Rooster_Ties

Hey Jim, which is worse?? --- Wynton, or Musicboy???

Jim said it better than I did, but I feel much the same way he does. Apart from the music (which I've heard some of, and it really doesn't do anything for me), it's also Wynton's "holier than thou" attitued that I've had it with. There are probably even a few Wynton CD's that I could honestly say I have as little interest in as Kenny G, and that's saying a lot. For me, it's like Wynton (and his followers) operate in a world that is entirely foreign to me. It's almost like, for them, that 30 to 50 years of music history never happened. This is something that I can't explain in words very easily, but which my ears seem to understand quite well. Most of wynton's music of the last 10 years (what I've heard anyway), just just nothing for me. That said, I did hear Wynton's recent first string quartet (At the Octoroon Balls: String Quartet No. 1), which I borrowed it from a former co-worker, and I actually found it to be fairly interesting (really!!!). And if I found it used or as a cut-out, I'm sure I'd probably buy it (money being tight for me now, I'm sure not gonna spend a bunch on any Wynton CD's, no matter how much I like 'em). But seriously, his string quartet, while not anything to call all the neighbors over to hear, it did seem like it was a little deeper than I had expected it to be. But for me, Wynton's jazz isn't even worth it to me, even at bargin-bin prices.

Just like Claude, I also voted for "J-Mood", although I probably like "Black Codes..." a little better... I think those are the only two Wynton CD's I own (at least of his jazz material). I've sampled a few others of his, but never have found enough to like to want to purchase them (even used). Like many others, I find Wynton's 'jazz' politics to not be in line with mine (putting it mildly), and I probably "hear" this into his recordings in such a way that I'm not very impartial, I'm afraid. I know, others will say it's my loss. So be it - there's plenty of other music that I'm passionate about, without trying to get overly interested in something that doesn't really float my boat. Sorry to be so negative. I usually am not that way on these boards. But I get so tired of seeing Wynton talk (seemingly on every jazz documentary ever made these days) as if he's the spokesman for all of jazz (and worse, for what isn't jazz). It'll be interesting to see if he changes his tune about the importance of Blue Note artists, now that he's on the label, since he's so rarely mentioned any of them in the past. It's like jazz doesn't exist for him past 1967 (when it comes to Miles), and not after 1960 (when it comes to anything even slightly progressive). That whole world of Wynton's (and of his followers, meaning other musicians working in that same style) is a sound-world my ears and brain have no interest in, plain and simple. My cards are on the table...

Damn voting 'radio buttons' won't let me vote for all of them...

Hi Neon, glad to see you posting here. Like a few others around here, I've never been much for vocal jazz. Not entirely sure why, but here are a few factors. I'm a singer myself ('classical', I'm a baritone in the Kansas City Symphony Chorus). But despite this, I am really pretty uninterested in both vocal 'classical' music (and especially Opera (yuck!!), although I handle 'art song' better), and I'm not really interested much in vocal jazz. I've sung material from operas a time or two, and both as a listener and as a performer, Opera leaves me cold. And I can't sing jazz at all, not even if my life depended on it. That said, there are a couple vocal jazz things that I have come to enjoy more than I care to admit.... I've heard a few things by Andy Bey that I've liked a lot more than I expected to, and Johnny Hartman's work (especially with John Coltrane) is also really quite beautiful. All that said, I still can appreciate the talent of some jazz vocalists, even thought that's not really my bag. For instance... There's Kansas City's own Kevin Mahogany, who I got to hear quite a bit (without really even trying) back when he still lived in K.C. in the mid-90's. (His wife is also an excellent photographer, primarily of jazz artists, I might add.) People go back and forth about whether Sinatra was a jazz singer or not. I won't comment, other than to say that I love what Sinatra does with songs. Again, I don't have much, cuz I'm naturally just not drawn to vocal music (outside of rock/pop/alternative), but since I'm a singer (and especially since I'm a baritone) there is no one I can think of who can sing that kind of material better than him. I have quite a bit of respect for Tony Bennett, for similar reasons. I have very little female vocal jazz, so I won't even try to talk much about that - since I know so little of the material. Although I will mention that I generally liked Norah's CD, probably because it wasn't like most of the vocal jazz that I have so little interest in. I think it will be interesting to see what directions she takes, musically, and if she ventures into any interesting teritories with that beautiful voice of hers. Oh, one other mention of a femail vocalist who I rather like, who I think has a lot of jazz-like qualities (sometimes), and that's k.d. lang. I've always wanted to hear her do an album of Cole Porter tunes, or something like that. I think she can sing the socks off anything.

