king ubu

Thanks for the reminder! Gee, I completely forgot... just sent you an email, Daniel!

Yes, got it in the meantime. I think it's even better than the first! But live, it was different, harder, more edge, more "body" to the music, more bass, less ethereal stuff... quite good. They should do a live disc!

what the hell is that? I hope it doesn't involve small children or animals!

Why do they lose money if they re-print the Jordan and Washingtons from some existing masters? They could at least do that, and not have them remastered again. I'm sure there'd even be some good Japanese remasterings around. I don't see how they can lose money if the production of one unit is 1 or 2 or even 3$. I'm sure they'd sell a couple of thousand, no? It's sad that these silly corporations aren't interested in such "peanuts"... I guess the idea was to bundle production, administration, advertising, marketing and all, but in the end it also made it unfeasible to release good music where *some* profit could be made, but not the kind of profit the big jerks need to buy their next dose of heroin and hookers...

No, but it does seem Cuscuna dislikes Les McCann (who's on that other Teddy Edwards album), or at least he's not a big fan. There'd also be another Lighthouse album by the Jazz Crusaders and their collaboration with McCann - these were said to appear on CD (Bluerein reported so long ago... never happened, see Jazz Crusaders Mosaic thread)

I'll certainly find my copy of the Hubbard... there are a few other BNs I still need. But the thing about their archives being exhausted, I don't quite buy it. There's still no readily available reissue of Cliff Jordan or of Tyrone Washington's album. We discussed this before, but there'd certainly be enough good material for another two or three batches of RVGs. And there'd be tons of fine stuff from Pacific (not just "ethereal" west coast music that didn't sell well in the WCC series, there'd also be some hard-blowing stuff, like more Teddy Edwards, Les McCann... but I guess Cuscuna just doesn't like all of that...)

Allen, I respect your opinions about Dylan and his losing his creativity, in fact some of your comments have been rather thought-provoking, so keep them coming! I do disagree of course... I mean clearly his peak was 65/66, I can fully agree with that. Maybe up to 67 (including the Basement stuff)? But because of that, I feel no need to put down the good stuff he made later on (Blood, Desire, Rolling Thunder, Slow Train, Empire Burlesque, Oh Mercy, Time Out of Mind, Love and Theft...), and I love the weaker stuff as well (mostly).

I didn't/don't have any background on these songs... sorry, no offense intended or anything... is it possible to just enjoy these as songs? I guess it's not after one does know... will have to do my homework there, I guess. Any yes Lon, Planet Waves is wonderful! Robertson doing these almost mandoline-like acoustic guitar runs on one of the "Forever Youngs"... marvellous! It's one of the simples, straightest, happiest Dylan albums, I think.

There you go again! Happy Birthday!

And yes on Desire! Great album! Some more favorite epics (Joey, Hurricane), some almost tex-mex, Oh Sister, Durango... hell of a great album in fact! Also the Bootleg volume dedicated to the Rolling Thunder Revue might be of interest (and two or three titles included in "Biograph" are NOT duplicated there). It's from the first tour. The second is documented (well, that's an exaggeration, you get a glimpse of it) on "Hard Rain", which seems to be among the least regarded of his albums as well. The Bootleg volume with the Manchester 1966 concert is effing amazing, too. The Hawks! Say no more! The power and immediacy of the sound is incredible, you can really feel the raw energy there - a fascinating document! Also for anyone in love with the "big three" (Bringing It All Back Home, Highway 61, Blonde on Blonde), the soundtrack from Scorsese's great film is a must buy (it's also a volume in the Bootleg Series - sorry, I'm too lazy to check all those right now and give the numbers...) - lots of fascinating outtakes and a couple of more live tracks (some others are on The Band's "Musical History" box, which also has a few from the 1974 US tour they did together... which brings us to "Before the Flood", another good one... and then on to "Rock of Ages", where Dylan turns up on some of the bonus tracks on the expanded 2CD version, as well as to his little set on "The Last Waltz", all with The Band...)

"Time Out of Mind" from 1997 is another excellent one. I think "Love and Theft" is more fun, but it's very different, much straighter, simpler, while "Time Out of Mind" is a somewhat swampy Daniel Lanois production. Some wonderful stuff there, including "Sad Eyed Lady of the Lowlands", one of my favorite Dylan epics. For those willing to look into the 70s/80s period as well, I found "Biograph" to be excellent. It also contains some early rarities (including a couple of singes/b-sides), some rehearsals and outtakes, as well as a very good selection from his albums up to the time it appeared (1986 I think? That would make it end with the weird but excellent "Empire Burlesque"). The liners are mostly based on a long interview with Dylan, summing up his career to that point. Even to a longtime fan like me, getting that box, listening and reading was a delight! And for those who like the country-rock stuff, I'd recommend the soundtrack album for Samuel Peckinpah's film "Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid" - it's not much of a typical Dylan album (only two or three songs contain vocals), but it's a very nice listen. Btw: those who love "Nashville Skyline" probably know, but his voice there is so flexible and all, it's quite fascinating he could do that... almost crooner like in some spots. I don't think he sounds like that anywhere else.

It has been pointed out to me in a recent Bill Evans thread: there's a Lonehill edition of this around that should be fairly easy to find. It's one of the few BN (related) items that I never found, either!

