xybert

Just a heads up for anyone interested, theres a whole bunch of Warner/Atlantic 1000 Yen type Gary Burton stuff available at the moment on Amazon Japan (and i presume wherever else Japanese CDs are sold). There's all the Atlantic stuff like Throb etc which you would likely be aware of and expect... i picked up Alone At Last and Paris Encounter (what a gem!)... but there's also RCA stuff like Tennessee Firebird, Lofty Fake Anagram and Duster available. And on top of that, there's now a GRP 1000 Yen type series, from what i can see of Burton there's currently Cool Nights and Reunion available. Anyway, i am quietly keen on checking out some of the RCA and GRP stuff. Not expecting a flood of enthusiasm (particularly for the GRP stuff)but thought it was worth posting in case anyone else is interested.

I'm somewhere in between: the more obviously fashion victim late sixties onwards stuff was obviously unfortunate but i'm not all that in love with the uniform fifties suit look either, although it's obviously the lesser of the two evils. Neither love nor hate the suit. It just has a bit of an homogenising effect for me, probably more pronounced as it's mostly viewed in black and white. I guess, if i had to choose, i'd err on the side of suits. Nowadays i think it's just a matter of wearing what suits you. I freaking love the music on these two Jeremy Pelt albums, but i honestly think the covers make him look like a total knob:

Bump. Any word on new sets? I kind of got burnt out on them but looking back there's a few i'd still like to get, and there's definitely more i'd love to see.

Just realised that i've been getting Susana Santos Silva and Sara Serpa mixed up in my head... they even look similar!

Definitely! Doesn't mean that Jasmine etc can't also be of a high standard... and i do really enjoy Jasmine, but it definitely, definitely, definitely isn't Jarrett and Haden circa 1974... and yes, why should it be, and yes, that is not necessarilly a bad thing, but yeah, anyone who doesn't like recent Jarrett but is getting caught up in the moment and rushing out to buy Jasmine should be fairly forewarned. If you don't like recent Jarrett, don't expect miracles, that's all i'm saying. It's good for what it is (and I'll eventually buy the second helping, too, I'm sure) - but for anyone not buying p/b duos, there's other ones by Haden they ought to look into (the ones w/Hank Jones, Chris Anderson, Hamp Hawes for starters) before I'd even mention the ones w/Jarrett. Ah, i see what your saying.

Great value indeed. Regarding the Duster/Country Roads twofer; i already have Duster but this might be worth it to get County Roads... will have to think about it.

Definitely! Doesn't mean that Jasmine etc can't also be of a high standard... and i do really enjoy Jasmine, but it definitely, definitely, definitely isn't Jarrett and Haden circa 1974... and yes, why should it be, and yes, that is not necessarilly a bad thing, but yeah, anyone who doesn't like recent Jarrett but is getting caught up in the moment and rushing out to buy Jasmine should be fairly forewarned. If you don't like recent Jarrett, don't expect miracles, that's all i'm saying.

I've been re-reading my old Tom Strong comics. ABC (America's Best Comics) had a great run in the late 90's/early 00's. I remember reading an interview with Alan Moore at the time, and i remember him saying that he wanted to bring comics back to being the 'imagination factories' that they once were. Anyway, a lot of fun, plays with genre/medium conventions etc without being all 'wink wink' about it. It's like, really well written, imaginative, medium brow straight ahead stuff. Random note: i liked that they put all the ads in the last few pages of the comics, rather than interpsersed throughout, does make a difference with 90's stuff where the ads were pretty obnoxious and X-TREME (a lot of the comics were too, but it's jarring when it's a Tim Sale or other tasteful artist's book). I've been craving comic books lately, i really regret trading the majority of my old collection.

If an artist/career/body of work/period/album gets reassessed in the woods, does it make a sound?

http://www.cherryred.co.uk/shopexd.asp?id=4749 I'm sure many fans will have this stuff already, but i don't have any of it, and Cherry Red did a great job on Quartet in Concert. DISC ONE WHO IS GARY BURTON? 1. STORM 2. I'VE JUST SEEN HER 3. FLY TIME FLY (SIGH) 4. CONCEPTION 5. GET AWAY BLUES 6. MY FUNNY VALENTINE 7. ONE NOTE NEW VIBE MAN IN TOWN 8. JOY SPRING 9. OVER THE RAINBOW 10. LIKE SOMEONE IN LOVE 11. MINOR BLUES 12. OUR WALTZ 13. SO MANY THINGS 14. SIR JOHN 15. YOU STEPPED OUT OF A DREAM DISC TWO THE NASHVILLE ALL-STARS AFTER THE RIOT AT NEWPORT 1. RELAXIN' 2. NASHVILLE TO NEWPORT 3. OPUS DE FUNK 4. S’ WONDERFUL 5. ROUND MIDNIGHT 6. FRANKIE AND JOHNNY 7. RIOT-CHOUS HANK GARLAND JAZZ WINDS FROM A NEW DIRECTION 8. ALL THE THINGS YOU ARE 9. THREE-FOUR, THE BLUES 10. MOVE 11. ALWAYS 12. RIOT-CHOUS 13. RELAXING FLOYD CRAMER 14. LAST DATE

