AllenLowe

wasn't he busted in Philly? Let's send Ron S. over to find out -

when I saw John Cage in the middle 1960s, some guy rode a bicycle across the stage - I don't remember if he was wearing a helmet (for you safety nuts) -

I didn't know he recorded at the station -

two words: The Bumps

well, I did have a drunken piano player get up once in the middle of a tune to use the men's room - but it was better than the alternative-

well, I've always thought of myself as the white Stan Kenton -

bandstand alternatives when having finished a solo and waiting for the other musicians to play: 1) juggle (I have seen Alfredson do this on several occassions; very entertaining) 2) read a comic book (Joe G. prefers this method) 3) check your makeup with a compact mirror (generally recommended only for people actually wearing makeup) 4) text the good-looking babe in the third row (but first make sure she's not the Mafioso owner's girl friend) 5) adjust the wedgie in your tighty whiteys (7/4 will be doing this at his upcoming Brooklyn gig) 6) throw up (I have had some success with this) 7) Urinate into the piano (somebody actually did this while my brother's country band was playing a gig one night years ago) -

sorry, she doesn't do it for me - I mean, I've asked her repeatedly, and she just won't do it for me.

weird...I started a thread without even realizing it. Gotta quit the smack. as for Cash, I like the Sun stuff, though it has its share of stiffs. as for Johnny, from all accounts he was a real mensch. Gotta like a guy like that. or, as we used to sing, way back when, "the lonely voice of youth cries: What is couth?"

interesting - Memphis Minnie has a song called Blues Monday Blues - Blue Mondays were little parties she gave to raise cash, lots of booze and music.

I agree with you; somebody was too busy yanking their own crank to pay attention to what was going on there - as for the Paramount Masters, that may be my favorite. My wife has instructions to bury me with that one.

she's purty - now if she could only learn to act -

Bill, is that Tipton quartet the one that was a memorial to Billy? just wondering because I recently found a Bill Tipton album from the 1950s - unfortunately, he/she turns out to be a pretty mediocre piano player.

be that as it may, I think JSP is performing a mighty service - particularly in things like their Paramounts boxes; the blues one is probably the best blues reissue I have ever owned. It's like the Rosetta Stone of old time music. If anyone out there does not own it, I siggest you buy two copies -

well, in the late 1960s, I think it was, Cash was walking a very thin line between his old-line country audience and the new generation of rock fans whom he wanted to court - when I saw him at Newport in 1969 he was uncomfortably trying to find common ground with that new audience, full of hippies and folksters, and coming up with songs like the above, which, much as I admired him, seemed forced and artificial.

yes, I was referring to JSP - and actually the owner of JSP told me that in an email -

"The lonely voice of youth cries... what is truth?" -from a bad song by Johnny Cash

nice version of Lestorian Mode, which I plan to use on my blues set. Dave, are you in Boston this week?

what an amazing story - I was a big baseball fan in those years, but do not remember him. Shades of Herb Score -

ever? Better than "Mel Gibson Reads the Complete King James Bible" (6 cds with alternate takes)?

to me that's too easy - kinda like saying, it doesn't really make a difference, when it does. The music still has to stand on its own. If James Joyce had started writing Romances, a lot of people would have objected, would have made critical judgments that the work was not worthy of him. We can't suspend critical judgment just because someone has the right to do something - no one is questioning that. But we can be all over it in terms of artistic quality. We do this with other musicians, so why not Miles?

never said he shouldn't have done it - more power to him - just said I did not think, in general, that the music was very good. though I do think he didn't need the extra fame, as there was probably no jazz musician more famous. I do think, however, that there was an ego thing involved that had little to do with musical considerations. If he wanted to indulge it, let him - I don't think there is any great principle involved. But I don't have to automatically jump on the bandwagon. And I do think it's appropriate for people to question his motives. Look, this is the guy who put down Ornette and Dolphy, and a hundred other muscians. He was as judgmental as they come, always questioning others' motives. So, judge not.... if he were a politician who changed his opinions in order to get elected, we would respond accordingly. Sure, someone can change their mind. Does not mean we suspend judgment. I think Miles was the musical equivalent of such.

I don't hear a particular tune, but I constantly have chord changes running through my head. I think it's a way of practicing when I don't have time to pick up an instrument - and sometimes I whistle along in a quiet way, which drives my wife crazy (lately I've been working on the bridge, in this way, to Devil and the Deep Blue Sea. But I don't hear the melody, just see the changes as though spread out on a keyboard).

it is true, I do take a more cynical view of it - some musicians change because of certain pycho-artistic necessities; Hal Russell, John Coltrane, Gil Melle, Charles Mingus, Miles through most of his career - but I think Miles was finally just chasing the ultimate pussy of fame and broads, sometimes quite pathetically at this point in his life; it didn't cause him immediate problems because so much of the rock crowd craved the kind of hipness he conveyed by association, and knew so little about jazz that they assumed his word was gospel (hence Joni Mitchell's sincere but silly collaborations; her first idea of jazz was the LA Express). He just wanted their fame; his was just a much more sophisticated version of the same old thing I heard from many African American musicians in the 1970s and 1980s - pissed off that the kind of music they had developed (soul/blues/jazz) was being exploited in more commercially effective ways by white musicians, they decided they could do the same things themselves and score some cash. Most of the time they ended up sounding hopelessley dated. Miles did much better, he was a better and more creative musician, and he saw a real way to do it - he saw the ends, let us say, but the means was more problematic. Ultimately it did not matter much since musical deficiencies could be overcome with charisma and promotion.

"if I could only hear or think about music only in terms of what I knew (or thought I knew) then I would have to agree with all of this" you're right - time for me to start thinking about music in terms of what I don't know. Than I can come to certain decisions based on non-criteria. Or better still, maybe I should lobotomize myself for complete objectivity.