Swinging Swede

I looked closely both at the front and the back cover. I even took out the booklet and perused it, but no mention of copy control there either, although it had the new blurb about how illegal copying is hurting artists etc. The funny thing is that on the front left of the insert tray that you mention the text about ”connoisseur” and ”limited edition” was contracted to the right, as it has been on the copy controlled discs so as to give room to the left for the copy control information. But that part was just blank on this Conn! And the back cover looked like it used to, with the album title and then artist name at the top. Not like the recent RVGs that I’ve seen, which have copy control information at the top. I’ll see how the other Conns look when they arrive in the store. This was the only one they had. It is strange, isn’t it? Maybe the disc really is copy controlled and they are hiding the fact so as not to scare away buyers. That’s obviously the strategy they use on the net, where these discs often are listed as ”CDs” and the copy protection almost never is indicated.

When you play them on the PC, does the disc have its own player that pops up and plays compressed files? The reason I ask is that I spotted a European copy of the Sonic Boom Connoisseur in a local shop today. It said "Printed in the EU". But nowhere was any mention of copy control to be found (unlike the recent Morgan RVG that was sitting in the same rack)! So now I'm confused. Are the European Connoisseurs copy protected or not? Or are there two different European versions? Any reports from other Europeans?

I got an e-mail on the 6th from CD Universe that they had shipped my five Conns! Maybe they are shipping to the Europeans first?

Well...

John, do you remember the track order and where Organic Greenery fits in? Or somebody else? I would be grateful for info on this. This must have been an obscure album, and it seems difficult to come by any additional information about it.

But AMG’s track listing is incorrect, or at least incomplete. The track Organic Greenery was part of the album too. What I don’t know is where it fits in. As the sixth track? Or in conjunction with its session mate Day In – Day Out? Or something else?

Lonesome Road (the entire album) was recorded at November 20, 1957. That’s only five days after the Small’s Paradise recording. It was his last session that year.

Maybe it's because Blue Note fans from other parts of the world now have to buy from America too? Since it's the first copy protected Connoisseur batch outside America, CD Universe may have underestimated the demand. Just a theory.

You might be interested to know that the Fantasy CD Spectrum is a twofer that contains two original Walton LPs: Spectrum from 1968 and The Electric Boogaloo Song from 1969. The Japanese CD only has the original Spectrum album.

That will depend on where you plan to play them. On car stereos and DVD players they will probably be unplayable. On computers the audio section isn’t played at all. Instead low quality compressed files are being played (wma, mp3 or similar). On a regular CD player the difference will at best be indiscernible to your ears, although tests in hi-fi magazines have revealed that the difference is audible. It is after all the same remastering as on the CD, but with the difference that errors are constantly inserted. Philips, which developed the CD format, and is adament that these new discs aren’t CDs and can’t be called that, has also warned that ”normal wear and tear could eventually overwhelm the error correction for the altered discs, causing them to become unreadable within a few years”. The reason for this is that the error level already is so high, that further degradation, that wouldn’t be harmful to the playability of CDs, could push the error level over the edge of what the error correction schemes can handle. The bottom line is that if you think that the copy protected Connoisseurs sound good, then you can be certain that you would find the Connoisseur CDs to sound at least as good (and possibly better), since it is the same remastering. And the CD also comes without all the other drawbacks that Cactus Datashield discs have. That makes the decision easy for me personally – I’d rather pay a bit extra for the CD version (and it may not even turn out to be more expensive). I also think that it is important that we as customers don’t support this move from Blue Note/EMI. If European customers turn out to be compliant, that may encourage EMI and maybe other record companies to switch to copy protected disc formats in America too - and then we will have no CD versions at all.

Amazon.co.uk? Since it’s a European branch, are you sure you don’t get the copy controlled format instead of CDs? I notice that they say ”Audio CD” but you can’t trust that since they just relay the info the record companies are providing them.

David, Clunky and other Europeans, I placed an order today at CD Universe for five of the Connoisseurs. The total sum including shipping was 75.94 US dollars, which is about 15 dollars per CD or about 9 British pounds per CD. Now there will probably be some duties I’ll have to pay when they arrive, but I’ll think you’ll agree that this still is a very competitive price. It may actually turn out to be cheaper to buy the American CDs than the European Cactus Datashield discs! Since this is the first time I have done this, I will have to report back how much extra it cost me in the end. Of course, if it is true that EMI will switch from CDs to Cactus Datashield discs in America too, then it will be thanks and goodbye to EMI from me as well. But it’s not like there is a shortage of other labels to explore. Fantasy has a huge catalogue of recordings in a similar style on Prestige, Riverside, Contemporary etcetera. There’s Collectables and other labels that have reissued large amounts of Atlantic, Columbia and RCA recordings. Japanese Blue Notes may still come out on CDs. Mosaic too. And as the years roll on more and more will enter the public domain and be available from other labels, including EMI recordings. If EMI wants to shoot themselves in their foot, then let them. Hopefully this move will be a fiasco, and they will revert to CDs. Going from CDs to a superior format like SACD is one thing, but going from CD to an inferior format just shouldn’t have been an option. OK, I digressed a bit, but the point is that, for the time being at least, buying from America seems to be a very viable option.