Couple of new releases on Aum Fidelity: I'm quite keen for the Farmers By Nature, but i'm going to go back and listen to the first two albums first to see if i need/want more. Always liked Gerald Cleaver but he's grown on me a lot in the last couple of years. Wouldn't mind the Shipp/Jones but like so many tempting new releases it comes under "if i had money to burn" for me.

That tune is called "Dancers In Love". It was part of the original "Perfume Suite" it appears on a number of live albums. Thanks Duane! I'll do a proper search when i get home but a quick online search shows that i at least have it in my collection on the Piano Reflections album and the Black, Brown and Beige 3 CD set:

There are TWO different Sun Ra Quartet double-albums on Horo. "Other Voices, Other Blues" (which I have on original vinyl)... ...but there's also "New Steps" - which I have on recent a high-quality CD bootleg (with superb packaging, including both a new 2009 essay, and also the original liner-notes). If fact, it was only around here somewhere that I read that the "New Steps" CD wasn't legit - though it's far better in almost every way than many legit reissues I have. I think i have the same CD version of New Steps... love that album, no regrets about not waiting indefinitely for a legit version to emerge (and i'll take my lumps for that if i need to). I know a lot of people rate Unity higher so i'd be keen to hear it.

Whoa, thanks for posting. That was intensely surreal, the red curtain made it kind of Twin Peaks-ish... Anyone know what the tune was starting at around the 5 minute mark (the one that gets the grumpy guy dancing) and whether it appears on an Ellington album? Many thanks.

Loved this. Same here. I'm buying the duo CDs because of reading this and I never buy bass/piano duo CDs - plus I havn't bought a Keith Jarrett CD except older recordings since Deer Head Inn and I bought that when it was released. Steve, i highly recommend checking out some tracks on youtube or wherever first. I really like Jasmine, but i think people are getting a bit worked up about these records at the moment (not here). I haven't heard Last Dance, Jasmine is a fine album but i think it's definitely an album where mileage will vary. With the best possible intentions I highly suggest trying before buying, that is all.

I just bluetooth from my macbook to my stereo, or bluetooth from my ipod to my stereo, or just plug my ipod in to my stereo either via the headphone/ 1/4 inch jack or via USB. Probably less than ideal but it sounds good to me. At some point in the future i'll probably set up a better system with a decent DAC etc, but there's no hurry.

Saw Scofield live five years ago or so with Joe Lovano and Matt Wilson... he was excellent live. Don't own any of his albums, but i'm looking forward to getting my copy of Blue Matter from Japan in the next couple of days!

We are at the point now where it's totally a non-issue for the general populace. You just don't pay for music. It's as natural as breathing. You are not any less of a man if you don't pay for music. I don't even know anymore (as in, with regards to this topic, not in a throwing my hands up at humanity thing). All i'll say is that i like CDs and i'll keep buying them as long as they keep making them. I like having a hard copy and the convenience to rip it as i please. I also like using Spotify to check stuff out, and i can see myself using it more down the line for the convenience of it, but there's just something hardwired in me that i need to own the CD. If/when it gets to the point where the artists that i follow offer download/streaming only then i'll adjust, as there will be no other option. As long as there is a CD then i need the CD. If/when it does get to the point where everything is in the cloud and it's all a big stream, i think i will only stream new stuff, it seems pointless to pay for downloads. My listening/collecting life will be divided into a CD and post-CD era. I guess that's kind of redundant to say, but it kind of helps me to be at peace with it. I'm the opposite, I haven't bought a CD in years. I see no sense buying a CD I'm simply going to rip and put on my already bursting CD rack and never touch again. But, I also don't use a streaming service. I will preview the odd album on Spotify, but then I either buy it, or never listen to it again. In the last year (since I was first turned on to Spotify), I've probably logged less than ten hours on the service. And BTW, before we start shaking our heads and muttering about "goddamn kids these days", we all grew up listening to the radio. Far as I recall, we didn't pay for that either. So let's not act as though listening to music for free is some strange, new phenomenon. Fair enough! I've mentioned elsewhere that the first thing i do when a CD arrives is rip it to my computer; the CD then goes on the shelf and rarely if ever gets touched again. So effectively all of my listening is of digital files, but i just like having that physical copy there if i need it. Just my preference! At first i was going to say "even if it is a silly preference", but actually there are more than a few tangible (pun intended) benefits to having a hard copy, in my view. I won't bother listing them as again it's just my preference and we could go round and round on it. When i said "I don't even know anymore (as in, with regards to this topic... )" i wasn't being passive aggressive or whatever: i really don't know! I used to think it was fairly simple: people not buying music is not fair and overall is bad for musicians and, yes, the 'industry', and by extension bad for myself as a listener. Now i feel like i am not that informed and there are a million different angles to it, and maybe it'll all work out for the better. Either way, i can't control it. Yeah, the radio! Not quite the same as Spotify but i get your point. We all used to dub CDs on to tapes for friends etc... All i'll say is that i like CDs and i'll keep buying them as long as they keep making them...

