crisp

The death of the CD would be OK if lossless downloads were widely available, but for most music the only way you can avoid compression is to buy a CD and rip it yourself. Of course, the answer to that might be, if you are an audiophile, buy vinyl, but some of us prefer the sound of CDs.

Hot Water by Wodehouse was superb, so I've started on the next one in my list: Luck of the Bodkins. I'm pleased to see it's also set in France (where I think the author was living at the time).

I like the idea of the e-reader, but having used an iPad regularly at work and sampled a colleague's Kindle, I'll reluctantly pass -- at least until either is improved. I find the iPad interface too slippery and distracting and the Kindle screen too grey and the buttons not responsive enough (I get the odd bout of RSI and don't want to encourage it). In fact, formatting content for the iPad is now a part of my job, and I hate it, but even without that association that I wouldn't want to use one as it currently is. I'm the same with music downloads: great idea, but the technology just isn't good enough yet.

Ah, I didn't know about Kinsey's link with That's Life. Thanks for that. George and Mildred had two theme tunes during its run, the first by jazz bassist Johnny Hawksworth (similar in spirit to his Roobarb theme), the second by Roger Webb (more mood-music-y).

I know it's crass, but being a child of the Eighties, I always associate Tony Kinsey's name with this.

I wouldn't usually recommend a PD release but this, which I'm currently listening to, is excellent and I believe ticks all your boxes.

What about these days, though? I don't think I've ever heard Body and Soul played at a gig. Or My Funny Valentine. They seem very much of their time. Autumn Leaves, on the other hand, comes up a lot.

Seriously, why not just pay for it? Newspapers aren't very expensive.

I'm with Allen Lowe on this one. I recently re-watched Airplane and barely laughed. Two-dimensional characters enacting corny puns in a shallow genre spoof doesn't cut it for me. Laurel and Hardy films make me laugh the most. Then W.C. Fields, Buster Keaton and Jerry Lewis. Movies with characters and situations you can identify with, however exaggerated.

I would assume more cock-up than conspiracy. My dealings with Popmarket suggest to me that its either a very incompetent outfit or a seriously understaffed one.

Probably lots. Vocalion has had a long relationship with Universal and has recently resumed its relationship with EMI. The label has also licensed the odd Sony release as well as library recordings. Did you order at HMV? I'm still waiting for mine, although they were posted last week.

PS Just noticed that, although the Armstrong box, like the Bessie, replicates the order of the Columbia Masterworks releases of about 20 years ago, the Popmarket site says "Contains the best sound ever, having been remastered by Sony’s multi Grammy-winning engineer, Mark Wilder, in conjunction with producer Michael Brooks." Maybe the Bessie has been redone too? Who knows?

In spite of all the caveats on here (which I do take seriously), I've preordered the Bessie set. The individual Frog sets work out a lot more expensively, and although I appreciate Bessie's genre-transcending greatness, blues isn't much of an interest of mine. So for me it's just a cheap, easy way to get the lot, poor sound notwithstanding. If it turns out to be remastered after all -- and if I can actually tell if it has been -- I'll let you know. Re Ellington, I'm hoping that it's just a matter of time before Sony repackages and reissues the complete RCA set of about 15 years ago. I was a bit hard up when that one came out and I reluctantly passed on it without realising it was a limited edition. A nice mini-box version of that would be fine.

There was that boiling hot weekend a couple of weeks ago, plus it was quite nice for most of the Olympics. The days and days of rain at the start of summer were incredible. I never complain about unpredictable weather, though. It's one of the many things I love about living in England. We could easily get some real summer weather in September.

I started reading him because I liked the Everyman hardback editions and fancied collecting them. I was rather unenthusiastic about his writing at first, being an English graduate used to literary fiction, but as I kept buying them and reading them I gradually began to get it. Much of his humour is about repetition, such as using lofty quotes to describe facetious situations, and you also laugh whenever one you've seen in one story recurs in another. Just reading a list of them, such as the one here, makes me smile. I can do without the repetitive dialogue, however.

Just finished another Wodehouse: Doctor Sally. Adapted from a play, which makes it more interesting (in a technical sense) than especially good. At least it was short, and would have been even shorter if he hadn't padded it out with so much repeated dialogue, eg, "I'm angry" "You're angry?" "I'm angry." I'm working through the gaps in my Wodehouse knowledge. Hot Water is chronologically the next unread title, so I'll read that then possibly look for something more substantial.

They are exact copies, but I thought the Evans would be like the Tatums I have in the same series: double jewel cases in a slip case. It's basic, but no more cheap than zillions of other boxed sets out there, including Mosaic Selects.

