ep1str0phy

There's something really beautifully, tragically grotesque about the FFT version. It's got just the right tempo--lyrical, but edgy. Moffett, for one, was perfect for this sort of tune.

Duo Exchange is baaaaaad...

I'd love to hear it all, but is there really enough material for a Select?

Also--we're (however unconsciously) speaking from the perspective of the (putative) consumer. Whether or not these compilations are meritorious in the general sense (e.g., bringing new people to the music, etc.) is somewhat different than their meaning to us (on this very specialized board). Apologies for pulling into this very narrow sphere of thought, but there's reason for inquiry (maybe not vitriol and gripe, but inquiry most definitely) among us--the faithful, all-weather audience (I'd actually like to see the numbers on the different Prestige profiles, just to prove to myself that random consumers do want to listen to Eric Dolphy)--when so much fine material goes unissued. This, again, has nothing to do with certain 'macrosocial' benefits immanent to the compilations--just in the same way that the Ken Burns documentary had its upsides. Although we voice the negatives, the positive perspective is latent. If we can't vent in the community, then where?

Me too (in Oakland last Fall). I'll cherish those concerts forever.

Oh... man. RIP. I'll be spinning something tonight/this morning.

One thing I'd like to add - it's never Trane's playing that bugs me, it's usually the setting, particularly Sanders' very aggressive caterwauling. I think I understand the intention to some degree. I've always felt that they were attempting to capture the free abandon associated with the santified church and the release that it accomplishes within those who participate, either as listeners or players. Trane's playing in every period is always thoughtful and engaging, even at its most extreme, but I'd rather hear it without the distractions. This is why I like "Interstellar Space" so much. It is pure and uncluttered, yet very intense. For the record, I do like some of Sanders' other records, especially "Tauhid", "Karma", and the underrated ESP album, on which he most closely resembles Trane. What's interesting--and this had been brought up elsewhere (a recent thread?)--is that Sanders recorded the ESP album well before his stint with Trane. As per my opinions--part of what makes 'Live in Seattle' so discomfiting for me is the fact that Trane lends so much space to his frontline cohorts. This isn't a bad thing per se--it's just that they're really, really incongruous with the rhythm section. On the slow burners (especially 'Out of This World'), Sanders is playing in such an odd rhythmic bag that Jones sounds positively nonplussed. Tyner at least sounds like he's trying, but there's a strange disconnect between Sanders and Jones that makes their later associations (e.g., 'Ask the Ages') all the more remarkable. It's notable, at least, that Sanders was playing in a much more straight-ahead 'Traneish' idiom on the preceding ESP date.

Now, the burning question: when are we going to get the damn non-US stuff? On the Henderson--honestly, I think the 'best of' Milestone disc for Henderson is kind of counterintuitive. Half of those albums sound like 'best of' comps already (I'd just reissue 'Power to the People').

Well, excu-u-u-se me for my limitations! When I use the term "late Trane", I am referring specifically to the period when he added Pharoah Sanders to the band, beginning with "Meditations". The only time I saw Coltrane live was in late 1965 at the Jazz Workshop in Boston. At the time, the most recent records available featured the classic quartet ("Ascension" may have already been released, I can't remember, but that was a special record event, anyway), and we were surprised as we walked in the door and found that we were about to see the John Coltrane Sextet. Nobody was prepared for what happened that night, and I have relived that evening in my mind many times since then. When "Meditations" was released a few months later, I dutifully bought it, and I discovered that it had been recorded the week before I saw the band. Each of the subsequent releases that came in the following two years, and I valiantly kept up with them, confirmed for me (although it took years to admit it to myself) that the full-blown sonic assault of the band with Sanders just doesn't speak to me. By the time "Interstellar Space" was released many years later, I just wasn't interested, which is why it took so long for me to catch up with it. It's easy to look back and evaluate things from a historical standpoint. We have far more pieces of the puzzle (or tapestry, if you will) now, and can get a much clearer picture of Trane's development. It's easy for some people to take what seems to me to be a position of intellectual superiority, but following things in real time as they are/were happening is quite a different ball game. I now realize that to categorize "late Trane" with a broad brush stroke is oversimplification. I don't need that pointed out to me, thank you very much. I like "Expressions" and "Live at the Vanguard Again", but don't care for "Meditations", "Om", "Seattle Concert" , "Kulu Se Mama" or "Live in Japan" very much. That's just me. No--I'm not criticizing the opinion--and apologies for coming across as brusque. Again, there's no accounting for taste--nor is there any point in wanting to. There are some individuals who just don't dig some of the late stuff--fair enough. I've seldom, if ever taken genuine issue with differences in taste (growing up in a household where primary listening habits veered toward Michael Jackson and the Beatles, conciliation was a necessity). But the whole early/mid/late Trane thing is an f'in nightmare--academically, theoretically, biographically, etc. The whole point is that, regardless of how you (and this is the general 'you,' by the way) define 'late Coltrane', you'll find dozens of other people willing to draw the line some place else (does it start after McCoy and Elvin leave the band? Maybe it starts after 'A Love Supreme'?). Perhaps the verbage is a bit extreme, but I've found that most people are willing to draw the line where they can't listen anymore. It could be a folly of my experience--and hey, I wasn't there, so my opinion is as much prolepsis as anyone else--but this very much seems to be the pattern (and patterns are simplifications in and of themselves, anyhow--but patterns still). It's all semantics in the final analysis, anyway. Conversely--I don't really like 'Live... Again' that much, although I enjoy 'Meditations' and 'Kulu Se Mama' quite a bit. I really haven't listened to 'Om' at any length, 'Live in Japan' is uneven (but intermittently brilliant), and 'Seattle Concert' is one of the most bewildering entries (for me, anyway) in the Coltrane catalogue. I think we agree on 'Expressions'. We'll find a thousand other opinions on this board, across listeners and critics. Take it for what it is.

