Harold_Z

No, it's been down here too for a couple of hours.

take the shot.

Bad news.

Yeah Jim....I dig 'em too. For me they're local guys and I used to see them before they made it in some of the local joints. A GIRL LIKE YOU is one of the best and I AINT GONNA EAT OUT MY HEART ANYMORE and IT'S A BEAUTIFUL MORNING are nice sides too. I sprung for the 2 cd Rascals anthology awhile back and never regretted it. Live Felix handled the bass lines very nicely but on the records there's some VERY nice Richard Davis and Chuck Rainey. Also it should not be overlooked the Dave and Eddie Brigati were the Starlighters for JOEY DEE AND THE STARLIGHTERS of PEPPERMINT TWIST fame.

Yes...I'd go for a Matlock/Cathcart Mosaic. It's great stuff..and get the Condon "Toddlin' town" on there as well. The Condon was out on cd briefly in the late 80s on Atlantic - in Stereo.

The reality of the situation is that nothing the record companies can do is going to eliminate copying. The genie is out of the bottle. In a way it's poetic justice for them forcing the cd medium on the public. What did Shakespeare say? Hoisted by their own petard?

I just got it today. I LIKE IT A LOT! It's an organ trio with percussion added and Stevie singing and playing organ bass. On some tracks there's sax and flute by Karl Denson. Not overproduced at all - good grooves and good playing. It's improvisational in nature and the playing is just what it's supposed to be. Whether it's jazz or not is up to you - it's improvised within a framework, it cooks, it's intelligent. It's GOOD MUSIC. Great version of WHY CAN'T WE LIVE TOGETHER, which was an early 70s R&B hit by Timmy Thomas. If I remember that record correctly it was just organ and drum machine (rhythm ace).

What I always heard back in the 60s and 70s was that these guys were on a weekly salary (the figure I heard was in the neighborhood of $300.00 per week) and were NOT paid scale per date. I had no way of verifying this then or now - but I heard this from more than one source and from people who I thought were in a position to know and I didn't find it inconsistent with my experience in the R&B scene. I DO know that this is the way a successful company located in New Jersey (owned by a famous R&B singer of the 50s) operated - on an even LESSER scale. This would also be the M.O. for the "acts" who were signed to long term contracts at a fixed salary (higher than what the musicians were paid). It was a classic conflict of interest. It would mean that acts were managed, produced and booked by the same company. The name was owned by the company. BIG TIME SHAFT JOB.

PRYAN...Yes, the Kansas City Sessions are the Commodores. I have those on vinyl and didn't connect with that title. Great music.

Don't miss the Leser Young Commodore sessions. For me those are a must.

Brownie...the MOJ I'm refering to is a one disc comp on Proper labeled as Essential - Masters Of Jazz. it also has the logo Media 7 on it. This series came under discussion a couple of years ago on Jazz Corner - I think the general consensus was it was the same source material and mastering as the Masters Of Jazz label. At any rate it's a good sounding disc....But I like the RCA better.

I've come to the conclusion that sound preferences are VERY subjective. About the only thing we all agree upon is how ROTTEN the late 80s Sony reissues were. To me this set is an improvement over the Blue Bird set and over a Masters Of Jazz compilation that contains some of this material. Yes - there is peak distortion at points but not to the point where it ruins my listening. In general RCA issues sound good to me - and for the past few years - Sony reissues also.

Jim mentions EMUS. Another possibiltiy is FORUM. I have it on FORUM. I have another Basie (Roulette) album (the one where he is holding a baseball bat on the cover) on EMUS

Herbie Mann has a been a Jazz name almost as long as I can remember - I'm very sorry to hear of his passing.

Bad news..Lou Mecca passed away sometime last week. Don't know any details yet.

I saw him on a Saturday morning NBC news show about a week ago and Stevie and band both sounded GOOD.

Yeah...It's a great album musically and sonically. I hope another is in the works.

No question that the original is far superior to the first cd reissue - but in retrospect the first reissue is the only issue I'm aware of with the alternate take to "Ain't Misbehavin".

A friend of mine gave me a 2 cd "best of" a few months back. YEAH!!! I dig it too, Ed.

I think you've hit on one of the main causes for jazz's declining popularity. I'm in my mid 50's now and when I was growing up the standard tunes that much of the jazz repetoire utilizes were still being heard regularly in a POP - NON JAZZ context. Singers on variety shows (remember them?) were still singing standards and Jukeboxes in diners and bars still had a lot of standards on them. In other words - even though Rock was begining to dominate the radio - there were still plenty of standards to be heard. When I got into jazz - the contrast of hearing the tunes in a jazz context was very appealing and the improvisations made sense because I "knew" many of the tunes already. Today's listeners face the problem you pointed out - only knowing the tunes in a jazz context and having to seek out and learn a body of work that an older generation had ingrained in them (if they were interested and were listening). I think all this adds up to making jazz a little harder to appreciate for someone growing up in today's pop culture brainwashing dictatorship. Another related problem - how are you going to recognize the "quotes" players often toss into their solos if you don't know this huge backlog of tunes? The quote goes right past you because you don't know the tune.

I also love it- just as much as the Handy. I probably listen to it more often than than the Handy album now - but in the past I think the Handy lp got more play. I'm happy to have both of them. At this point I've lived with both of these albums over 40 years and STILL listen to them often.

Another vote for the Columbia Hot Fives. The JSP is VERY good, and was the best issue UNTIL the Columbia came out. I have both- the sets aren't complete duplicates of one another repetoire-wise.

HOWARD TATE HOWARD TATE HOWARD TATE HOWARD TATEHOWARD TATE HOWARD TATE HOWARD TATE Can't let this thread go by without mentioning Howard Tate. GET IT WHILE YOU CAN is a Soul classic.

Street Of Dreams is my pick also. Grant Green and Larry Young are a great combination and this is one of their best collaborations.

Hank White died some years ago - I can't remember exactly when but it's a while. Herbert Morgan is still playing (GREAT -I might add) - I did a gig with him less than 6 months ago.