mikeweil

Well, boring might be a little too hard as a rating, but I think it's below your average good hardbop date. After listening to hundreds of hardbop albums, I started to find some of them boring, too, if they were not as inspired as the classic icons of the genre, so I sure know what Al is talking about.

So here's Ubu, Mr. Bassman & myself at a gig in Switzerland earlier this year: Who's who?

Yes, really nice cover - the Vogue issue is totally different, has Shihab in B&W on the cover .....

ebay link

UGHHH - they wanted to make it even rarer? Crazy ......

but that is one point that is almost completely neglected in those german papers I read sometimes (SZ) or regularly (FAZ, Die Zeit) - and in fact I find it quite distressing. I really hope that in the circumstances of Germany in the 60s and 70s, I wouldn't have turned into a "Sympathisant", but then who know, under those circumstances... interesting though to see what happens at BKA right now - very positive a developmet, even it much too late. I think it is still neglected - you read the current Spiegel series on the RAF? Nothing really new there, which is disappointing if one knows how close Stefan Aust was to the RAF scene. Ex-chancellor Helmut Schmidt makes admits woefully how difficult it all was, but he never talks about what actually brought young Germans to go that far. This is the question that really interests me, and it is not answered to this day. I was there at the time, and I wasn't even a "Sympathisant", as I thought it crazy to import Tupamaro strategies into Germany or take Mao as a yardstick, but I wasn't on the other side either. The problem was the the government and the establishment didn't take the younger generation's criticism seriously. They defended their newly found comfortable status, and were not willing to question their attitudes. They had been brought up in that mindset. There is a new book edited by psychotherapist David Becker who tried to work with ex-terrorists - a very interesting read. The mindset was just as brutal as that of fascist organisation. It was born from the same source. Ubu we will meet and talk later this year .....

I see it rather at a very old attitude, you can find it in the Old Testament - you define your enemy, and anything may be justified. As long as you do not question this definition, everythings is balanced. I still see this all over the world - have you read Amin Maalouf's essay "In the Name of Identity: Violence and the Need to Belong" (available in German as "Mörderische Identitäten", edition suhrkamp) - I'd really be curious what you think about that.

That people like Höcker got away with minimal punishment is the biggest scandal in German history to me. This double-tongued attitude of German justice and authorities and establishment was one of the major frustrations for the people of my generation and the one before is, and a motivation for some to join RAF terrorism, which is currently being discussed here once again due to the 30th anniversary of the RAF leaders deaths. Seeing these Nazis go on without consequences for their deeds was indeed frustrating.

One of the rarest LPs in my collection that was never reissued on CD, AFAIK, is a co-led Roulette LP (Vogue pressing, that is) of a Sahib Shihab / Specs Powell band - Dizzy Gillespie wrote the liner notes. At the time I found it a strange but attractive mixture of modern bop and swing era stylings, but the pairing of the leaders with Powell's background explains some. From what I heard on this LP, he was a very good drummer playing for the band in a most effective way - I always wondered what became of him. R.I.P.

This was on German TV news yesterday. I can't help but think they made some deal. I believe Mattel knew about this, or even consented.

If you prefer his CDs with jazz players, this one is a good choice. Only weak point IMO is the conga player, Milton Cardona, who works fine in Cuban styles but has rather limited experience with the time signatures Abou-Khalil uses. It might not be that audible for anybody else. I prefer his more Arabian albums, like Roots & Sprouts - there are more of these available on the Arabian market - I hope to get some from a Morrocan dealer these days.

Well, I understand your move, but you could have asked first - never mind. Yes it is disturbing - it always was, and it still is, and will always be.

I could enforce this at court, but that's not my way of handling such things. Any strain betweeen me and the mother will have a negative effect on my daughter, that's my experience. My wife who went through never getting to know her father assures me the girl will go to see her father some day - she's welcome. My adress hasn't changed.

I didn't leave for the child, and I pay a considerable part of my income for the child - I supported the mother as best as I could during pregnancy, witnessing the birth was the most moving experience in my whole life - but everything I did and every attitude I had was wrong in that woman's view. You always know better after the fact .....

Am I the only one who finds this little tidbit very disturbing? All fine and dandy on the "soul mate" front and the search for good vibes in partnership and marriage, but I sincerely hope some of Mike's best friends told him he was an utter jerk in this respect; if not for leaving the mother of his 4 month old child, then for not leaving her 13 months earlier. John, it was not that simple - it really was a difficult relationship, we both made our mistakes, but she was changing her attitudes very fast at the time and was the first to say she didn't know if she'd rather break up, but she hadn't the courage to do it. That was almost a year before she got pregnant. When that happened I predicted we would now make it or this would make us part. I tried my very best to stay with her, but doing so would have meant losing my identity - no kidding. I was the bad boy all the time, the poor musician not making enough money etc. - you can ask all my friends, they all confirmed it was the best I could do to split. Now marrying another woman, and so fast, had nothing to do with this, it was another process altogether, I had been true to my partner until the day we parted and months beyond, if you implied this. My former partner later moved to another city without telling me and now refuses to reveal her adress or letting me have contact. It's all a very complicated and painful situation, and my wife, who had to grow up without ever seeing her father knows what this is all about, and she says I did right. There is no perfect solution in a situation like this, and I had countless sleepless nights before I made that decision and I have been thinking it over again and again and again - you can only make mistakes. It's tragic.

Well, it was for Connoisseurs, and those are few .....

Why do they always make these offers when I'm short on money .....

Just a few days ago I regretted selling a CD of US harpschord player Mark Kroll with Bach pieces - it sounded rather harsh and I had those works by other players. I kept another one of his on the same label, and it sounds great on my new Marantz player .....

R.I.P. IIRC the first Cuban trombonist of international fame - as important to his style as J.J. Johnson was to modern jazz.

I want a copy of this for so many years now that I cannot recall how many ...

Some server or domain hosting issues? When I type in www.djangomusic.com I get an empty page, and the source code there is absolutely no content uploaded! Expiration date is October 27, 2007, fwiw ..... www.djangos.com gets error message. The domainhosting service is http://registrar.godaddy.com - perhaps they know something?

I think the two albums The Prisoner and Fat Albert Rotunda are stepsisters that share only one parent: Herbie Hancock. The other parents are modern jazz arrangement in the first case (many hear a Gil Evans influence), and in the second case, some souljazz and funk. I always found the album a little disparate, because you get Jessica and Bedtime Story, which are in line with his last two Blue Notes, and then the funky beats. I understand some of the music was done for a TV series, and I guess the remainder was recorded as a filler. I prefer to listen to these two types of tracks from that album separately. From a jazz point of view, The Prisoner is the superior album. But Fat Albert Rotunda marks Herbie's first successful steps among the booby traps of funky jazz.

I find her singing a little too sweet. I prefer them with more guts and rhythmical drive. Plus the band plays pretty much Hollywood/Brazilian pop style. There are others I like better.

Polycarbonate is softer than other plastics, that's all. Use the back of your fingernail and you scratch them effortlessly ..... (not recommended).

He also overdubbed some flute on his album "The Elements" on Milestone, and on "Multiple".