... not to mention Family Ties, Growing Pains, Full House, Boy Meets World, Save By the Bell, Home Improvement, that one with Jessica Biel (Seventh Heaven?) etc... based on TV shows, i always wondered if it was the norm for kids in the USA to have these massive bedrooms, literally packed with wall to wall posters, toys, computers, musical instruments, sound systems etc...

We are at the point now where it's totally a non-issue for the general populace. You just don't pay for music. It's as natural as breathing. You are not any less of a man if you don't pay for music. I don't even know anymore (as in, with regards to this topic, not in a throwing my hands up at humanity thing). All i'll say is that i like CDs and i'll keep buying them as long as they keep making them. I like having a hard copy and the convenience to rip it as i please. I also like using Spotify to check stuff out, and i can see myself using it more down the line for the convenience of it, but there's just something hardwired in me that i need to own the CD. If/when it gets to the point where the artists that i follow offer download/streaming only then i'll adjust, as there will be no other option. As long as there is a CD then i need the CD. If/when it does get to the point where everything is in the cloud and it's all a big stream, i think i will only stream new stuff, it seems pointless to pay for downloads. My listening/collecting life will be divided into a CD and post-CD era. I guess that's kind of redundant to say, but it kind of helps me to be at peace with it.

Thanks for posting, skimmed through it to get to the artists whose thoughts i was most interested in but will go back and read it properly at some point. Some very interesting and illuminating thoughts there.

Great pics! I love music store photos, whether in Japan or elsewhere. 'Store Porn' i guess. I'm definitley jealous, would love to go to Japan again although i can't see it happening anytime in the near future. I was lucky enough to go there in 2006... at the time i hadn't been a dedicated jazz fan very long and i took the opportunity of being in Japan to pick up such rare, available-in-Japan-only gems as Bright Size Life, My Spanish Heart, Heliocentric Worlds Vol 1 & 2 and Al Di Meola's Land of the Midnight Sun and Splendido Hotel.

I really dig the music on the Paul Motian BS/SN box. It really opened my ears to Lovano. I keep meaning to get the ECM box or the On Broadway box (pricey relative to my desire), but what i'd really like to do is check out more of the Electric Bebop band stuff.

Yeah, i loved 'oldies' radio growing up, all that classic Rock n' Roll and whatever label The Supremes etc falls under. Thinking now, there was a lot of it in the air at the time with the soundtracks to Stand By Me, Platoon, Tour of Duty, Goodmorning Vietnam, even watchig Back to the Future etc... loved watching re-runs of Happy Days... loved Grease... But Classic Rock... mixed feelings... loved Jimi Hendrix and Led Zeppelin and all that when i discovered them, but there's this certain section of Classic Rock that was always played on radio stations and looped background music CDs at crappy jobs that i worked at and at supermarkets etc: Steeley Dan, The Eagles, Bob Seger... it's probably not bad music but i associate it with audio death on a loop... elevator (to hell) music for me...

I'm sure all this stuff is findable but my lazy/cheap self would love a set of Ornette's stuff from say Soapsuds, Soapsuds through to Virgin Beauty. pretty much his late seventies and eighties stuff excluding obvious stuff like Song X. Wouldn't mind getting Body Meta and Dancing in Your Head in better sound so you could throw those in too to flesh it out. Would be great to have In All Languages in better sound but apart from that i haven't heard most of the stuff from that period. Where are all the billionaire jazz fans? If i was one i would commission Mosaic to make stuff happen.