Bunny Berigan!!!

Shit, here's a whole board where everyone speaks in Engrish!!! (OK, they speak Engrish just in one topic area.) Here's a music-related thread: wHo bring to nice pleasure in Music? Maybe we can send Musicboy over to their board!!! Hee, hee, hee!!!!

How much ($$$) are they worth to you???

One of my least favorite reviews on AMG: Greg Osby: Symbols of Light (A Solution)

You all are not gonna believe this, but as you know - I started a duplicate version of my "Race" thread over on the Norah board. There's been a few replies, and the discussion is going reasonably well. Well, one of the replies I just got is from the same moderator who has the Bob Jones link on his own personal web-site. Well, here was his reply to my thread... Also, he and I have traded a couple PM's, and he seems like an OK guy. Sure, I'm positve he and I don't see eye to eye on religious matters (and that's maybe putting it very mildly, to be sure) -- but just because he has a Bob Jones link on his web-page, doesn't appear to automatically mean that he personally believes in everything that they stand for (or at least stood for). As Spock on Star Trek would say, "Interesting..." Here's a link to the entire "Race" thread, over there: Racial Interaction, How to foster more/better communication? - and clearly you might want to take Musicboy's posts in the thread with a big ol' grain of salt. After all, he and I were both pretending that none of the shit he stirred up here had ever happened. PS: I also gave him ("CT") a link to the "Race" thread on our site, and invited him to join in our discussion. No idea what might come of it, but he seems like a relatively reasonable sort of guy - at least for someone who believes "The Bible is God's Absolute Truth!", per his signature on the Norah Jones board. (That's not a 'dig', just an observation.)

For many of the reasons you gave, I also prefer the AMG. The most important reason, though, at least to me - is that the AMG includes all titles, and the Penguin only includes titles in-print. I'm way beyond needing just to know the quality of what's in print. At least 25% of what I buy (maybe closer to 50%??) are OOP titles.

I lost my job in January, so I haven't been buying much at all. I had already slowed down quite a bit back as early as October or November. Still, much of what I was buying was OOP titles on eBay - stuff I would have loved to have bought 'new', if I could have. Also, I tend to buy 'used' as much as I can. For jazz, that means not very many titles, cuz I don't find much of a good selection of used jazz in this town. But I try to get all the rock and pop titles I can used, whenever I can (or at least the major-label stuff). I'm always buying locally produced stuff (the true independents) whenever I can - and I have even bought a few of them after the job loss. Every sale counts for those folks, and I'm glad to try to do my part.

Even if I wanted to argue with you about that, how could I? Where would I even begin?? (Not that I want to argue about it, mind you. ) Me?? I often forget to turn off the Memorex "clock-radio/cd combo" player (that I got at Target on close-out after Christmas, for only $10!!). Doesn't seem to affect the sound quality either way, come to think of it!!

If it's any consolation, I know how you feel. Not about getting a virus, but my hard-drive crashed completely in February, and I lost everything. Had to reinstall everything from scratch, and I lost a ton of stuff. (None of it really important or anything, but a whole bunch of stuff I would have rather not lost.) Good luck getting back to normal. It's a pain in the ass, for sure...

Lot's more like this one, at: http://www.arouse.net/jesus/

Ken-taco-hut!!! That what we's who are "in the know" call 'em here... Nothing quite like the combined smell of fried chicken, pseudo-mexican, and pizza.... (By the way, I'll take Popeye's over KFC any day.)

There was a sociology course taught one of the years I was in College, that my then girlfriend too, on the subject of "The Black Family". I seem to remember her doing her final project on images of Black families in the movies. I think she took a look at 4 or 5 movies, but the only two I can remember were "Superfly", and Spike Lee's "Crooklyn" - which I recently saw again for the first time since it came out, and found to be really a wonderfully entertaining movie ("Crooklyn"). I also remember, at the time, thinking how much I would have liked to have taken that class too. I'm pretty sure it was after I got even my 2nd degree (that last year I was still in that college town, before moving to Kansas City), and I was working nearly full-time at the time. I'm sure, now, there would be a number of Black-Studies courses that would greatly interest me, especially those that focussed on either current issues (or culture), or relatively recent historical areas (meaning after 1900). I know. I know, the 1800's and before are critically important to the whole discussion of Black History, but in gneral, I've always been far more interested in the history of about the last 100 years.

Thanks, John B!! Appreciate the info. Man, I do hope I can somehow make it to this show. Got my fingers crossed.

