Allan Songer

Is there any music more demonic sounding than The Four Freshman--espically with those freaking trombones!!!

Just got this in the mail yesterday. I heard Danny at Charlie O's here in L.A. at least twice a month with John Heard and Roy McCurdy for about 2-3 years from 2001-2003. John sent him off to NYC, telling him he was "ready." Well, he certainly IS ready for the big time. His work with Vincent Herring, Nicholas Payton and Tom Harrell has been terrific and after only one spin I have to say this is one fine debut as a leader! Congrats to Danny--he's worked HARD and can really play his ass off.

Coleman Hawkins Desafindao original Impulse! mono

Miles Davis and Horns original Prestige NY mono TASTY PUDDING!

Lee Morgan Expoobident!, original mono Vee-Jay Bought this one SEALED about ten years ago. And it's noisy. Vee-Jays are for crap most of the time. But I love that Eddie Higgins!!!

I think you're missing albums like: James Moody - Moody's mood for love - Argo Milt Jackson - Vibrations Nat Adderley - That's right Yusef Lateef - The Centaur & the phoenix Sam Jones - The chant Tad Dameron - Magic touch Milt Jackson - Big Bags Freddie McCoy - Lonely Avenue King Curtis - Killer Joe's Discotheque In the pre LP era, he also recorded with the Billy Eckstine band, Sir Charles Thompson, J C Heard, Hal Singer, Big John Greer, Lucky Millinder, Wild Bill Moore and Wardell Gray. MG I have all of those except the Freddie McCoy and the King Curtis. Tate Houston is NOT given the exposure on all those dates combined that he is on the Fuller date. It's a mystery to me . . .

Curtis Fuller Bone & Bari original deep-groove mono. Who is Tate Houston and why is this the only record date of any note that he appeared on? Dude can flat-out BLOW that baritone.

Yep, so do I! I think he was talking about an LP, but if it's a 45 . . . .

Sure enough. But it was never printed on the label--just on the jackets.

Does Not Exist

Webster Young For Lady, orignal NY deep-groove Prestige mono It's been at least 4 years since I pulled this one out! Forgot how GOOD it is . . .

Randy Weston at the Jazz Bakery. Not sure which night, but probably on Thursday . . .

I talked to Bill at length about the 2 degrees session and he told me that what made the date so special is that John Lewis knew EXACTLY what Perk was able to do and that he built the whole session around all of his strengths and avoided exposing any of his weaknesses. Works for me-easily the "coolest" of all the "cool jazz" records--Perk's Easy Living still makes my wife go weak in the knees every time she hears it on the hi-fi--even after 30 years of my spinning it regularly. She loved Bill--she's has two degrees in engineerig and so did Bill (including an MS in electrical engineering from Cal Tech). I think Perk's engineering and math genius had a lot to do with his constant probing musically and inability to ever be satisfied. He was a wonderful man--a real gentleman. Here's another late Perkins record that's worth tracking down--some really fine soprano work on this one. I really loved Perk on the soprano--in the last years really think he was stronger on the soprano than he was on the tenor, baritone, flute or bass clarinet.

Bill Perkins Remembrance of Dino's on Interplay

Bill Perkins was a great player--especially in the last 20 years of his life. I was lucky enough to hear him play dozens and dozens on times both in causal local gigs and with the Holman Big Band where he was by far the most interesting soloist in the sax section. He made his living playing the the Tonight Show band but did all his great work in a bunch of nameless clubs all over greater L.A. I remember him blowing a soprano solo on "Bemsha Swing" about 15 years ago that I STILL think about. I went to his final gig at Charlie O's about 6 weeks before he passed away and he could barely stand but when he played it was like magic--the best I heard him play in the last 2-3 years of his life while he was battling cancer and a bunch of other maladies. And then he was gone. The albums he made in the last twenty years were pretty good too. If you want to hear the Bill Perkins I loved and remember so vividly, check out "Remebrance of Dino's" Another really strong effort is "Frame of Mind" on Interplay from the late 90's. On the strength of these recordings and all the live stuff I heard over the years I am of the opinion that Perkins' talent was a lot bigger than almost anyone gives him credit for--I certainly place him ahead of Cohn and Kamuca, that's for damn sure!

Jeez ! Yep. L.A. has to be the greatest place on earth to listen to great players for almost no money. Tomorrow night Arthur Blythe is playing for a ten buck cover at a tiny little place in downtown LA called Cafe Metropol. Charlie O's has great jazz seven nights a week with no cover. Well, once in a while they have a cover charge. I'm there a couple of times a month--would be there twice a week if I didn't live 45 miles away and have to be at work at 6AM five or six days a week! Charlie O's--the best jazz club in Los Angeles

79 year old burner Red Holloway in a quartet with Art Hillary on piano, Richard Reid on bass and Gerryck King on drums. At the lounge at the Westin Grand on Century near the airport. Three nice sets, no cover. And they wheeled out a big-ass birthday cake for Red between the 2nd and 3rd set.

You can. But you shouldn't. I've been using Duane Goldman's record cleaning brushes and fluid for almost ten years. I use them with a Nitty Gritty Record Cleaning Machine (on my second one--the first one crapped out after about 12 years). But you don't HAVE to use a machine--see Duane's instructions. The Disc Doctor

The vinyl compound used by Plastylite in the "flat edge" era has to be the toughest of all time. I have early 12" Blue Note that look they were passed around to everyone on the South Side of Chicago and dragged behind a '57 Buick between stops that play GREAT! I have a Sonny Rollins Lexington flat edge that is as ugly as you can imagine--big scrapes, needle drops feelable hairlines--I almost PASSED on it at only $20 a few years ago, but it had a really nice "frame" jacket, so I bought it for the jacket only. Well, I got it home and cleaned it up and decided to play it and DAMN! It's ALMOST dead-quiet--NO surface noise AT ALL in the lead-in and only about a dozen repeating LIGHT, SOFT tics in one spot. ZERO distortion! It's the best sounding version of this record I have ever heard. And it's beat to shit.

The 1543 price is OK, as is the 4034. $619 for a really nice 1576 isn't crazy. But the other prices are flat-out WACK-O. REALLY, REALLY WACK-O. And when you start talkin' "Candy" or "Cool Struttin'" all bets are off--those titles have been nutty expensive for YEARS.

That's a $200 record on it's BEST day. Jeesh--two fools who just HAD TO HAVE IT! Of course, when Ron say a record is NM it looks brand new. He is the best seller in terms of grading I have ever dealt with. He won't even sell the VG stuff--he doesn't feel right about it--but he will horse-trade! Ron has all of Leon's records--rooms full of Blue Notes. Isn't ebay a hoot?

Fuckin' A.

How can you not have your own "blues" melt away when you listen to Lou and Herman? This was the first original "deep groove" Blue Note I ever bought--I must have owned 40 different copies of it over the years and I still play it at least once a month!

I have a spare original pressing if you're interested. Decent jacket (typical Transition splits, but image is clean and clear and beautiful), no booklet, vinyl is VG--has surface noise and some pops and clicks but the fidelity is still pretty astonishing--this was by far the best recording ever released on Transition in my opinion. Side one label is missing (but I will include a high resolution scanned copy)--again typical of Transition pressings. This one isn't for the "audiophile," but for the jazz lover and collector of RARE pressings. Anyone who wants to make an offer of this one, go ahead because I have no idea what to price it at. I know that NICE copies can sell for $800 or more and Chuck Nessa mentioned selling one for over $1000 a while back . . .