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Tony Malaby


Bol

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I was wondering what people think of Malaby's recordings. His "Adobe" on Sunnyside is the first of his recordings I ever got, and it is one of my favorite recordings of last dozen years or so. But I've tried half a dozen of his other recordings ("Paloma Recio", "Warblepeck", "Tamarindo", etc.) and I've been disappointed with all of them. Unlike "Adobe", these other recordings seem to me just aimless and aggressive in gratuitous ways. The fact that Paul Motian is on "Adobe" may make a difference, but I also really like Mark Helias's Open Loose recordings that Malaby plays on along with Tom Rainey. So, it can't be just Paul Motian who is making a difference.

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I rate him very highly. Out of the leader dates of his i have (Paloma Recio, Warblepeck, Voladores, Novela) i've probably spun Paloma Recio the most. He's a sideman on so many great records, two favourites being Hollenbeck's Eternal Interlude (not that he's heavily featured, but still) and Chris Lightcap's Bigmouth Deluxe. If i see his name on an album it's always a good sign. Having said all that i must admit that i haven't felt like listening to him much in the last year.

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Only heard him as a sideman on disc and once in person, but I wasn't impressed. Bleak, mooing and/or vacuum cleaner tone and that tendency, once so common among second-, third- or fourth-generation Trane-influenced players to get "ecstatic" too abruptly to be believable, at least by me. Much prefer the music of his pianist ex-wife, Angela Gonzalez.

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Only heard him as a sideman on disc and once in person, but I wasn't impressed. Bleak, mooing and/or vacuum cleaner tone and that tendency, once so common among second-, third- or fourth-generation Trane-influenced players to get "ecstatic" too abruptly to be believable, at least by me. Much prefer the music of his pianist ex-wife, Angela Gonzalez.

It's Angelica Sanchez.

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Only heard him as a sideman on disc and once in person, but I wasn't impressed. Bleak, mooing and/or vacuum cleaner tone and that tendency, once so common among second-, third- or fourth-generation Trane-influenced players to get "ecstatic" too abruptly to be believable, at least by me. Much prefer the music of his pianist ex-wife, Angela Gonzalez.

It's Angelica Sanchez.

Oops. You're right. Heard her on a Chad Taylor trio record back in 2009 and was impressed.

http://www.482music.com/albums/482-1065.html

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Only heard him as a sideman on disc and once in person, but I wasn't impressed. Bleak, mooing and/or vacuum cleaner tone and that tendency, once so common among second-, third- or fourth-generation Trane-influenced players to get "ecstatic" too abruptly to be believable, at least by me. Much prefer the music of his pianist ex-wife, Angela Gonzalez.

I think, as you say, getting "ecstatic" in non-believable way in one of the features of his various recordings I don't like. Same when I saw him in person once. Not a fan of "ecstatic" even in Coltrane. I guess "unction" might be a good term for this.

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Another Malaby agnostic here. I recognise what Larry Kart says about abrupt ecstasy and I hear a "detachment" between technique and feeling.

The two recordings I've owned, Tamarindo and Voladores I sold on. Sadly I'm going to miss a very rare London apperance which i would have loved to experienece to see how the 'live' compared to 'recorded'.

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I first took notice of Tony Malaby with the "Tamarindo" album. I thought that was a terrific album and still do. My friends and I thought that "Tamarindo" marked the emergence of a major talent, maybe even the next David S. Ware. Well, it never came to that. Tony came to be defined by his variableness. To some extent, this is still true. Nevertheless, the Clean Feed albums are very good, as are the Open Loose albums. His sideman appearances are quite respectable. Expectations have had to be reset, and it seems doubtful that he will fulfill the early promise. But I'm still willing to wait.

I like Bol's description of Tony's playing as "aggressive in gratuitous ways." Quite likely Tony would probably laugh and take that as a compliment. I've seen Tony in many performance contexts. After one performance with Angelica Sanchez quartet or quintet (don't recall), he told me needs a lot of time and space to get into it. 75 minute sets are common. I think Tony is a throwback to the early free jazz movement. He loves to explore many different aspects of a musical phrase or theme. You know Tony has hit a seam when he starts flapping his elbows, like he's pumping up an engine. Tony is from the West (Tucson), and there is a sense of wide open spaces in his playing. If you want Berklee high-tech or Euro tailored performances, Tony will not suit. But if you like big tenor sound, with a lot of heart and soul, Tony is still a good bet

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I first took notice of Tony Malaby with the "Tamarindo" album. I thought that was a terrific album and still do. My friends and I thought that "Tamarindo" marked the emergence of a major talent, maybe even the next David S. Ware. Well, it never came to that. Tony came to be defined by his variableness. To some extent, this is still true. Nevertheless, the Clean Feed albums are very good, as are the Open Loose albums. His sideman appearances are quite respectable. Expectations have had to be reset, and it seems doubtful that he will fulfill the early promise. But I'm still willing to wait.

