BruceH

Just like the bastard, ain't it. This reminds me of those folks who see God's mercy as evidenced in the aftermath of hurricane Katrina. What about the damn hurricane in the first place? Just a heavenly clerical error? Yeah, and I love that whole Alzheimers/senility thing he came up with. Way to go, God! Thanks loads! Then there're earthquakes...not to mention the related tsunami's. Thanks for that East-Indian ocean tsunami...and right near Christmas too! Gotta love that touch.

One of my favorites as well!

Who's on it (besides Kenny)?

I read somewhere that Benny really dug Wardell Gray. In fact, reportedly, it was hearing Gray's playing that made Benny think that maybe bop wasn't total b.s.

All the Things You Are, perhaps? Hard to choose.

He did some good stuff with Lee Konitz that you might want to check out.

I know what you mean. Sometimes you have to make the attempt to imagine what someone sounded like 'way back when they came on the scene. Parker must have sounded bracingly new, at the very least. Now (and for a long time) it's hard not to hear Parker as very "normal"-sounding. That's what happens when you have thousands of ardent immitators.

Hey, I happened to spin this album just last week! One of my favorite McLean Blue Notes, and my favorite of the three related albums (I like it just a tad more than One Step Beyond and quite a bit more than Evolution.) You mention "avant bop" being distasteful to some...well, for me this is avant bop that works---evocative, atmospheric, but also substantive, never dull, richly repaying repeated listening. I'll admit, the kick-in time, so to speak, was one or two years. I had the album at least that long before putting it on in '98 or '99 and suddenly having it click for me. But often the longer it takes an album to kick in, the more you love it when it does. I'll be listening to it again soon, thanks to this thread.

This is such a great line-up!! Looking forward to Happenings and Here To Stay being back in print.

Bobby Hutcherson---Stick-Up! What a nice album! All Hutcherson compositions except for one---and that one's by Ornette Coleman!

Right on! I have no musical guilt whatsoever. Now on other subjects, well.....

I remember reading some of Balliett's early stuff years ago and being startled at a reference or two to Rollins's "ugly, billy-goat tone" or words to that effect. I had never thought of Rollins that way, but had to admit that I didn't listen to his "tone" per se, but rather to his "line"---what he was doing musically. If you compared his tone to prettier sax players, then yes, I supposed it was rather flat in comparison (though I prefered to think of it then, and now, as "emphatic"---certainly not ugly.) But you don't listen to Rollins for tone; particularly for a fat, burnished, singing tone. This was a criticism he made several times, it obviously got on his nerves, but it strikes me as like castigating Dizzy for not having the golden tone of a Clifford Brown. Anyway, I dismissed it, because these were particularly old Balliett essays and he may have changed his mind in the ensuing three decades or so.

Call in the dog whisperer!!

Wow. I've been reading his stuff since junior high, and I have to agree with Kalo that much of it holds up well. (I'd have to say, though, that in addition to Stapledon and Phillip K. Dick, Sturgeon, Le Guin, and a few others could be mentioned in the same sentence as Lem.) I know we all gotta go sometime, but the big ones seem to be going thick and fast these days. RIP.

No electric Miles. No Kenny G, either. Still no regrets.

That makes one of us! Of course, no Basie and 20+ Jarrett on my part might seem a bit odd. Just a bit. But to each his own.

I've been looking over a lot of my Allan Moore-written comics for some odd reason.... Quite a few of them hold up rather well.

The first name I thought of when I saw this thread.

No Keith Jarrett in my collection. But I don't consider this shameful or bewildering at all.

I'd count that more as a personal day.

And anyway, doesn't "too much" of anything make you sick?

RIP

If memory serves, this, and Something Else, were the first Coleman albums I bought. Still among my favorites.

I don't whether to get this either. So I probably won't.

Indeed, you can almost imagine him frothing at the mouth towards the end. He started reminding me of Henry Pleasants for some reason.