Rooster_Ties

Who is Audrey Plaza?

On my phone, it shows two options under “store” in the upper right hand corner, “bandcamp” and “physical CD’s”. Be aware that the CD’s seem to have (presumably domestic) shipping included (which explains their relatively high cost). And there’s also a note to email them if you’re buying more than one item. ALSO, there seems to be a (short) “page 2” of more CD’s (which could be easily overlooked). This is all on mobile via my iPhone — no idea what it looks like on a desktop browser.

OMG, I’d completely forgotten about Reptet. I probably have a CD of theirs somewhere. They played in KC about a month before I left for DC — and stayed at our empty house (the entire band). Had to all sleep in their sleeping bags on the floors through the house (carpeted, at least), as that was after I’d already moved all of my wife’s and my stuff to DC (I was sleeping on the floor myself my that point) — as I was still trying to get the house ready to put on the market. Great band, far as I’m remembering.

Looks like four (4) sets to me — but can we identify any of them??!!

Personally, it’s the organization of having three separate (smaller) boxes that sold me. I would NEVER be able to wrap my head around what is what within a 16-disc box set. With three smaller sets, I’ve been able to digest the music in an organizational sense. I mean, I still have no idea what was what in terms of the original album content and sequencing — but each of the three sets is a collection of a manageable number of sessions — as opposed to a behemoth 16-disc set. The smaller sets each have a great (large format) booklet of liners — and the unique fold-out design (and method of holding the discs) is pretty nice — and allows for the sets to each take up the same amount of shelf-space.

If you didn’t get that one, here’s another one. 99¢ opening bit, but $18 shipping from Japan, iirc.

Amen, amen, and amen — 1,000x over. The collective knowledge and wisdom around here is unparalleled, in terms of a singular place to get good info, discographical or otherwise — and a solid variety opinions and historical perspectives. And the BS-quotient is normally quite low, all things considered (a rarity in this world, especially online). I wouldn’t know 1/4th of what I know about jazz without this place — and might not have ever discovered probably close to 1/3rd of the titles in my entire collection — or easily only discovered things a decade or more later than I did. This place has been a serious blessing in my life (and despite my use of the terms ‘amen’ and ‘blessing’ here… for the record, I’m really more of an atheistic-leaning agnostic).

Think of my use of the term "understated" as me trying to find a word that means the opposite of "uproarious". In other words, quiet (drumming) with an attack that doesn't try and draw attention to the playing -- BUT what's being played is really active and every shifting. And ideally, in a larger context where the entire group is also playing in a deceptively unassuming way. There's largely a ton of stuff going on from every player on Pat Metheny's Question and Answer album (nearly every track) -- and yet I could play that album on my desk at work at a moderate volume, and practically NO ONE would ever notice. The timbre of Lee Konitz' alto sticks out slightly more (that Pat's guitar), but I can easily play Motion with Elvin with my wife in the room, and she'll barely notice it either. And yet, when you turn either of them up just a little bit more, and really listen -- there's SO much going on, like everyone is half-soloing all the time, every measure, on every track. And Elvin and Roy are largely the reasons.

I kept going back and forth about posting the studio version of Brad Mehldau's version of Radiohead's "Knives Out" (from the first album Mehldau did after Jeff Ballard joined his trio in 2005)-- and had all but decided against posting it (because, although the drumming is both really busy and fast, it's also somewhat louder than what I'm looking for). BUT, this *live* version from 2006 definitely gets closer to what I'm talking about -- and Ballard's playing here is just lovely...

Seems like Billy Higgins is a master of this kind of playing, and yet I’m not sure I can think of any album he’s on that’s ‘understated’ enough — overall — to qualify. What am I overlooking?

Seems like I don't have nearly enough of stuff like this in my collection. Lee Konitz' Motion (especially the first of the 3-disc set, the one that's all Elvin) -- and Pat Metheny's Question and Answer, with the incredible interplay of Roy Haynes and Dave Holland -- are the two best examples I can think of off the top of my head. And I guess this is also a call for suggestions specifically for albums with more of Elvin in this kind of Motion mode -- incredibly understated and SO tasteful, but also fairly busy (almost continuously!), but somehow not overly busy (maybe because his playing is so understated). And where else can I find more Roy Haynes playing in this kind of way too? And anybody else?? -- especially albums that are deceptively quiet and maybe a little sparse in terms of instrumentation and band size. I guess I'm open to anything, but I *don't* think I'm looking for the most ECM-ish of production values, if you catch my drift. Busy, lots of interplay, but quiet, understated -- and NOT all hidden behind that ECM 'sheen'. (But I guess don't omit ECM, in case I'm being boneheaded again and being too self-limiting.) Motion and Question and Answer make my brain tingle (especially the drummers) -- and I want more of that.

I wonder who does? Who held on to that, while selling all(?) the other rights to Mosaic? And doesn’t Mosaic outright ‘own’ (literally own? the material otherwise (whatever ‘otherwise’ means in this context).

Holy shit, you weren’t kidding!! https://www.dustygroove.com/item/145593/Donald-Byrd-Dexter-Gordon:Lost-Recordings-Berlin-Studio-Session-1963-180-gram-pressing

Oh fuck, that reminds me… back in Kansas City I was at sold-out speaking event (1,000 seat venue, a historic theater downtown), where an academic dean from a local university (not UMKC), COMPLETELY mangled Fareed Zakaria‘s name about 5-6 times trying to introduce him. And I mean MANGLED — over, and over and over again. Zakaria was the only speaker that night. 80% of the audience surely knew how to pronounce it (I would guess, since it was sold out), but this guy acted like a little kid trying to sound out a long word he’d never seen before — literally repeating Zakaria’s last name immediately twice in a row, wrongly — not that his intro copy had him repeating it, but he just decided to have another go at it, and he fucked it up again. And then again 2-3 more times. Something like FAIR-reed ZACKerEEah (where the ‘Zack’ rhymed with ‘back’.) His whole intro was like 2 minutes long, and felt like an eternity. OMG, I’ll never forget that feeling in the hall, which was palpable.