Jim Alfredson

There's no doubt the guy can play. That rig is enormous; I'd hate to try and gig with that. Not sure about the overall vibe, but the guy has great technique. I noticed he has the pedals monophonic, meaning only one note can be triggered at once. That would make things easier in some ways, I suppose. Still, good heel & toe technique. EDIT: Just stopped by his website. Interesting stuff... he'd be a neat guy to talk with.

Thanks Tom. I was just emailing Mike today and he was very complimentary of the CD. I'm glad he put it in a "formal" review.

What point would that be? Seriously. What I gleamed from his article is that Chicago should be spending more money on the festival. How to achieve that is open for debate, but I have to say I was underwhelmed by the festival when we played there (which is not to say I was ungrateful). I was expecting something much more grand from a city like Chicago.

We'll see about the quality. I didn't expect the tile saw to last through the first project, which was cutting porcelain tiles for my kitchen counter. They are extremely hard, much harder than ceramic, and yet the saw held up fine, did the hallway job, and I also loaned it to a couple of friends that did some pretty big jobs with it, too. It's still rockin'.

I suddenly have an urge for a turkey sandwich. But alas, I only have turkey sammiches. I wonder if they too are a rich source of turkey sandwiches?

It's a great disc with really inspired performances. I'm proud of it. I did the engineering and artwork. Greg has been working hard with Glenn Brown to create a really cool sound in the mix.

That's why you come hang with the Alfredsons afterwards! I think Reich has a point, frankly.

So this week I've been trying to finish some left-over odd repair jobs around the house and also organize my garage and office. My garage has a new roof (no leaks!!! YAY!) and half of it will be my workshop for restoring pianos, but it is full of crap and all my tools are scattered all over the place. I've been trying to clean it up and I need to make a nice workbench and somehow catagorize and organize all my tools. I'm getting tired of not being able to find my hammer, buying a new one, and then finding the old one a day later. Anyway, one project I needed to finish was a repair to one of our plaster walls that I started last winter. A space about 2 feet by 4 feet was bulging pretty bad, so I knocked it all out, put in a piece of drywall, and filled the surrounding space with drywall compound and feathered everything in as good as I could. Really all I needed to do for the past 6 months is re-attach the molding. I realized that I was really lacking in finishing nails, but I found just enough to do the job. Unfortunately, the first two decided not to go in straight and bent. They were not going in very easy. Rather than dig out my cordless drill and make pilot holes, I decided to go to Harbor Freight and see if I could get a finishing nail gun (I've always wanted one). Long story short: A finish nail gun that accepts up to 2" nails and a box of 5000 2" nails cost me a grand total of $31.47. That same gun would cost four times that (at least) at some place like Home Depot. I feel dirty. At the same time, damn... how is a man supposed to resist? I have a 10" tile saw from Harbor Freight that I used to tile my hallway and my kitchen counter and backsplash that I paid under $200 for. The same tool with a name brand would be $600 to $800 anywhere else. Amazing. To tie in with my other thread tonight: I think we're fucked.

Now this is an interesting point and one that I've been thinking about a lot lately. It does seem that the music itself has less and less intrinsic value, and the true value is (or maybe it's always been that way) in the medium itself: the vinyl record, the compact disc, the stuff that, especially when rare or oop, people pay big bucks for. Now that medium is the digital file, which, infinitely duplicatable, has no "real" value like a physical object. I can see the upside to this, which is that music may again take on a communal nature where the performance is more important than the recording. In other words, it will get people to want to experience live music rather than horde the millionth re-issue of Kind Of Blue.

I have an addiction to sweets. That's my biggest vice. I never started smoking because my dad did and I didn't like it, even from a young age. Never tried pot for the same reason. Did my drinking phase in college, now I rarely have a beer. I can't drink wine anymore because the sulfates make me break out. But man, I can throw down the sweets! Popsicles, ice cream, candy, Jell-O, chocolate, it doesn't matter. As long as it's sweet, I like it!

Detroit is free. It is four days long. It pretty much blows away the Chicago fest and that's coming from someone who's played both. I was actually quite surprised at how small the Chicago Jazz Festival was when we played in 2006. I envisioned a much bigger ordeal. If their budget is really $250,000, then they are doing a spectacular job with such limited funds. Isn't the Chicago Blues Festival huge in comparison? Where do they get the funds? What is their budget?

Just curious: Is the new organissimo on there yet?

All I've got to say is I'm sorry this is happening. And I better get off the computer now, because my wife is hungry and wants to go get something to eat. And she's giving me that look. "Here I come, honey!"

A new review from the South Bend Tribune: http://www.southbendtribune.com/apps/pbcs..../66150/1038/Ent

Just a bump because we're now available via Amazon.

I love the Philly R&B sound as well and Philly is/was the jazz organ capital of the world. For some reason, the majority of well-known jazz organists came from that area. My wife did her undergrad in Philly and always told me how great the city is. I fell in love with Philly when organissimo played there in 2005.

If the point of this poll is purely informative, that's great. If it is to somehow prove that the majority of people do it and therefor I should allow discussion of various sites, then it's a waste of time. Regardless of how I or anyone here may personally feel about it, it is way more trouble legally than I want to bother to deal with.

Dan, thanks for posting this. I agree with you that certain types of music should be captured as close to "live" as possible. The concept of the studio as an instrument is always worth exploring, but oftentimes the availability and ease of use of the tools acts as a crutch to support poor performances that are later "fixed in the mix". Jazz, being an improvisational music that relies of the interaction of the musicians more-so than maybe any other genre, is especially hampered by the current studio trends of extreme isolation, close mic'ing, micro-editing, pitch-correction, automation, etc. That's not to say those tools cannot be used, but as with everything the key is moderation. I also know what you mean firsthand by the reluctance of modern day musicians to accept the limitations of working in an "old school" way. The last organissimo CD "Groovadelphia" was tracked in my home studio, which is simply my basement, with 7' ceilings. We chose to play all in the same room, no isolation, balancing ourselves as much as possible. It was hard to do. Each one of us at one point said out loud, "Man, I wish we were in the real studio, so we could fix these mistakes instead of replaying this tune over and over again." One tune especially kicked our butts. But it was worth it. The resulting sound, though maybe not as pristine as that from a modern studio, nevertheless has a vibe and energy to it that you just cannot get from everyone in seperate rooms doing multiple overdubs of their solos. Again, thanks for posting and I will definitely check out the release.

See, for some reason I have a memory of getting that one on CD somewhere. Then again, maybe I just have the vinyl. I'm too lazy to look.

Some of them have been released on Collectables, I think. Then again, I could be wrong.

You think that's evil? Check out what happens when you color invert the cover art:

Maybe the bassists smell funny.

Good to hear!