The Magnificent Goldberg

I see - thanks TTK. A very different tracklist from what I expected. MG

Slim Gaillard Bugger. Bug-bug-bug-bug-bug-bugger! (Pause for Bird solo) Bugger-bugger-bugger-bugger-bug-bug, Bugger-bugger-bugger-bugger-bug-bug, BUGGER!!!!!! mg

Oh, are we starting to talk about the actual music now? I was never a Getz fan. Like Brubeck and Desmond, he was playing some other kind of music from what I was buying - greeeeeaaaasssssyyyy stuff even then So my approach to "Desafinado" (and earlier, "Take five") was pretty much that of the average pop buyer. As pop records, I thought they were both wonderful! What really made them hits was something radically different from the kind of thing that made most pop records hits in those days - a kind of limited danceability, which "Take five" certainly didn't have for most people - you really can't jive in 5/4, although, once you got the hang of it, bossa novas were pretty sexy to dance to. I think people were really grabbed by the extremely attractive and melodic improvisations of Getz and Desmond. Even if you're not a jazz fan, you can easily sing along with those solos. As I recall, they don't stray much beyond most people's vocal range. It's very hard to be that simple and melodic and still be playing meaningfully and relying, with some conviction, on the melody to get through. Very few jazz musicians have ever managed it, certainly not since the forties. So, though it's not my taste, many props to Getz for managing it. MG

Stray Dogs Reservoir Dogs Veronica Lake

Snigger MG

Hi Gato - and thanks for that! MG

He comes off differently on the first album. If you ever have the chance to check it out, it's worth a listen. OK - what's it look like? MG

Well, this is beautiful music! She's much more jazz-oriented than Concha Buika - in fact, there's very little R&B in this. She's also a much more serene singer than Concha, whose music is ecstatic. Comparing her to Concha is a bit like comparing Ella Fitzgerald to Nina Simone. Looking forward to her earlier album. Maybe tomorrow. MG

Postman just brought me two separate packages. Sharles Williams' "Stickball" was one I hadn't noticed had been reissued. Fortunately, Hiroshi was able to get me one. Very nice, perhaps not quite so good as his previous two. La Negra is another singer in the Concha Buika mould - singing a combination of jazz, house, soul and flamenco. She's based in Madrid. Her real name is Graciana Silva. I have her other album under that name on order, too. Produced by the same guy who produced Concha Buika's last album, "Mi nina lola" (and her latest I think) - Javier Limon. I'm waiting until my wife goes out to pick up the grandsons from school to play this one nice and loud! MG

Got an e-mail from Sterns yesterday to say they has issued this (probably only in Britain, so far) on 5 May. Balla & ses Balladins (formerly the Orchestre du Jardin de Guinee) were one of the best of the Mandinke big bands from Guinea - and one of the first to be recorded by Syliphone. This compilation is a great intro to their work, which is invariably great. I have most of disc 1 but only two tracks from disc 2, so I'll be getting this. It's a pity they've just taken a few tracks from the albums I have - I can't replace any of them with this coupling. One day, there'll be a market for Mosaic style complete boxed sets of these bands. But not yet, unfortunately. Here's a link to Sterns' site http://www.sternsmusic.com/disk_info.php?id=stcd3035-36 but you can probably get this from Amazon.uk (and set O up for commission). MG

Just as well it wasn't two gay guys! That asshole sheriff would have blown them away. What a racist place the U.S. still is, and the U.K. also! [i was chatting to a Canadian DJ who works in England, and he says he is sick of all the racism there. He's from BC, where there are so many people of Chinese descent, but there, they are called Canadians. In England, he says, they could have been there for several generations, but are still called Chinese, or even Chinkies, Likewise people of Indian descent.] True - but this seems to be a new thing here. I don't like it at all. MG

Jon REALLY is on a roll at the moment. How do you avoid cutting yourself all the time? MG

Interesting. The same may have happened when Britain's currency was decimalised in 1969. Allegations is the right word. I don't know about the whole economy but I was working in a record shop when we decimalised and we simply added a decimal price tag - so the LPs had two tags. MG

I hear you. But I've always felt that there are jazz singers, pop singers, and a bunch of singers between at various points on the spectrum. I think that pop singers with good intonation and a decent sense of swing - when given the right tunes, arrangements, and instrumental settings - can make very good and listenable "jazzy" records, even if they're not purely jazz (however we would define that). I agree - and people in that middle ground, like Peggy Lee, Frank Sinatra and Ella Fitzgerald, are pretty interesting. But I've never heard that in Johnny Mathis. MG

Dixon of Dock Green Officer Krupke P C Plod

And you played it in preference to "Return to sender"? Nice story, Jim. MG

Ahhh! WHAT - home of Sonny Hopson, The Mighty Burner! It would be nice to hear from our members in France about the state of jazz broadcasting there. My introduction to John Coltrane was on French radio in 1965, in the small hours when I worked night shift. The DJ played "A love supreme", which had just come out, ALL THE WAY THROUGH! Of course, I was flattened and, as soon as the shift was over, rushed down to Joe Lyons for breakfast and was outside the record shop door when Ken came to open it up. But really, what programming! And even more, what understanding of what was going down! MG

Alvin Cash The Crawlers The Registers

Big Miller Windy Miller Alex 'Hurricane' Higgins Try again - I changed mine 'cos I wuz pipped at the post BY YOU!!!!! MG

S A Brain O'Hanlons Theakston's

And what the hell's this lot supposed to mean? Record Label of the Year Arbors Blue Note Clean Feed Concord ECM Palmetto Sunnyside Blue Note? Concord? MG

Ah, I didn't realise - but as it happens, I was playing the Monterey concerts CD yesterday. MG

Yes - there are all sorts of deplorable things in the world. Most of them have some kind of defensible rationale behind them - even if one doesn't agree with the rationale. This is done for pleasure, which seems to put it in the same category as snuff movies. MG

Sir Walter Scott Walter Wanderley The Waters

Getz/Gilberto was 1964. Bit hard to start a craze two years after. MG