Gerry Hemingway Ray Anderson Barry Altschul Anthony Braxton Chick Corea Dave Holland

I honestly really, really love this album. Although it lapses into the maudlin, there's a corny sort of sincerity to the sides that just really gets to me. One thing's for sure: Guaraldi could be a bitch. 'Since I Fell For You' grooves like no one's business.

Not that I'm going to but any of this, but I'm surprised that they're holding out on a Bartz disc.

'Montreux One' was the first post-'fire music' Shepp album I ever heard... had to put some effort into taking that one for what it is (and I was in high school, so...). I've warmed to the Shepp quintet (Shepp/Greenlee/Burrell/Brown/Harris) over the years, though--not quite the blowout that it could have been (granted the ensemble), but tastefully played. In and of itself, it's perfectly fine hard/post-bop--and there are certainly some great compositions on that first album. Tangentially--Harris's 360 Music Experience (featuring some of the same members) took the music in a similar direction. It's notable, though, that Harris's band was the more 'avant' bent of the two groups (and it included, at times, more 'inside/outside'-oriented players like Rahn/Ron Burton and Ken McIntyre). Times were a'changin...

As somebody who's not particularly concerned with neither canon nor cognoscenti, all I can say is "oh well!" Ha! Well said. As for recordings--the converse/upside of the pigeonhole thing is that those willing to invest the time, patience, and (sometimes) money have the capacity to reevaluate their opinions--maybe not change them, but look a different way. For the malcontents, the Impulse sides will live into eternity. For the rest of us... it can be difficult to examine one 'period' without recourse to the other (and that, perhaps, a canonically 'favored' one). Accounting for effort, I've warmed to the later Shepp sides. Without resolving into the notion that 'things change,' it's very, very easy to miss out on some fine music... so, fortunately, those copies of 'Splashes' and 'There's a Trumpet...' needn't always collect so much dust... and hell, it's very well possible to enjoy--at the very least, understand--both. If it doesn't make critical sense, lord knows it pays off.

Harold Land Jordan, Air Cowboy, Space Shinichiro Watanabe Hayao Miyazaki Isao Takahata

That's precisely what's so disconcerting to me... cause I can't sense it, either. I'm of the mind that Shepp played through his limitations--and not because of them. It feels as if the negative implication of the 'Shepp always wanted to be a changes player' is the latter concern (that he couldn't), but I'm glad you put in your two cents--there's a dimension to that idea that's far more positive, more in line with what Shepp articulates emotionally (and not just technically). Dude - "limitations" are only there when they're there, and most in the 60s Shepp, I don't really hear them as being there, so there were really no "limitations" to play through! I mean, if you want to paint fruit, and can do so splendidly, how big of a limitation is it if you can't paint dogs, unless you decide that you want to paint dogs? And I in now way meant to imply that Shepp always wanted to be a changes player. Frankly, I think that it was pretty far off his personal radar for most of teh 1960s. Like I said, there were more "pressing priorities" in the 60s, musically and socially, than getting your changes together. So once again, the perception that there were limitations is based on the premise that he was doing something otehr than what he really wanted to do, and that's not a premise to which I subscribe. Before and after, yeah, probably. But during? I don't think so. The times when he did play changes in the 60s show him playing them just fine, using his vocabulary of the time, at times masterfully creating a whole new way of playing changes (a way that was certainly evolutionary, but also entirely his own). It was after the fire died down that I think he took stock and decided to go back and re-evaluate. And there was some rough sledding there for a few years, because he was trying NOT to play like he did before. Why that is, we can only speculate. but I'm sure he had his reasons. Definitely "musical", and probably personal as well. People change as they age, and I don't think it's really fair or accurate to judge one phase in terms of another. Goals, means, everything can be, and often is, different from one time to another in the same person, so you don't necessarily want to compare the apples of one phase of a person's life to the oranges of another. That works with some people, but not with others. And Shepp is one of those for whom I think it doesn't. I'm honestly trying to find a place where I disagree and--I see now--that I can't. Although--I think it's worth saying that a lot of the confusion regarding the 'contemporary' Shepp stems from the fact that we never got to see him self-consciously 'shift' his concern. Like Ayler--and unlike Coltrane, Rollins, or even Miles--Shepp emerged fully-formed, dead-center of the storm. The generations have come to fetishize youth--I mean, the same thing happened to Elvis Costello (for heaven's sake!). I'd be betraying my impulses to suggest that Shepp wasn't responding to the exigencies of the time... so really, we're left with is the notion that Shepp's concerns changed. There's positively no way to get around that, although it does leave a lot of firebreathers scratching their heads. I think the catch-22 is that it is and always will be difficult for the canon and the cognoscenti to evaluate the modern Shepp from the young one (I certainly try to, although I admit--I am more partial to that 60's kinda music). At the risk of sounding glib--and lord, I'm trying not to--I'll certainly do my best to listen/think on the later Shepp with open ears next time. I can't guarantee I'll like it more--and I really shouldn't--but we could all benefit from a little perspective, no?

