Head Man

Giorgio Moroder? 'SME meets Donna Summer' ....in your dreams

Nice find, Bev. I think I'll treat myself to that! I was also surprised to be reminded that "Bob Downes - Electric City" and "Keith Tippett - Dedicated to You, But You Weren't Listening" were first released on Vertigo. Both of those have been reissued on CD but not by any of the major companies.

What a great site - thanks for the link, mjazzg. It always astonishes me what people put up on the web. Unfortunately there's no trace of John Stevens on it. The matrix numbers of the three albums I mention above are: 6360-131/135/141, none of which are mentioned. Perhaps they will get added later. Anyway, I'd forgotten how many groups recorded for Vertigo; Jon Hiseman's Colosseum, Graham Bond, Ian Carr & Nucleus...and not forgetting Manfred Mann, Rod Stewart & Status Quo(!). Lots of the albums have been reissued on CD, so I wonder why the John Stevens never have? I seem to recall that all the Ian Carr & Nucleus albums got released by BGO a few years back, so I wonder whether they might be interested in putting them out. I'll drop them a line to find out.

Clearly a potentially formative event for listeners/musicians of your generation, Sidewinder! Alan Barnes said he travelled down from music college in Leeds to hear Pepper at Scott's that week. Can't work out exactly why I missed it. Maybe having tickets for the Capital Fest diverted me from Scotts that week. Combined with student shortage of dosh, of course. What I do remember from RFH though is that Pepper's brief but glorious rendition of 'Somewhere Over The Rainbow' brought the house down. I remember Jazz Journal and Melody Maker having major writeups of that Scotts gig, so it was high profile. I was lucky enough to catch him on one of the nights, Saturday I think. He and the group were absolutely sensational. Although the CDs are very well done they can't really do justice to the live performance - it was ever thus! The atmosphere was electric and you were never quite certain where the music was going. There also seemed to be a bit of 'feeling' between Art & Milcho Leviev on the night which added to the tension. It's one of the few musical events that I can still remember in detail.

Stylistically they're nothing like the nessa & Emanem discs; more jazz-rock than plain jazz. But jazz-rock the way you'd expect John Stevens to play it, if you know what I mean. It's similar to the sort of music that Jon Hiseman, Dick Heckstall-Smith and perhaps Ray Russell were making at about the same time and it's a great shame that none of it is currently available.

Happy birthday, Bob. Don't forget to open your surprise parcel

There are many excellent albums by the drummer John Stevens that have been reissued on CD. I'm thinking particularly of two he made with Bobby Bradford; one on Emanem, live in Paris in 1973 and one reissued recently on nessa (thank you, Chuck). However none of the albums he made for Vertigo Records in the mid-70s - "John Steven's Away", "Somewhere In Between" and "'Mazin' Ennit" have ever seen the light of day on CD. Does anyone know what happened to Vertigo Records? Who now owns the rights to reissue their albums?

My CD version sounds fine. Your bank manager's not wrong!

Ooooh....and presented by the yummy Annie Nightingale. That takes me back...

That took some guts to post. I guess it's good that he seems to have at least one friend left

Thanks for the heads-up, JETman. I'm tempted

Me too. It's been on my player all week

These arrived from DustyGroove today: Dick Morissey Re-Issues and they're really good! One of them, 'Have You Heard' was originally released on vinyl by Doug Dobell's 77 Records in 1963 and as far as I know has never had a CD reissue. The other two are live recordings from 1966-ish. They are very nicely put together with decent liner notes and the recording quality is decent too. Obviously not 'Hi' Fi but more than adequate, considering the age of the recordings. There are no details as to where the recordings came from and I guess 'Have You Heard' must be a needle drop, although that's not obvious to me from the quality of the sound. The other albums appear to come from taped recordings and their sound quality is not quite as good. Anyway, the music itself is terrific and if you're a fan of Dick Morrissey, which I am, then you'll know what to expect. The CDs seem to originate from Taiwan and were remastered by Jazzhus Disk which has a Brooklyn address. Anyone know anything about this outfit?

Thanks for the tip, jazzbo. I've just ordered two from Amazon.co.uk...I only wish they cost the same in £ as you can get them for in $!!!!

Thanks for the PDF's, chuck

Pity they haven't released the companion to this, "Late Spot at Scott's" as well. They were both recorded at the same time and include some of his best live music. They're the ones I go back to most often. Update: I see that they're both available, used from Amazon, at very reasonable prices.

Put me down for the Roscoe Mitchell I have the Von Freeman release on Bomba and can thoroughly recommend it

Looking at the discography I'm astonished that so little of it has been re-issued on CD in the US and Europe. Even the Japanese re-issues are difficult to get hold of. Does anyone know why this is? Who owns the re-issue rights? BTW I've heard nothing back from Ace re my query about possible future releases by them.

What a great article. Thanks very much for posting it, Porcy.

When I were a lad in the 1960s, Imhoff's was THE place to go for imported American LPs. The whole of the window in New Oxford Street used to be covered with the latest imports: Muddy Waters, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley et al. You could then ask to hear them in the listening booths before buying (or not!). I remember many a happy Saturday morning spent listening to music there with my friends. Strangely, I don't recall using the HMV shop in Bond Street. Perhaps they didn't stock American imports. At that time I bought 'standard' releases at my local record shop (remember those?) in east London. For jazz & folk I used to visit Collet's which was just a short distance from Imhoff's along New Oxford Street. Folk was on the ground floor and jazz was in a tiny basement overseen by the (in)famous Ray Smith. The final port of call was then Dobell's in Charing Cross Road where you could again listen to the latest jazz & blues releases through tiny speakers in their booths.

Of all his albums the one I go back to the most is "Small Talk". I've no idea how it may have influenced Miles but it's a great album anyway. It's part of an essential boxset called "The Collection" which came out a few years ago. It has seven of his albums remastered with extra tracks and great notes. There's currently a used copy at Amazon for a not unreasonable price: Sly Stone - The Collection

I thought it was going to include "Hard Blues" as a bonus track

I came across this compilation from Ace records (UK) which contains tracks by various artists from the Mainstream roster: Mainstream Jazz Compilation There's also one containing tracks by soul and jazz artists: Mainstream Soul/Jazz Compilation Both look tasty! I've e-mailed Ace to ask whether they intend re-issuing any complete jazz and/or soul albums from the Mainstream catalogue.

Since these are/were all recordings on the Liberty label I wonder whether they were ever re-issued by EMI when they bought Liberty in the 1980s? I can't recall ever seeing a Howard Rumsey recording on EMI.

Thanks for that, Late. Shame about the castanets on "Celt" Update: All three Dick Morrissey CDs are now available from DustyGroove: Dick Morrissey CDs