A reissue of Easy apparently. It has the same tracks.

"Kopiergeschützt"

I was thinking of that one, White Lightning! Here's another one: There was also a Charlie Parker LP that had a picture of Johnny Hodges on the cover!

Yes, I’ve been looking forward to this CD even more since I learned what’s on it. I have the December 1944 session on an LP that I haven’t been able to play for a long time, but I remember that my impression was that this was a very good candidate for being the first bebop session. They play Dee Dee’s Dance and Crazeology, two early bop classics, and the band was made up of musicians either directly involved in the new movement, or at least open to it. I think it really is a very important session, but gets a bit overlooked, maybe because neither Diz nor Bird was present. It will be interesting to hear it again. The leader, Clyde Hart, is another one of the numerous tragedies in jazz. He led this session, and in early 1945 he played on several sessions with Dizzy Gillespie and Charlie Parker, but he died later that year from tuberculosis. Another case of ”what could have been?”. Al Killian played with Basie, Ellington and JATP, but was murdered in 1950. Nice to see one of his leader sessions reissued. Budd Johnson himself is a vastly underrated jazz musician in my opinion. He always sounds incredible. Seems to be lots of goodies on this CD. Can’t wait to get my hands on it!

Not quite yet, but until then one can watch these BIG covers from Walmart:

Three new twofers from Fantasy are coming out on October 21: Together Again! combines Together Again! and Together Again, Again!, two Willis Jackson albums recorded 1959-61 with Jack McDuff on organ. Billy Taylor Trio combines At Town Hall and A Touch Of Taylor. What’s noteworthy about the latter album is that it is PRLP-7001 – the very first of Prestige’s long and famous 7000 12” series! Almost all other early 12” titles have been on CD since long, but not this one – until now. This Bud Freeman release is titled All-Star Swing Sessions. There are good new and bad news about it. The good news are that it contains the Swingville album The Bud Freeman All Stars featuring Shorty Baker from 1960, which was reissued on an OJC LP, but not on CD until now. The bad news are that it only adds half of the Leonard Gaskin album Darktown Strutters Ball (1962). Instead of releasing more from this album, they have included Freeman’s 1935 Parlophone session with Bunny Berigan. But this session is readily available elsewhere (on Classics for example), so it would have been preferable to include the rest of the Gaskin album (if possible), even if Freeman doesn't play on all tracks. Despite occasional objections regarding the configurations, Fantasy continues to be totally superior to Blue Note and Verve in terms of making its catalogues available.

There was a third Prestige album, also recorded by van Gelder. There was also a fourth Young-led Prestige session, recorded in early 1964, that remained unissued until 1999, when it was included on this CD: The first three albums are firmly in the soul jazz genre. The fourth session, which I haven’t heard yet, teams him with Booker Ervin, and may be more advanced. Anyone heard it?

Chris Anderson?! By the way, Kenny Burrell has recorded on banjo.

What a coincidence! I just alluded to this incident in the Chronological Classics thread! The orchestra carried on for a while under Georgie Auld’s leadership, and Classics is now releasing the first Auld volume, which will contain the recordings this band made under Auld's name.

September batch: 1320 Duke Ellington 1952 1321 Dizzy Gillespie 1952 1322 Georgie Auld 1940-1945 1323 Oscar Peterson 1950-1952 1324 Benny Goodman 1942 Blues & Rhythm series: Lowell Fulson 1947-1948 Lil Green 1940-1941 Jim Wynn 1947-1949 Georgie Auld was recently discussed, and several posters expressed interest, so Classics starting a complete series should be welcome news. Freddie Webster was also recently discussed, and brownie mentioned his solo on Auld’s Co-Pilot from 1945. This track should be among the last on this first Auld release. By the way, the first two sessions were actually the former Artie Shaw orchestra without Shaw. Shaw had to everybody’s surprise left his highly successful band in late 1939, and the band members, reluctant to disband the great orchestra, carried on for a while under Auld’s leadership.

I haven’t gotten any of those (not yet at least), since I already had this material on the old RCA release. But judging from what I’ve read the general consensus seems to be that Never No Lament is the best-sounding release of this material ever, except for Jack the Bear, which some have claimed to be unlistenable. This is apparently due to the original metal parts being damaged. The Classics releases do however also contain the small group sessions recorded during the time covered, which nominally were led by Johnny Hodges, Rex Stewart and Barney Bigard.

Kenny obviously endures more than Herbie.