Late

By all means, check out Sugar Belly (real name: William Walker). I think he made his own bamboo saxophones. The sound he got from them was actually quite rich. Somewhere between a soprano and an alto. Kinda like Roland Kirk's stritch?

Thanks guys! In San Francisco today. Hoping to visit Amoeba some time over the weekend ... where I plan to pick up The Kinks' Face to Face (new edition), and maybe McCartney's Ram. AND (if they have it) Cecil Taylor's five flies. Thanks again!

I have this set and just realized I've never listened to Disc 2. Listening (for the first time) right now to the sonata. Whew — a lot different than Menuhin's version! Has anyone here heard Robert Mann's recording of Bartok's Sonata for Solo Violin? I've never heard it; Peter Bartok evidently produced the record. OK, time to log off and start at the beginning of the Gitlis.

No I haven't. I think this album ties if not outright wins for the most times I've bought a CD version (3) and I'm just not ready to do it again, as much as I love the album. Gotcha — thanks for letting me know. I've purchased Giant Steps four times, so I know where you're coming from! Of course, I'll probably still drive myself crazy wondering what that new mix sounds like.

Because those two albums were released at the same time. That fact just popped into my head. I love both The Village Green Preservation Society and The White Album, but happen to play the former more often than the latter. No baiting intended. Quincy — have you heard the new mono mix of VG from the box set? That would be the main reason I'd buy it.

Any more recommendations for Bartok's Sonata for Solo Violin? And has anyone here ordered from Bartok Records? The site seems to be the only way to acquire Robert Mann's version of the sonata. I'm about to take the plunge, but wanted to check with other members' experience.

I think The Kinks Are The Village Green Preservation Society is a great album. It shouldn't be blasphemous to say — though it feels like it — but I enjoy and play this Kinks record more than The White Album, its direct contemporary. The 2009 3-disc deluxe edition of Village Green even has some great songs ("Did You See His Name," "Rosemary Rose") that were left off the original release. Did anyone else here purchase the Sanctuary deluxe editions of The Kinks first seven records? All (except Village Green) are 2-disc sets, containing both mono and stereo mixes (except for Kinda Kinks, which evidently was only released in mono). The amount of bonus tracks, including BBC performances, short interviews, and some instrumentals, adds a huge amount of material to their catalog — and most of it is not just filler. Kinda Kinks is especially excellent — the second disc is more impressive than the first (original album) disc, with five demos (tracks 11-15) that are just lovely. In fact, I'd say that if you have any affection for this particular record (Kinda Kinks), you really need to have this 2-disc set. In November of 2011, Sanctuary released a UK-only 10-disc box set of The Kinks in Mono, which reissued their first seven records. It's already out-of-print, and going for impossible prices on Amazon and eBay. Did anyone here pick it up? I wish I'd known about it upon its release. I would have purchased it on Day One. Any UK members here still see it in shops?

Agreed, and perhaps best experienced on this disc. I made it through 2.5 discs this morning. There's a lot to digest (in a good way) here. At least one Thanksgiving dinner per track. One weird thing in my first go-through: I kept focusing on the tuba player (when there is one). The liner notes keep reminding the listener of a tuba player's need for breath. And, I have to say, there is some fine tuba playing therein.

Who's playing the piano starting at 2:48?

Set #649 will be spun this morning. The photos in the booklet do seem a little under-exposed, but that's a minor gripe. The booklet as a whole (I've only read the first six pages so far) seems excellent.

McMichael rarely gets mentioned, even in poetry circles, though he was a finalist for the 2006 National Book Award. I was surprised when my book was reviewed along with Capacity. (Four Good Things is still my favorite book of his.) Matthew — have you read any Killarney Clary? She studied with McMichael, and I think all her books are fantastic (she has three). She writes the finest prose poems.