That's precisely what's so disconcerting to me... cause I can't sense it, either. I'm of the mind that Shepp played through his limitations--and not because of them. It feels as if the negative implication of the 'Shepp always wanted to be a changes player' is the latter concern (that he couldn't), but I'm glad you put in your two cents--there's a dimension to that idea that's far more positive, more in line with what Shepp articulates emotionally (and not just technically). I enjoy this summation: A far more conciliatory interpretation of the later Shepp years and, ultimately, the key (I think) to truly apprehending his artistic changes. That being said, I'll always harbor a respect for the man's aesthetic--even when/if the art itself isn't so successful.

I had forgotten about that. Looks like a very good session to me. Claude Bartee, Manny Riggins, Herbie Lewis, Idris Muhammad - great band. I can't leave your love alone Let yourself go (a true funk workout I should think) Love on a two way street (GG did another version on "Visions") Green acid Raindrops keep fallin' Something (that would be a good tune for GG) Let it rain I guess this is another one to ask about. MG Claude Bartee is a favorite... nice to see Herbie here. And is 'Let it Rain' the Clapton tune?

And Guy--I hadn't noticed that you'd put the 'click here' to buy up near the album title. Way to proselytize, man.

That is a puzzle, Jack. Not that I have anything against Expression, but I don't think it's as inspired as IS. I guess Trane thought differently. I wonder who named the "tunes". The bit where Trane and Rashied break into straightahead swing on "Saturn" is exhilarating. One more thought: I picked this and Sun Ship up at the same time four or five years ago, and they were essentially converted me into a "Late Trane" fan. But these two albums are so far apart musically and conceptually that they prove the "Late Trane" moniker is only useful as a chronological demarcation, not as a useful description of the music. I think the whole early/mid/late Trane thing is a semantic injustice--regardless. Moreover, it's a gross oversimplification of a process of continual development; the idea that periods can be broken up into portions suggests truly 'crucial' breaks (i.e., punctuated evolution) when, as anyone who's familiar with the Trane catalogue knows, there were indeed several. To be fair, Sun Ship is really in the sphere of 'tail end classic quartet'--that is, the musical relationships of the musicians involved go a long way toward apprehending the music. Interstellar Space is a whole other bag--but even that's different from Expression, etc. In the final analysis, the whole 'late Trane' thing is sort of a categorical pigeonhole for listener limitations. The entire Impulse! oeuvre is better examined as a whole than in breaks; as M. Weiss said, the harmonic development from '65 to Interstellar Space isn't that severe--and it's more comprehensible with respect to the VV recordings in '61. I'm sure you'll find a lot more cats willing to say the Trane 'they can't handle' is in the 'late Trane' category than you will well-versed scholars who are willing to resort to such terminology.

Tender Moments (BN) Also a classic...

Wally West Barry Allen Jay Garrick

Oh hell yes!

Totally blanked on that one--good going, Hot Ptah. As per JSngry's comments--makes a whole lot more sense (from a realist perspective). Although--this strain of argumentation sort of leads to a 'diminishing' of the early 60's work--consummate free jazz, no doubt, but (as others have noted) played by a cat whose 'inside' skills were not commensurate with his philosophies (or wants, for that matter). Shepp has transformed himself into a great changes player, but there's a rawness to those early Impulse! sides that's difficult to ignore. It's somewhat disconcerting to me to imagine that they were produced through limitation and exigency, however great they sound on tape (and a lot of those sidemen, we have discovered, can play bop/changes like madmen). Is this (what we have now) the actualized Shepp?

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart Yaron Herman Rudy Van Gelder Alfred Lion Donald Byrd Jack Baer Jack Paar Bye Bye Birdie Humphrey "Bogie" Bogart Lauren Bacall Audrey Hepburn Katherine Hepburn