BruceH

An exceptionally likable screen presence. He sure lived a long time. RIP

I thought it was written by Satan.

Speaking of, this is kind of what frustrates me about this mass deletion. Surely the continual licensing of these evergreens to audiophile labels (who sell their pressings for top dollar) have got to be offsetting costs somehow. And on a related note, let's delete a bunch of titles while releasing our own LP/CD packs of stuff that a) everyone who cares has probably already got on audiophile vinyl released in the last couple of years and b) anyone who cares has probably bought a dozen times already. I understand everything can't stay in print forever, but when you look at the number of different issues of Soul Station in the last few years, you have to ask if we could have a little less Soul Station and a little more Dippin'? Actually, I think we were lucky that Dippin' was even reissued at all.

Yesterday I bought Ricky Rocks, a Bear Family Ricky Nelson compilation. It's good (33 songs on one disc!) but it doesn't include "My One Desire," a favorite from my vinyl double-album Liberty comp. Oh well.

On CD, yeah. But just like when LPs went away (mostly) they'll be some other way to distribute the "software." The biggest drag is the way the cover art, liners and personnel info has gone away- it shrunk from LPs to CDs and now has vanished almost completely with the download age. My students will bring in a recording and I'll ask them "OK, who's on drums, piano etc.?" and they don't know. They have to look it up somewhere, and too many don't bother doing so. When I was their age one of the important parts of listening to and studying the music was to be able to hear the difference between Elvin/Tony/Billy/Joe etc. Now many of these key players seem to be becoming anonymous to the younger generation. Also, I've always thought of an album as a set of tunes that belong together, put in a specific order for a reason (think Speak No Evil). When people download one tune at a time they miss out on that quality, plus they miss out on discovering lesser-known "B side" gems. I have mixed feelings about the way things are evolving- there are many aspects of convenience in the technology, but it seems like some critical aspects of the "art" are disappearing. Yep, we're all just floating in a digital sea, or we're getting there fast. Of course, if you were born to the digital sea you think it's just dandy, but like you I miss the various addenda one used to get---liner notes, session info, discographical info, art, photos... When I stop to think about it, half the stuff I know about music (particularly r&b and blues) I got initially from various liner notes. My older son, OTOH, doesn't even know what GROUP he's listening to on his I-pod, or care, just as long as the song sounds good. But so it goes, I guess. This all just makes me a curmudgeon.

Had them for ages Good for you!

Yeah...clearly. Huh?

very good ones: honourable mention: the jury's still out on: maybe I'm too hard on some (Hamilton, Carter, Morgan, Mobley) but it's been a while since I played most of those... By all accounts, if you're interested in bebop, don't miss the Dameron/Navarro (there's a Definitive substitute of course) and the Nichols (no substitute I know of yet), then add the Hope (he belongs to the same bunch of great pianists around in the early years of modern jazz as Nichols). McLean's New Soil is one of his best, and so is Mingus' Wonderland album (the first of his band with John Handy/Booker Ervin, Richard Wyands is subbing for Parlan). The Mulligan/Konitz is some of the best Mulligan I'm aware of (and fine Konitz, too! He puts this on a different level than the Mulligan/Baker quartet recordings, I think). And the Getz is pure magic - some of the most beautiful and imaginative playing there is... pure, too. Between this and the last bunch of deletions, several of McLean's best albums and almost all of Tina Brooks' output goes OOP again. Sad. Also it makes me worry a bit that recent reissues like two of the Capitol vocal collection albums (Hendricks and Raney), Benny Carter's fine "Sax à la Carter", and recent RVGs like the one by Art Taylor are going OOP so fast! Wow, I'm in almost complete agreement with your lists. But as to your last comment, yeah, Sax A La Carter and the Art Taylor albums sure went out of print fast! Seems like I just BOUGHT the Taylor a little while a ago! What a shame. At least most of the Brooks albums have been out there in the marketplace for a reasonable period of time.

Actually, if one buys an inessential album and you find it so interesting that you fall in love with it, then it's ipso facto "personally essential," no? For instance, Davis Cup and Flight To Jordan for me. (Anyway, if you want to avoid the essential, for godsake don't get any of the Tina Brooks' albums!!)

But his head is shaped like a football.

YMMV of course, but I'd say the first four are not exactly essential. The Blackburn and Adderley, however, are damn good.

The Poll-Winners is actually one of my most oft-played Cannonball albums.

I wonder if he's ever gotten a hummer from a Hummer.

I miss Village Music. A truly great store.

I was 19 and getting my car fixed. The mechanic told me. At first I just couldn't believe it.

Holy freakin' shit, that was great! Thanks Marcel.

BillF named a good one in Dupree Bolton. If ever a musician seemed to come out of nowhere and knock everyone's socks off, it's him with The Fox and Katanga! He then simply dropped off the radar screen.

If so then I guess it will turn out that the CD was the true "bridge to nowhere."

Happy Birthday!!!! (What's left of it.)

Same here. My secret plan of buying like a madman for 15 years is really starting to pay dividends.

I thought he lived in Rhode Island?

I heard that back in the small town where she grew up, Betty was raped. I hope this isn't true, but if it is it would account for some of her "troubled" quality.

Way to go.

Interesting. (Almost sounds like a type of barbecue, just going on sound.)

"Skete"?