin-off groups such as Happy Apple (Dave King; Michael Lewis, saxophones etc.; Erik Fratzke, bass, guitar, etc.), the Gang Font (King; Fratzke; guitar, Greg Norton, bass; Craig Taborn, keyboards), or Buffalo Collision (Iverson; King; Matt Maneri, viola; Tim Berne, alto & baritone sax). But I like the Billy Hart quartet with Iverson, Mark Turner and Ben Street.

[Tom Storer]

You infer that their repertoire and their playing is crass commercialism--why? Because they play tunes that have been pop hits? So did most of the major jazz stars of the 1950's and 60's. Did that have no element of commercialism? Did Miles Davis really never think of sales or popularity, and if he did, did that make his music any worse?

You say, with apparent pride in your discernment, that you refuse to buy their "product." Have you ever spent any time listening to it? As I said earlier, maybe it's not to your taste. Between that and spitting on them for having impure motives there's quite a gulf.

I guess Iverson had better get used to it: many here are hipper than he can ever hope to be. Or think so, anyway.

[AllenLowe]

I'm wiith Tom on this one - excellent trio - hey, if Jaki Byard could play Besame Mucho and In the Land of Make Believe, than we ought not to bury repertoire but to praise it -

[AllenLowe]

or, ask not what repertoire can do for you, ask what you can do for repertoire -

[clifford_thornton]

or, ask not what repertoire can do for you, ask what you can do for repertoire -

Very well-put, Allen.

[Tom Storer]

but at least byard was not disengenuous about his motives for playing particular songs as i believe the bad plus are.

yes i have heard enough bad plus to not have to hear more. i have also seen the various musicians in different permutations with schmucks like bill mchenry.

a few years ago iversen claims never having heard smells like teen spirit prior to them playing it? please. he seems familiar with enough of the other tunes the band covers. i don't believe it.

I have to wonder why you're so pissed off and suspicious. Why, for example, would you characterize Bill McHenry as a schmuck? Because of his playing? You accuse Iverson of being a liar and the group of being disingenuous. Why? Just because?

[Aggie87]

because this is all very bad for jazz and music in general...what makes these guys legitimate musicians who we should listen to and spend money on? because they went to like the new school jazz program? they have no more claim as being jazz musicians than my younger sister or the guy down the hall with the ethnic goth band. just because they spent money on music lessons or got to go to conservatory, this isn't what the music is about to me. being a "jazz" musician is a concept is no different than being a "rock" musician to these people. it was just a path they decided on. no one is carrying around a big sack of woe on their backs or dying of cihrossis at 40 or shooting up smack or wearing cool afro-centric robes. no these are like dorks who were in high school band. it is totally illegitimate in my eyes and pretty soon there will be no jazz. everything is blurred and coming together and melding into a big ball of suck. this is just my opinion.

I think in order for your concern to be valid for everyone else, we'd all have to agree on the definition of jazz. And I don't think that's going to happen, based on past discussions (either here or at AAJ).

[Tom Storer]

no one is carrying around a big sack of woe on their backs or dying of cihrossis at 40 or shooting up smack or wearing cool afro-centric robes. no these are like dorks who were in high school band.

This makes me wonder if it isn't you who are being disingenuous. But carry on, carry on.

[AllenLowe]

"pretty soon there will be no jazz. everything is blurred and coming together and melding into a big ball of suck. this is just my opinion. "

well, wake up now - this blurring started about 30 years ago - and I do sense a bit of Crow Jim, as Dave Van Ronk used to say, in your attitude. It's like when I recentty read about Joe Chambers complaining because the Bad Plus guys haven't paid enough dues - the music is the music is the music, on its own terms, I don't care if these guys were born in a log cabin or in a manger. We have the music, and it's quite good. Too much sour grapes in the jazz world when a good (young) band is successful -

[Tom Storer]

i need them telling me what i should be listening to as much as i needed thurston moore telling me years ago.

They tell you what you should be listening to?

[Tom Storer]

Which you don't seem to read...

No, but seriously. In addition to drumming up custom for their records and giving props to musicians they admire, the Bad Plus blog often has very interesting content.

And in response to your earlier comment, I have no personal or professional connection to any member of the Bad Plus. Never met 'em.

Edited October 17, 2007 by Tom Storer

[Jim Alfredson]

I didn't realize I needed to be addicted to heroin to be a legit jazz player. Good thing drug dealers are easy to find in my neighborhood.