I've yet to get the Hubbard - I've never seen it in any local store, and it's been out for half a year... I love the Monk/Trane, Mingus and Silver discs - more along those lines would be great indeed!

The Chu Berry set contains recordings from the late 1930s/early 1940s, while the Tal Farlow dates stem from the 1950s. You can't compare those two sonically, it's apples and oranges. Well, as apples are clearly superior to oranges, the question is: which of the two is the apples and which the oranges Glad to see the backordered sets coming back in stock, although after Cindy told me so (around the times of the Great Mosaic Debacle, or GMD as it will be known to future generations), I had no doubt that they would return to stock!

The good people at Lonehill released this double CD set which includes material which was never issued previously. How did Lonehill come across unissued material? From reading the threads on the board, I thought they just did redo's of stuff from previous commercial sources? I don't know, but that's a great two cd set. Yes, excellent! But in my opinion, it would have been better (less pirate-like) if they'd omitted some of the "bonus tracks" on disc two (mainly the Fantasy session that's part of the excellent "Theme and Variations" twofer CD, which contains a fine unreleased date that you'll miss if you stick to the Lonehill).

well, from my own experience army and mental health don't really go together anyway... army is more like organised/chanelled and socially sanctified insanity

double-posting this, for those who don't follow the "gig a month" thread: On Wednesday (Nov 4th), I caught Dave Douglas' Quintet (Donny McCaslin, Uri Caine, Matt Penman, Clarence Penn). Excellent concert. Great tunes, funny, charming, groovy, from marching band to dixie, from Masada to gypsy, from Monk to Ornette... Douglas and McCaslin were excellent, both with plenty of dirtiness in their sound, and lots of punch. Clarence Penn was terrific as well, very lose in his feel, very relaxed yet very poised and often very busy, sort of a groovier/funkier version of Elvin at some times, it seemed. Penman had some fine spots as well, but they were rather few. He and Penn were excellent in their backing though. Uri Caine was - interestingly enough, as Douglas kept pointing at him "the GREAT Uri Caine on piano, these tunes were written especially for him, and especially for him on grand piano" - pretty superfluous and boring. Of course he has great technical skill, but the piano was totally uncalled for in these tunes. They'd be much more open-ended without a harmonic instrument, and the clean sound of the piano (as Caine played it) was not a good match for McCaslin and Douglas' sonic inflections. Anyway, on top of that, Caine totally lacked humor in his playing... Still, it was an excellent concert!

Caught CéU on Friday 30th - excellent gig (see the "Hard Bossa" thread for a short review). On Wednesday (Nov 4th), I caught Dave Douglas' Quintet (Donny McCaslin, Uri Caine, Matt Penman, Clarence Penn). Excellent concert. Great tunes, funny, charming, groovy, from marching band to dixie, from Masada to gypsy, from Monk to Ornette... Douglas and McCaslin were excellent, both with plenty of dirtiness in their sound, and lots of punch. Clarence Penn was terrific as well, very lose in his feel, very relaxed yet very poised and often very busy, sort of a groovier/funkier version of Elvin at some times, it seemed. Penman had some fine spots as well, but they were rather few. He and Penn were excellent in their backing though. Uri Caine was - interestingly enough, as Douglas kept pointing at him "the GREAT Uri Caine on piano, these tunes were written especially for him, and especially for him on grand piano" - pretty superfluous and boring. Of course he has great technical skill, but the piano was totally uncalled for in these tunes. They'd be much more open-ended without a harmonic instrument, and the clean sound of the piano (as Caine played it) was not a good match for McCaslin and Douglas' sonic inflections. Anyway, on top of that, Caine totally lacked humor in his playing... Still, it was an excellent concert! Next up: Cesaria Evora on Nov. 12th, Carla Bley & The Lost Chords on Nov. 20th, and possibly on Nov. 22nd The Klezmatics. Not sure the wallet will allow all of this, alas... but tickets vor Evora I have already.

It seems Jost isn't interested much any longer... a friend of mine tried to get him to talk some by sending emails, but he seems to escape from questions. I guess this generation of producers might just well go and call it a day once their time here comes to an end, without actively trying to keep their legacy alive... sort of like their legacy will go when they go, too... that's sad, but then they can do as they please, of course. I'll have to get some of those Jazzwerkstatt reissues, some good ones there!

There's an earlier thread here: http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=18722 Weren't there some issues about the FMP releases in the UMS series? (Related the split/breakup/fuckup of FMP as whole... the "wrong" party let Corbett do reissues or something like that?)

Oh yes, same here - the Enja is great! But I never went looking for other discs of his, for whatever reason (there's so goddam much to search for, after all...) Freddie Waits is the drummer there... and Jones blows some beautiful clarinet, in addition to his tenor. At some spots, it sounds like an updated (mingus-ized?) version of the Jimmy Giuffre Three... it's rootsy more in a folksy than a bluesy kind of way (and after all, rural folk - and blues of course - is often more "rootsy" and seems more honest about that than cool urban hardbop blues, no?)

seems so, after all... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurie_Allan

The above is the only other disc of his I have, besides Yakhal' Inkomo... I think I'd agree that the earlier stuff is stronger, but the one I just got also sounds pretty good to my ears!

The spelling is Danilo Rea - he's good, although I haven't heard much from him so far...

the liners from Losin's scans can (almost?) be read: