The Magnificent Goldberg

Plus Bob Thiele with Impulse. I knew there was one I'd missed. Forgot him. MG

Dr Blood The Liver Birds Leather Lungs

I'm sorry to hear of Austin Mitchell's death - the Arnett Cobb album is the only one I've ever heard of him in. Glad he had a nice long career doing music he loved. RIP Austin. MG

I'm not anything like an audio expert and, what I found fascinating was stuff about the relationship between RVG and Alfred. RVG worked with loads of different producers and I wonder if anyone has looked into his relationships with Bob Weinstock, Esmond Edwards, Cal Lampley, Don Schitten and Bob Porter at Prestige; Creed Taylor in the ABC days, the Verve days and the CTI days; Herman Lubinsky (or was it always Ozzie Cadena) at Savoy; Ozzie at Choice and Prestige (Trusound) making gospel group and choir albums; Orrin Keepnews at Riverside; and others I either don't know about or have forgotten. MG

Manfred Mann Houston Person Guy Fawkes

Oh Chuck, when I'm certain you have something useful or important to say, this is unbelievably frustrating. MG

Goodness! MG

Jack McVae Dusty Fletcher The Three Flames

Where the hell do you go to get bits of Mosaic sets? MG I've seen random Mosaic disk at Half Priced Books, of all places. It seems incredible that people should flog half a Mosaic box, whether on e-bay or Half Price Books, or anywhere. Surely the value (musical and financial) is in the set? I've got the Joe Pass PJ Mosaic and only play the Les McCann albums that were included, but I'd never consider selling the other CDs, even thou I don't like them. MG

Happy Cauldwell Joya Sherrill Lonesome Sundown

He wrote the song 'Big city' which Ernie Andrews recorded on his album with Cannonball. Les McCann & the Jazz Crusaders did it abut the same time on the 'Jazz waltz' LP. I think I'd be interested in getting this. MG

Gotta say, that chair doesn't look any too modern - 19th C style Or was it the trousers....? MG Actually, the trousers, shirt, waistcoat, shoes and tie - as an ensemble - are a bit beyond the pale. MG

Where the hell do you go to get bits of Mosaic sets? MG

Don Byas Alfie Bass Snudge

Better get that, too. I love that session. Only have it on a DMM LP. MG

Seb Coe Jimmy Coe Al Cohn

Spud Murphy Chip White Potato Valdez

Is that the same content as the Collectors Choice CD John or is there new additional material on it? I have the CC. I don't have the CC edition, but this has 5 tracks that are said not to have been issued before. They're very nice. MG

Here's a sample of one of the tracks https://www.sendspace.com/file/jr5ggg MG

Looking for another Ibro Diabate album on Amazon last night, I came across this from 2003, so, being a sucker for Syllart Records, as well as a long time Ibro fan, downloaded it immediately. What a surprise! Ibro, despite being from a djeli family, doesn't sing like a djeli; he has a husky, nasal voice - so nasal he sounds as if he's singing through his forehead! And he enunciates just barely - djeli singers almost invariably enunciate very clearly but Ibro kind of drawls, as if he's from the part of Guinea Conakry that's the equivalent of Lake Charles, LA. On this album, he still has the same voice, attack and drawl, so that's the mixture as before. But the arrangements!!! My good Gawd, I never heard anything like these arrangements - certainly not in West African recordings, but not really in western music, either. Though there are elements that are a little bit familiar - there's a (presumably French) horn section which, on some tracks, riffs as sharply as Kool & the Gang did in 1968, and on others a string section that reminds me of Xavier Cugat phrases from the forties. But those have got to be coincidences. Because the thing is, all of these odd ideas and ways of putting rhythmic sounds together work together! So it's not someone dredging up a raft of disparate ideas from an old record collection; it's someone's idea of what makes a commercial West African album. But I don't know whose idea it is - you get no sleevenotes with Amazon downloads. Anyway, if you want to hear what someone who WASN'T one of the usual suspects had in his head in 2003, that no one's ever taken any notice of since or tried before, here's something. MG

Pete Fallico took all his Doodlin' Lounge articles on organists off a few years ago, saying he was going to incorporate them into a book. However, no book's appeared yet. I saved a good few of those articles for ease of reference. This is the end of Pete's piece on Baby Face: MG

Bob Hoskins Anthony Hopkins Simon Hopkinson

Got this album on K7 in Paris a couple of weeks ago but found alarming crackles at one point. Never looked for this because I never heard of it until I saw it there (apparently issued in 2011), but they had it at Amazon UK, so I got it yesterday evening. Ibro Diabate - M'maloloe - DIane Sanussi Vibrations Good album, much in the style of the other 4 I have. But I saw this one, too, another I'd never heard of but which came out in 2003! Ibro DIabate - Esclave de l'argent - Syllart This is a brilliant album! Completely different from his other work. And today, the postman brought John Patton - Blue John - BN SHM thingy Really nice bonus tracks - very pleased. MG

C C Rider Wynona Ryder The Riders in the Sky

Most productive recording session? How would it have been measured? Number of tunes or the total length of the music? Willis Jackson recorded four albums in one night - total length 2:24:09 - 'Jackson's action'; 'Live action'; 'Soul night live', 'Tell it' - 22 tunes, though. How long was that BG session? MG