Thanks for the review. By the way, I asked this in another thread (Andrew Hill Quartet - Iowa City Jazz Festival, Anybody from Kansas City interested???), but does anybody know who would be playing in what is billed as the Andrew Hill Quartet, this July, in Iowa City??? Thanks!!!

Yeah, what Dan just said, me too...

Not sure who all on this board is from Kansas City, but I just recently learned that the Andrew Hill Quartet will be playing at the Iowa City Jazz Festival on Sunday, July 6th (at 4pm). The festival is free(!!), and I've always wanted to hear Andrew Hill, like nobody's business. (I have no idea who's in his current quartet, anybody here know????) Here's the complete line-up of the Festival... Friday July 4th 6:00 p.m. United Jazz Ensemble 7:00 p.m. United Jazz Alumni Band 6:00 p.m. OftEnsemble (University of Iowa Faculty Ensemble) Saturday July 5th 2:00 p.m. Dennis McMurrin and the Demolition band 4:00 p.m. Geri Allen Trio (with Buster Williams and Lenny White) 6:00 p.m. Don Byron /Music for Six Musicians 8:00 p.m. Charlie Hunter Quintet Sunday July 6th 12:00 noon Fred Anderson Trio 2:00 p.m. Ron Miles Quartet 4:00 p.m. Andrew Hill Quartet 6:00 p.m. Dirty Dozen Brass Band My folks are supposed to be visiting us (my wife and I) from St. Louis that same weekend, but I think there's a chance I could get away for the Sunday line-up. It'd be a long day, but the drive from Kansas City to Iowa City appears to be about 4.5 hours long, one-way. (That's about the same as the drive from Kansas City to St. Louis, or at least to the far side of St. Louis where my folks live, near Belleville, IL.) I wish I could go for Saturday's line-up too, but I'll be lucky to get away on Sunday. What I'm thinking is that we'd leave Kansas City really early on Sunday morning, depending on how much mutual interest we have in hearing Fred Anderson and Ron Miles. I'm a little embaressed to say that I don't know either of them that well, but reading their AMG bios just now, they both seem like artists I'd like quite a lot. I could take or leave the Dirty Dozen Brass Band, so then the day could go like this... Leave Kansas City around 6:30am, get to Iowa City by Noon. Hear everybody up through Andrew Hill. Leave Iowa City around 6pm, get back to Kansas City around 11pm. Who's up for a roadtrip????? (By the way, I'm much more sedate in person than my on-line personality might indicate. Occasionally I probably come off here as being a little "Aric"-like, but I'm really a fairly introverted person, actually. You need not fear being trapped in a car with a motor-mouth. My 'type' is worse than my 'talk' )

With the exception of Jimi Hendrix (who I still love), practically no rock music from the late 60's or any of the 70's does anything for me any more. (A possible exception might be the occasional Jethro Tull album here and there.) My wife is really into the whole "retro-80's" thing lately, so I've selectively caught that bug myself. We were both in our teens all thoughout the 80's (she was born in '67, I in '69), so it's difficult not to be nostalgic for some of that music. I'm not really into the really cheezy American pop from the 80's, but I do find that I like the slightly edgier Brit-pop from the 80's, more than I care to admit. Again, I know it's purely a nostalgia thing. I'm a little embaressed to mention that I have nearly every "The Fixx" album ever released on CD - but they kinda grew on me a couple years ago, in a way I never expected. But as far as Rock music more recent than the 80's, I do rather like Nirvana every now and then (and I think Cobain was a great songwriter), and I secretly like The Foo Fighters a lot, when I hear them on the radio. (I don't own any "Foo" CD's, but when they come out with the inevitable Greatest Hits CD, I'm sure I'll buy it.) Although not entirely considered Rock, there are a number of relatively recent "power-pop" groups I like quite a bit, like almost everything Matthew Sweet has released, and also Ben Folds Five, or Folds' two recent "five-less" releases. I know, practically none of this is really Rock. What do I like that really is Rock???? Radiohead is really outstanding in my book, and I look forward to each new release of theirs with baited breath. Interpol, while not exactly Rock, is also a band I've grown to like quite a lot. My wife really likes Dave Matthews (who I don't consider to be Rock with an uppercase "R"), and I guess I've grown to like Matthews more than I would have otherwise. (Although his sax-player sucks rocks - man, that guy has about as many intonation problems as a typical student trombonist!! ) If I think of any others, I'll post them here. Most of my 'pet' bands from the 80's and 90's are more "New Wave" in nature, like "The Cure", and "Talking Heads". If I think of any other real "Rock"-type bands to mention, I'll be back...