The Magnificent Goldberg

An evening with Slim & the Supreme Angels - Nashboro - orig Bishop Jeff Banks & the Revival Temple Mass Choir - Touch me one more time - Savoy orig Georgia Mass Choir - I'm going to hold out - Savoy orig MG

My daughter, who buys them for the kids and lends them to me tells me that only two more are planned. MG

In the public interest, since it isn't on the web already... MG

Have a great Birthday, Alexander. Great time to celebrate - non-stop from Christmas Eve to New Year! MG

MG

Got that one - some very nice stuff in there. This is my favourite R&B compilation (14 LPs) MG

My wife's been on the computer all day and has just gone out, so I'm starting on today's ration of JB LPs. MG

Well, "Get it together" was the one that really GOT to us as a kind of revelation. Because it was clear that Brown was doing something no one had done before within the context of jazz, R&B or any kind of popular music; he was making up the words as he went along. Oh and Maceo was effin' hysterical! Pee Wee was certainly responsible for the later material but it was Nat Jones who'd been the straw boss of the band before him, during the period up to 1966. Pee Wee took Nat's place when he died. (I think Nat was a veteran of Jack Travis' big band in Chicago - that's Dempsey J Travis, whose book on Chicago you put me onto.) MG

MG

No, seriously, it didn't seem all that earth-shattering at the time, because it had been preceded by records like "Out of sight", "Papa's got a brand new bag", "Money won't change you" and "Let yourself go". It was even sharper and harder than its predecessors, but we saw it as the culmination (so far) of what he'd been working up to for a few years. And JB wasn't the only one working in that field. Alvin Robinson's "Down home girl", a few years earlier, had been another chunk of incredible funk - about a million times GREEEEEAAAASSSIIIEEERRR than anything James Brown did, EVER. JB was more successful than any of the others and therefore he became the king. I'm not putting JB down. But in the sixties there was REAL STUFF around. JB rose above that stuff - and on ability. But the rise was a progression, not a lightning strike. And after "Cold sweat", there was further development. In hindsight, in my view, "Doin' it to death" seems to have been the point beyond which JB's ideas developed no further (and even that mighty groove was foreshadowed by the jazz version of "Maybe the last time" from his 1965 album "Today & yesterday"). MG

And awesome music! MG

No, young sir, I get your point. And I do agree with it, in the abstract. But for me personally, as one who can't distinguish between the DG vinyl and McMaster versions of "Workout", though I freely confess I haven't tried to compare an MP3 version with anything I've got, either on vinyl or anything else, it all seems a bit academic. Yes, YOU must have choice, since you want it and you're the fucking customer. I don't buy this stuff ANYWAY (well not yet) so I'm NOT the fucking customer, (since Universal have decided that us Europeans are not to be trusted with their precious downloads), so why should any company take notice of anything I say? MG

Playing some more JB jazz MG

So all I'm waiting for is for this stuff to be made available over here. So, what's the problem, Clem? It's no good you saying "I criticise". What's the problem? (And please remember you're talking to a tech idjit.) MG The problem is that the same $10 that used to buy a digitally remastered CD with bonus tracks, historical liner notes and enhanced packaging is now the going rate for a bunch of compressed mp3 files which have to be downloaded and burned onto a greenback CD-R which is more vulnerable to problems than a real CD, and there is no art, bonus cuts, historical essays, etc. I have so far refused to begin paying for downloads, and at $10 a pop, it should be pretty easy to keep my resistance. I will have no sympathy for the majors and will gladly pay for the CD's on Proper, Definitive, Lone Hill, etc. when they become available in Europe due to the different copyright laws. Now THAT I can understand. And agree with. Thanks Felser. MG And here's another issue - no resale value. If I buy a CD and don't like it, I can sell or trade it and recoup part of my lost value, plus sometimes CD's even appreciate over time (ehllo Mosaic). All of this is taken from me with downloads. Which should make a person much less willing to explore music, to take a chance on something. I don't doubt that I'll eventually pay the $10 to download something like the missing Archie Shepp and Marion Brown Impulse titles if that's the only reasonable way to get them, but I certainly won't be exploring, the way I do with CD's. And bothe the companies and I will be poorer for it. Another good point. Yes, if it's the only reasonable way to get them, I would go for downloads. "Reasonable" means different things to different people, of course. It may not be reasonable, at my age, to be prepared to wait twenty odd years before some of the great disco recordings by jazz musicians can be reissued. (And will they EVER be reissued? Some, by the likes of Idris Muhammad, have been. But I reckon you could wait several lifetimes for David Newman's "Scratch my back" and NEVER see a result.) MG