I like Bol's description of Tony's playing as "aggressive in gratuitous ways." Quite likely Tony would probably laugh and take that as a compliment. I've seen Tony in many performance contexts. After one performance with Angelica Sanchez quartet or quintet (don't recall), he told me needs a lot of time and space to get into it. 75 minute sets are common. I think Tony is a throwback to the early free jazz movement. He loves to explore many different aspects of a musical phrase or theme. You know Tony has hit a seam when he starts flapping his elbows, like he's pumping up an engine. Tony is from the West (Tucson), and there is a sense of wide open spaces in his playing. If you want Berklee high-tech or Euro tailored performances, Tony will not suit. But if you like big tenor sound, with a lot of heart and soul, Tony is still a good bet

Well said

Heart and soul with technique to spare and endlessly frustrating at times as there have been quite a few nights that the elbows never flap.

Because the goal or the target is unknown sometimes it doesn't happen.

But especially within 2 sets from a band like Open Loose the listener will be surprised and for me always wanting to hear more.

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Once live is way not enough to know anything about the calibre of Tony Malaby's abilities. He is poorly served on his own recordings and he is wildly unpredictable live but when on, for me he is the most bracing, original and exciting tenor saxophonist on the planet.

Come see in NYC 3/29 at Cornelia Street

I've seen him live twice within a few days. Once with The Liberation Orchestra where his tenor stylings could be compared to Chris Cheek and secondly in a trio setting. He came across very well in both settings. Having said that I've only a few of his recordings , which I don't play too often.

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  • 2 weeks later...

http://m.youtube.com/watch?v=17kQBwMNpwk

As close to those flapping arms as you'll ever need to get.

I don't know that not tucking in a non-square-tailed shirt is the best way to hide your gut or to let everybody know that you care about making a good impression (in fact, I know it's not).. But as far as actual fashion sense goes, reasonable minds can and do differ: http://www.styleforum.net/t/46676/square-tail-or-regular-tail-for-untucked-shirts

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extreme unction & he dresses like a slob; a couple tolerable section gigs don't count, as many dozens of others could have filled the same role equally well or better. the guy's hit/miss ratio seems absurd (silly) as well because what he's 'swinging for' (apologies for baseball analogy, I just listened to Buddy Johnson) is usually so banal... (compare to Buddy Johnson).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eATBlrxdczc

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Now the problem is how he dresses?

And his weight is a problem as well?

Try May 9th or 10th with Taramindo (William Parker and Nasheet Waits) and hi to me if it's the 10th.Plus who are these dozens of today's tenor players? I've seen or heard quite a few over the years and I can't think of any!!!

I'll go out on a limb and guess Moms won't list Joe Lovano.

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Joe Lovano's a fat guy too (hell, I'm a fat guy), but he dresses well (enough), and gets gigs aplenty. "Music business" is two words, "music" and ""business".

On any given night, I'd prefer to hear Malaby over Lovano. But how much the cover would be and how many people I'd be sharing the room with, that's business.

But really, under any condition, wearing a regular-tail shirt untucked conveys the look of "I wasn't expecting company".

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Oh, it's not about what you wear as it is about how it comes together.

You might think I'm playing, and at one level I am, but then again - look at the cats with strong identities - they all have some kind of a "look" that they pull off, they don't come to a gig looking like they were unwinding at the crib with a six-pack and oh shit, I forgot you guys were coming over tonight, let me get my horn, ok, sorry. I mean, you can do that look, but the components have to be A - of a certain quality & B - put together with a good eye to detail.

A t-shit and jeans will they look right if they come together and present an image, but if they look like you're taking a break from playing video games all day, hey, that's not a look, that's a Random Act Of Civilianism.

I laugh at people who wonder why they're invisible when they dress they don't want to be seen. At some point, you have to accept responsibility for the light waves coming off yourself.

Posture comes into it as well, body language, carriage, etc., maybe even more than dress. I learned that a long time ago because I suck at it both congenitally and instinctually. But it's real, it's a basic form of sub-conscious conveyance of information to others, and pretending it doesn't matter will only give a person a sense of self-granted justification, not any real-world relief.

The whole thing about "people see with their eyes" has, like most basic truths about our hard-wired selves, has been distorted into a thing where oh, I refuse to project a look because that's for SHOW BUSINESS and other Untalented Types. Yeah, well, ok, so it is, but it's also still hard-wired into our brains to process all information through all our senses. So don't take that and turn it into the falsehood that all that matters is how you play, because, yes, that will be all that matters in the music, but in order to be heard, that's where the business comes in and then, you can't go swimming in a rock, ok? And you can't break a river with a pickaxe. The idea that you should even try to is silly, just downright silly, and the notion that you should be able to, and if you try and fail it's not your fault for being fundamentally wrong about your premise is simply ruinous.

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