danasgoodstuff

At the library I work at some donations get to the collection but most are sold. I always try to make this clear to patrons so they won't feel mislead or disappointed. Most librarians are much more print oriented than music oriented but any reasonably sized library probably has someone knowledgable in charge of acquiring CDs etc. and contacting them could help your stuff into the collection. At Multnomah County we employees definately do not get first pick, we have to go to the annual sale just like any body else, I would think that skimming the good stuff for yourself would be at work rules violation at almost any poblic institution. And yes, library use is very hard on materials of all sorts...

This and the one featuring Canonball(New Wine Old Bottles? I have on a 2fer and get the sessions confused) are my fav Gil w/out Miles. I esp'ly like the bonus track of Spoonful, so much so that I have been know to put it and the renditions by Howlin Wolf, Charlie Patton, Cream, PBBB and the MGs together on mix tapes. After this Gil seemed to lose his attention to detail and just let his bands jam within v. loose parameters... Not that there's anythings wrong with that. Think how much better Muddy With Brass coulda been if Gil had done the charts... I know that Gil had wanted to work with Louis and Lester, were there any other projects that didn't come to fruition?

One apect of this fine album not yet commented upon is the sound quality. Not that I fixate upon sound engineering technicalities when I'm listening to this or anything else; on the contrary, however they did it, what I like about this is that it doesn't call attention to itself as a recording but allows me to hear through the process to the music - what i'm hearing is not the recording but instruments in a room, or as coase as a recording can get. 'Recording studio as an instrument' may be OK for pop, but for jazz I prefer a more documentary approach, even if that may involve some trickery to get there... as for the m,usic itself, I dig, even if none of the tunes are quite as strong as "Beatrice", etc. Which may be an unfair comparison, but any BN with someone from back in the day on it invites exactly that sort of invidious comparison. Thanx muchly for making this AOTW, hadn't listened to it in a while.

Revert back? To some extent we already have, and it ain't pretty... Now to go slightly off topic, it used to be that Check Berry and Bo Diddly were sorts standards for rock bands, is this even true any more or has something else taken these semi-standards place? Feeling old, Dana

So I'm going to have to get some of this software to go from flac to wave, or might it already be in one of the three CD burning programs on computer already? Sorry to be dense but you'd think they'd put info like this on a site that sells downloads...

Love Lefty, nice pic, presumably from after his career went sour... but to get this thread more or less back on track have any of you downloaded the Further East/Further West linked earlier? I've never done anything like that and I'm a little fuzzy on how it works. Do I need any special software installed and is Flac worth the extra $? A little hand holding here would be much appreciated.

I certainly read nof's opening post as "swipes", albiet rather mild and polite ones. Your millage may vary... Point is, it's not necessary to prefer 'swing' in general over any other style in order to dig what a fine session this is. I personally love Monk, Coltrane (right up to the end) and Ayler too but think this is indeed a fine session. J. de Valk in his Ben bio dismisses this and Sweets in general by saying he played the same solo over and over...but then he doesn't like the session with Tatum either so what does he know? He loved the spirituals session discussed above, that's why I asked about it. I agree with the comments about how nice and airy the rhythm section is here and don't think it necessary to put down Oscar P (my fellow Canadian) in order to praise them (and now we've come full circle).

I have all of these (now if I only had time to listen!), the're all v. nice but kind of an unadventurous bunch of choices...or am I just too jaded?

Has anyone heard the album of Ben playing Spirituals and other public domain material, done on the cheap for some scandinavian supermarket?

I remember liking the playing by Cecil and the rest on this one but not liking that the poetry bits weren't seperate tracks so you could(n't) edit your way around them. Maybe if it had been better poetry...

How about "Ferry Cross the Mersey" with a Trane/Elvin feel, all ruboto like "Alabama" then snapping into tempo for the bridge...or am I nuts?

Go get it Johnny!

The rock influence didn't really come into play until he'd been with Bluesway for 'bout 5 years... But I know what you mean, I was surprised to find when I made cdr's for my brother that I prefered the Bluesway years one to the RPM years one, but then I cherry picked 'em and the Bluesway drew on a far larger body of work.

I think you'll find what you're looking for in the disccography in the back of Muddy Waters: Mojo Man by Sandra B Tooze (ECW Press, Toronto, 1997). For example: May 1965 Muddy, James Cotton, Otis Spann, Pee Wee Madison, Sam Lawhorn, Calvin Jones, Willie Smith My Dog Won't Bark - Chess 1937 Roll Me Over Baby - not issued til later Come Back Baby - not issued til later Rich Man's Woman - Chess 1937 The first three above are on the domestic dbl CD set One More mile but the last (the b-side of the single) has never been on a legit US album.