This box set is limited to 500 copies. It's not on Amazon U.S. yet, but I'm guessing that it will be (and at Dusty Groove) sooner or later. If you've absorbed the Evidence reissues, like them (— I agree that they're an excellent starting place), and haven't yet heard these later Saturn sessions, they're certainly worth owning. Looser over all, but also more hypnotic at times. In my opinion, The Antique Blacks is the best of the bunch, closely followed by Nidhamu and Horizon. Disco 3000 gets a lot of attention, but I personally haven't connected with it yet. My two favorite 70's Ra recordings — Discipline 27 II and The Soul Vibrations of Man have yet, as far as I know, to be reissued on compact disc. I found the following 2010 snippet of text (from Peter Dennett of Art Yard) online, and thought it might be worth posting here: ... it has taken much work to get this going, despite the difficulties running an independent and occasional mistakes in production. 'I am still here'! and have now been doing this work for six years. It seems to me now, that Sun Ra is one of the most published artists of the 21st century! So, despite the endless bootlegs, free-for-all digital downloads from share websites and some official releases, I hope to be here for some years to come. My intention is to get Sun Ra's recordings released with a degree of artistic integrity. I have been trying to get it right with these releases, and keep it in the ethos of Sun Ra, in the way that the records/ CDs are presented, El Saturn was a Underground record label which issued LPs with various hybrid or generic sleeves, many hand drawn images were applied or stuck on, or they would be issued in 'plane blank sleeves'. I can only try to emulate The Arkestra's work, This way I hope to add to these concept recordings, not distract! The point being is that as you may know Sun Ra was something of a mystic and reliable information behind the scenes is hard to come by, a lot of the El Saturn releases do not even have a line up of the musicians, so I do commission research from the people that were there at the time, we are doing our utmost. Michael Ray has written liners for the release of Disco 3000 and Knoel Scott for the Paris tapes 1971 to be released later this year. Michael Anderson has also written liners for The Antique Blacks vinyl edition that will be pressed soon. Hartmut Geerken has written much about the recordings made in Cairo Egypt and his work, as did Salah Ragab. I will try to get some more words from the book Omniverse transcribed for an insight, which will be printed on 10 inch vinyls in a box set recordings from Cairo/ Paris/ Milan and others 'some Unreleased' and some recordings from Salah Ragab via Kindred Spirits the record company in The Netherlands with whom I collaborate. Rick Steiger has also written about the Sun Ra Detroit residency which Beyond the Purple Star Zone came from and also Oblique Parallax those two El Saturn's albums will be released on one CD this year, if all goes to plan. Sun Ra's approached the El Saturn label as a series of concept albums, and we are still putting the pieces of the puzzle back together, as it is great to listen to the whole of the Disco 3000 concert with all the tracks in context, and that's available on Itunes ect, bonus tracks are a wonderful addition, but the original album cut for Disco 3000 and Media Dream were how Sun Ra wanted the works to be presented, that's why I have re-pressed Disco 3000 in its original form, - 'its a concept album'. Unlike most record labels these days I don't go in for the big promotion advertising angle, its far too expensive! or write assessments of the work in hand - stating how important these recording are!, nor do I do trendy DJ promotion party's. I hope the Art Yard releases stand up to contemporary sinersisium or criticism and get the attention they deserve and positively reviewed in the music press to bring them into the public awareness. This work is about restoring Sun Ra's recordings and making them available once again, Sun Ra's music should be accessible to everyone, not just the elite few who can afford to spend five hundred dollars on a rare original Saturn LP. Art Yard is a small independent record company and publisher that continues in its struggle into the 21st Century - and has done the right thing by working in collaboration with The Sun Ra Arkestra under direction of Marshall Allen - Give The Credit Where Credit is Due. 'it is what it is'. I hope you dig the music - listen to the Cosmo Song. Peter Dennett Art Yard, London

Any new recommendations for an SACD player in 2012? I'm saving to ultimately take the plunge.

Does anyone have the new edition of Fly! (X5) yet? I'm guessing the sound is good. I'm looking forward to getting this eventually. What does Schlippenbach have to say?