Yeah, the titles of the first seven are the same as the Columbia Masterworks releases of ages ago, eg these ones. I only recently got rid of my copies of these when I bought the Complete Masters box from Universal, so I'm not buying them again!

Looks like an opportunity missed on the Bessie then. I notice now that the individual titles of the Armstrongs replicate the Columbia Masterworks issues of decades ago, at least for the first six or seven discs. Those masterings are ancient. I've ordered the Charlie Christian as I missed it first time round, and might get the Ellington if they really are remastered, as I have all but one of the albums already and really only want Drum and Bal Masque without the overdubs.

Although the Second Disc post reads: "Virtually all of the CDs in the Complete Album Collection jazz series have been newly remastered by multiple Grammy-winning engineer Mark Wilder." So I'm not sure. At least the price is right: £32.84 for 10 discs at Amazon UK.

Now up for preorder at Amazon. Released October 29. More details at The Second Disc.

The Second Disc is reporting four new(ish) sets from Sony Legacy: Louis Armstrong, The Complete OKeh, Columbia and RCA Victor Recordings 1925-1933 (OKeh/Columbia/RCA/Legacy 8869794565 2, 2012) Louis Armstrong & The Hot Fives – Volume 1 (1925-1926) Louis Armstrong: The Hot Fives & Sevens – Volume 2 (1926-1927) Louis Armstrong: The Hot Fives & Sevens – Volume 3 (1927-1928) Louis Armstrong & Earl Hines (1927-1928) Louis in New York (1929) St. Louis Blues (1929-1930) You’re Driving Me Crazy (1930-1931) Stardust (1931-1932) Swing, You Cats (1932-1933) Laughin’ Louie (1933, 1932, 1930) (Already reported at Organissimo here.) Charlie Christian, The Genius of the Electric Guitar (Columbia/ Legacy 88697 93035 2, 2012) The Master Takes: Benny Goodman Sextet – 1939 / with The Alternate Takes The Master Takes: Benny Goodman Sextet – 1940 / with The Alternate Takes The Master Takes: Benny Goodman Sextet – 1940-41 / with The Alternate Takes The Master Takes: the Metronome All Star Nine – 1940, Benny Goodman And His Orchestra – 1939-1941, The Sextet Breakdowns & False Starts, The Sextet Rehearsal Sequences, March 13, 1941 Jam Session (More sensible packaging than the original issue, as shown at Amazon.) Duke Ellington, The Complete Columbia Studio Albums Collection 1951-1958 (Columbia/ Legacy 88697 93888 2) Masterpieces By Ellington (1951) Ellington Uptown (1952) Blue Rose – Rosemary Clooney and Duke Ellington and His Orchestra (1956) A Drum Is A Woman (1956) Such Sweet Thunder (1957) Ellington Indigos (1957) Black, Brown And Beige feat. Mahalia Jackson (1958) Duke Ellington at the Bal Masque (1958) Duke Ellington’s Spacemen: The Cosmic Scene (1958) (A Drum is a Woman at last! Hope they remove the fake audience from Bal Masque.) Bessie Smith, The Complete Columbia Recordings (Columbia/ Legacy 88725 40310 2, 2012) The Complete Recordings Vol. 1 (1923-1924) (2 CDs) The Complete Recordings Vol. 2 (1924-1925) (2 CDs) The Complete Recordings Vol. 3 (1925-1928) (2 CDs) The Complete Recordings Vol. 4 (1928-1931) (2 CDs) The Complete Recordings Vol. 5 (1931, 1933, unissued takes, St. Louis Blues soundtrack, Ruby Smith Dialogue/An Interview with Chris Albertson)( 2 CDs) More details at Second Disc.

I don't think that adds up, Ubu. Hip-o Select hasn't released a jazz boxed set since the Wes Montgomery one, almost a year ago, so it's getting less active if anything. The Chick Webb set under discussion is Universal material, which suggests Mosaic is still getting that material. And the Granz Jam Sessions set came out years before Hip-o Select was conceived. But a Hip-o/Mosaic merger could indeed be fine. With Cuscuna in control, the mastering would probably be more Mosaic-inclined, while we would get more compact/attractive packaging.

Another fan of Ghost World here. Scarlett Johanssen's performance as the main character's friend was a revelation -- until then I had no idea she was that good an actress.

The Steve Race is fun but it's more a pop album with jazz elements than a jazz album. On the other hand, where else could you hear Tubby Hayes soloing on Z Cars?