I think I have the BB you're asking about on a reissue dbl LP Great Moments on Impulse and the material you're asking about is good but not as good as Blues is King which is stellar in my book...I actually think that BB peaked as a recording artis shortly after he got to ABC/Bluesway. They recorded him live which RPM had never done (the "Live" album on Kent is a fake meant to steal Live at the Regal's thunder). The box set from a few years back picks up some choice non-album singles from this period and while I've never cared for the Lucille album much I think Live & Well and Completely Well are really fine. People take BB for granted I think 'cause he's donme so much, and while there is certainly better and worse I've heard v. little that was really poor... Not sure if this helps but I'd say go for it!

Pee Wee may well be the hippest MD james ever had, but for me the peak of the band as a well-oiled machine is the breif period in late 69 after Pee Wee left and vefore the Collins bros. come in in early 70. This period that produced "Funky Drummer", "It's a New Day", "Brother Rap", and "Ain't It Funky Now". Maceo and Kush were co-MDs but the impression I have is that they were functioning in a more or less co-op mode. Then they all bailed on the godfather to form Maceo and All the Kings Men and the Collins bros. and friends from Cincinati got the call, walked onstage in front of an audience who'd been waiting for hours for the band to show up and James yells out "Cold Sweat, hit it!".

Great story. The only time I saw them was in 74 with Dylan. Bob's singing is quite mannered on that tour to say the least, but the show I saw in Seattle I thought the Band played v. well with an intense rawness largely missing when the're on their own. Before the Flood smoothed the edges off, unfortunately and missed a lot of interesting material (set lists varied considerably on this tour, the one way you could say it was 'better' than 66). a remixed with bonus tracks reissue would certainly be welcome and probably is inevitable unless someone's nephew puts the kibotch on it...

While I could agree that James was operating on a pretty high level up through Papa Don't Take No Mess, it's only recently that I'd go as late as 69 for the peak playing period. It could be argued that the last really visionary inovation was Cold Sweat and everything thereafter was just funky recapitulation. In some ways I like the first Live at the Apollo (Oct '62) as well as anything he ever did and that's years before he introduced the brand new bag, although the seeds are there...

Clem, No offence taken...I don't think it will come as a surprise to anyone here that I have a more forgiving nature than you, but that being said and taken into account, I don't think we disagree all that much here... I'll get back to you when I get the chance to listen to the Drive By Truckers, Dana

Sony should just ignore Wilburn, if he's really behind all this shit.

Artistic decline can indeed be a fascinatingly complex, if frustrating, thing (see my postings on the Band). Personally I feel that James and the band peaked in late '69, with much greatness both before and after, what say you?

Y'all practise for hours, every day?! No wonder my playing sux, I'm lucky if I get in 20-30 minutes 5/6 times a week...

Just a couple more things I forgot to add last time: 1) Moondog Matinee is not really, as others have pointed out, a recreation of the Hawks. Very little of it is from their old repetoire, some couldn't have been 'cause it's too recently written. It's an idealition, not of who they were but who they might've been if they hadn't become the Band (?). The newly remastered version with bonuses has some v. nice outtakes, even if some of them are a long way from finished. 2) Musical History does do a v. good job making clear one aspect of their work, no mater how rustic in effect, it was v. much a conscious, carefully constructed studio creation. They did not, as Robbie is quoted as saying of Dylan, "record the Same Way that Blind Lemon Jefferson did". 3) The blues side of their influences is over emphasised at the expense of country and other things; this is perversely wrongheaded, they are far more complex and interesting than any one-dimensally hard rockin' blues-based bar band, even if they had been there and done that in real road houses from Arkansas to Ontario before Clapton, the Stones, et al had even played their first gigs... As always, your input is appreciated.

Glad to see all the response, sorrry for not getting back to this sooner. Yes I did see the reveiw in the Guardian (it's linked from the fansite www.theband.hiof.no). Kind of a cheap shot if you ask me and not particularly helpful to anyone considering purchasing this box and wondering if the compilers did a good job. Have to wonder what flavour of the month he does like. Apparently he does need to hear The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down again 'cause he just doesn't get it... I agree with Jazzbo that Moondog Matinee has a certain fascination, even moreso in the remastered/bonus cuts added edition - I have a theory that all great originals are also great interpretors. At over 1/3 previously unissued, I think the proportions are about right there and I don't think there's much more studio stuff of release quality; live is a different matter, maybe we will see some more of that someday... Some of their previously unissued is just technically so, different live version or different studio mix, but then some of the previously issued singles are quite obscure. I don't know if I would've had more Dylan overall but I think I would've made some different choices... Overall I think it's about a B level job, when they deserved an A. Unfortunately it won't do as an only Band purchase, the omission of the master of "Lonesome Suzie" and any version of "Jawbone" make purchasing MFBP and The Band necessary. Too bad, a little more care in the selections and intelligence/honesty in the notes would have taken it from good to truly excellent. I forget who asked but if you can get Across the Great Divide for less than $20 go for it! I could blow by blow this to death (I've been scribbling on my legal pad for weeks) but won't do that here/now. Thanks muchly to everyone for your considered responses.

I usually take 20+ bags off my lawn every fall, a little at a time, and consider the trees one of the best things about living here...