That's what my wife asked for yesterday's dinner. Funny, my wife wanted gammon & salad, then turkey & etc, then chocolate trifle. (I passed on the trifle and went for mince pies and Courvoisier cream.) MG I mean after the shrimp cocktail, raviolis stuffed with codfish, dressed with a sauce of dried tomato and black olives, and several traditional desserts. Looks like you had a good one, too. Playing Johnny "Hammond" Smith - Here it is - Prestige Musidisc Europe pressing Johnny "Hammond" Smith - What's going on - Prestige Musidisc Europe pressing Johnny "Hammond" Smith - The prophet - Kudu orig Reuben Wilson - Bad stuff - GM 2fer reissue MG

More JB jazz on vinyl JB's rap on "Soul of a black man" is one of the greatest things he ever did. And Maceo's solo!!!! MG

Some more JB vinyl Popcorn The real thing Us (Maceo Parker) MG

Well, a few days ago I posted "A love supreme" here. So it's all down to how you feel. MG

So all I'm waiting for is for this stuff to be made available over here. So, what's the problem, Clem? It's no good you saying "I criticise". What's the problem? (And please remember you're talking to a tech idjit.) MG The problem is that the same $10 that used to buy a digitally remastered CD with bonus tracks, historical liner notes and enhanced packaging is now the going rate for a bunch of compressed mp3 files which have to be downloaded and burned onto a greenback CD-R which is more vulnerable to problems than a real CD, and there is no art, bonus cuts, historical essays, etc. I have so far refused to begin paying for downloads, and at $10 a pop, it should be pretty easy to keep my resistance. I will have no sympathy for the majors and will gladly pay for the CD's on Proper, Definitive, Lone Hill, etc. when they become available in Europe due to the different copyright laws. Now THAT I can understand. And agree with. Thanks Felser. MG

Al Grey - Christmas stocking stuffer MG

I haven't got that one. Strange to think of that as a museum exhibit. MG

Well, since I can't tell the difference between vinyl and CDs on the few I've tried side by side, flipping from one to t'other, I guess I really needn't concern myself with all this fussiness MG

So all I'm waiting for is for this stuff to be made available over here. So, what's the problem, Clem? It's no good you saying "I criticise". What's the problem? (And please remember you're talking to a tech idjit.) MG

My wife and I agreed not to get each other anything this year; she's going to buy what she wants; I'm going to buy a CD recorder, when I can get around the shops and find a good deal. I've got record tokens, however, that I can spend at leisure. And, from my daughter, I have the first three in the series, and I'm a sucker for a strong fantasy. MG

You're right Felser. What they're doing is putting stuff out for download that they used to have as CDs. As far as I know, nothing's gone for download that hasn't already been issued as a CD. The companies don't seem to be remastering material in order to make it available as downloads. The possible benefit to the (US) consumer might be price (though I suspect not, in most cases I've seen prices of $9.99). And, as far as Universal is concerned, no benefit to European consumers, since we can't get them through emusic. MG There were/are some Impulse downloads not available as CDs, though I suppose they might have been mastered for Japanese CDs. I suppose one benefit would be if the downloads are never allowed to go OOP, though currently the price is too high for the quality and lack of liner notes, etc. But it does seem like the beginnings of a fairly major and permanent shift, unfortunately to a worse medium. While I am satisfied with current DVD technology, at least one senses that Blue-Ray and whatever the other new medium is are better technologies. But replacing CDs with mp3s does pretty much suck. I thought that you could download stuff in MP3 format and, when you burn it to CD, it converts it to some format that will play on proper CD players. I dare say there's something wrong with that, though, from what you say. But I'm ignorant, I'm afraid. MG