king ubu

She did a concert here with the Billie programme and got a fine review... but honestly, isn't she all that Billie never was?

I heard Vijay Iyer and Rudresh Mahanthappa in duo last night. They kicked off a short European tour in a nice jazz club outside of Zurich, where I fail to go nearly as often as I should, just because it's a quarter of an hour train ride... The first set was highly virtuosic, the opening meandering free improv was amazing, how Mahanthappa flexes and bends the tones and how he catches up straightening out his lines just before it gets too weird was truly masterful! Then they mostly seem to go on autopilot, creating quick-fingered and -minded music that was amazing but ultimately failed to convince me. After the break they returned for a shorter set, and now they were PLAYING! Wow! They did just two long tunes, first a bluesy kind of 5/4 thing that went into a great groove immediately. Both did amazing things on that one, and in spite of all the craftsmanship and artistry involved, the music sounded simple, direct, and was of great beauty! That went on in the second tune, which almost got into a kind of Abdullah Ibrahim vibe, Mahanthappa playing with an almost overripe sound on his alto. Truly great music! The encore though was back to autopilot (and a good example why after a fine concert, encores often are a nuisance...)

The old man and the plastic saxophone... may he live forever, his music certainly will! By coincidence I just found "Ornette at 12" yesterday, for a pretty humane price (about 12-13€), of course with a small drillhole, but the vinyl looks flawless!

Will try and catch him in Zurich on March 30th. It's been around 15 years since I saw him (for the only time so far), playing unamplified in a huge hall, with Steve Swallow and Paul Motian. That was an impressive concert!

gee, no, I guess though thinking of politics just makes me angry these days, no matter if it's the US, them silly Switzers, or anything else...

I love her Philips recordings! Started a thread about her when my discovery of her music began:

And I already got my discs! Wow, that was fast! And they're cool enough to put a wrong value on the custom slip so I don't have to pay any friggin' taxes - very nice!

I finally got "Soul Sisters" last fall - fine album! Rest in peace

Ok, ok, I gave in and ordered

Kind of weird... about 1.5 discs worth spread on 3 (fine with me), for 40€, and coming from Lithuania? I must say I am tempted, though...

Well thanks everybody for the education here... will know better next time, but I guess I was kind of lucky this time around!

And one more note, Chuck: these series - at least the best of them, they achieve something that US mainstream films have given up several decades ago: they build complex plots with many characters, they even explain the motives of less important characters, they challenge the viewer and demand attention, or you'll get lost soon. This may be a big point in why they're successful, as most of what Hollywood's been producing for the past two or three decades is aimed at teenaged boys going to the movies on the opening weekend, while they have mostly abandoned doing films that hold up for a slighty more demanding (and mature) crowd. These TV series bring that back again, which is not a bad thing.

Well Chuck, it's not *that* bad, "Lost" is only the fourth series we're really watching (including "Californication", which was hilarious and hard to be believe it came from the US, but not including "Twin Peaks", which is way more than just some series...). We watched "Alias", just for the fun of it, and then much of "24" (not yet seen Season 7), and now "Lost". I mostly keep busy revisiting classics of cinema from all over (including the US, latest was Frankenheimer's "Seven Days in May", very good one).

Just watched the first five episodes of Lost Season 4 - holy crap! We're hooked again! But there will be a break after that as Season 5 still costs serious $$ as it can only be imported.

squatting being? putting up a bid with a max sum on day 1 and just wait until it ends?

Alles Gute zum Geburtstag, Mike! :party:

No - you can check out the contents (tracklists, that is - you'll need to compare with the older CDs or allmusic or something else) here: http://www.amazon.de/Montreal-Tapes-Charlie-Haden/dp/B0024Y5Z0K/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=music&qid=1258467956&sr=1-1

Thanks, will look into it when I do my next ebay-bidding!

That Piano Select is really getting expensive these days... Ebay Piano Select flurin got quite a good deal for his $90 ! Yeah, I had 100$ in as a maximum bid (and that was the total cost including shipping - it's on its way by now)... and newbie that I am on ebay (I bought about five discs in the past ten years...), I would have been totally lost to keep up with the guy/gal who bade (is that the correct verb form?) against me during the final few minutes... glad it only arrived at 90$ before ending! The best way to bid is to wait until the last few seconds and then place a bid or use a sniping service that does it for you. Bidding early only invites others to try and outbid you and it drives the price up. I see I still have a lot of learning to do there... don't like the word "sniping" in this context, but I guess I'll have to look into that, eventually... the price stood fairly low until the final few minutes, so I don't think I've driven up the price to my own disadvantage.

I can be bought at Amazon, at least on their European sites. I've got all the Universal/Verve sets except for the one with Rubalcaba, so I'm not going to buy the box.

That Piano Select is really getting expensive these days... Ebay Piano Select flurin got quite a good deal for his $90 ! Yeah, I had 100$ in as a maximum bid (and that was the total cost including shipping - it's on its way by now)... and newbie that I am on ebay (I bought about five discs in the past ten years...), I would have been totally lost to keep up with the guy/gal who bade (is that the correct verb form?) against me during the final few minutes... glad it only arrived at 90$ before ending!

Done with Season 3 of lost, watched a whopping 7 episodes yesterday It got better and better after around the middle of it, I found, but there still were some slow and boring moments. Now I guess we'll get started with Season 4 tonight - this will be a fast one, to be caught in 3-4 viewings (14 episodes only). We don't have Season 5 yet, it's still way too expensive over here, as it still is on TV right now!

It doens't include the set with Gismonti. And it was discussed here, came out somewhen last fall:

spoilt as in "you get CDs for half as much money as we get them here"... not for Bush, war, tea parties, health care (or lack thereof) etc...

Yes... the total lack of interest is somewhat disappointing... can't be the prices, I guess... Would also have expected some offers for the Shank/Cooper set, but then most here seem to think 80 or 90$ way too much for a Select, while I was ready without the slightest reluctancy to pay that much or more for the ones that disappeared last year...