Thanks, Lon and Hans — I appreciate the input. On a side note: I know that things can sometimes get touchy on this board in regard to preferences for remastering and different engineers (and different labels), but I value all informed opinions. I have ten of AP's hybrid SACDs (only two on Impulse! however), and like them, so I'll probably check out the hybrid ALS at some point. I'm hoping to purchase an SACD player some time next year, and look forward to finally hearing the SACD layer of a number of my hybrids (most of them classical). Anyone else have this particular hybrid SACD and care to comment?

I thought there was a thread already on the hybrid SACD of A Love Supreme, but none of my searches yielded any relevant hits. ANYway, does anyone here have the Analog Productions hybrid SACD of this title? How do you like it? (I'm asking about the sound/remastering as opposed to the music, which we already love.) I'm curious as to how the hybrid SACD sounds in comparison to the 2-disc RVG edition, and particularly if AP was able to use the same tapes that Rudy used. (OR ... should I be looking for the 1987 German or Japanese pressing?) ARgh! Thanks for your input!

Actually, the set doesn't have "Body and Soul." It turns out that, all along, that famous solo we all know and love was played by the reclusive McElroy McDermott. A third cousin of Hawkins who was present on the day of the session, this is McDermott's only known recorded performance. Information gathered from a number of semi-reliable jazz forums suggests that, as the tapes began to roll, Hawkins was searching for his bottle of cognac, and, as a result, is indeed not the tenor player believed to be heard. McDermott, based on a number of oral accounts, was uncomfortably aware of Hawkins' stinginess with drink, and had, apparently only minutes earlier, concealed the bottle in his own saxophone case. The reason for this act is unknown, though some suggest it was a non-verbal "lesson" from the younger cousin. Regardless, McDermott's playing is inspired.* * The Complete McElroy McDermott Session is scheduled to be released by Mosaic on a 3" CD, along with some previously unheard bonus tracks — namely a :03 track of giggling, and a gorgeous :08 off-mike spoken cadenza of expletives — sometime in 2013.

Not the greatest discount, but through June 24th, importCDs has a 10% off sale. No minimum, and apparently you can use it more than once.

And the typo of course is that the band is actually called Penis Land.

Whoops — left off the s. I was thinking of Touching and Blood. I haven't heard In Haarlem, but the Black Lion CD edition of Touching has, as its last track, the song "Blood," which was recorded November 4, 1966 in Haarlem — so maybe I've heard part of it? My main point was that I like Bley's trio recordings from the 60's! (Yes, and the quartet session with John Gilmore.)

Just curious — are you importing into iTunes to mostly play the set on your iPod? I've imported some Mosaics (the Ellington Small Groups for example) to make my own comps — e.g. the small groups sans vocals. I've made some fairly interesting (well, to me) condensed sets this way. Also helps with getting a handle on larger box sets. My Hawkins set is supposed to arrive June 5th.

Seconded. I have the BYG (paper sleeve) reissue, and it works for me. Sound is very good to only fair at times, but I think this is to be expected from the source material. It's a fine record. Played in conjunction with Bley's Savoy recordings, early trio work on ECM, and the Fontana record makes for a good day (week/month) of listening.

I've been buying Taiyo Yuden CDRs from Runtech Media (thanks to this thread) for a number of years now. I use them in my Mac, and I've also used them, somewhat to my surprise, in my JVC CD burner — "surprise" because, in all my experience with it, this component will only recognize "Music" CDRs. (I've never really understood the difference between "music" CDRs and "data" CDRs. Is it some sort of copy protection encoding?) Here's my question/situation — after years of having Taiyo Yuden CDRs being recognized (and burnable) by my JVC unit, my last two spindles haven't been recognized by my burner. The error message I get is: No Audio Disc. Has Taiyo Yuden modified their CDRs? My JVC unit seems to be fine — its playback doesn't yield any problems — but I suppose something might be up. Has anyone else here run into a similar situation? I'd like to keep purchasing TYs, but I suppose I'll have to move over to some brand of "music" CDR if my JVC unit can't use TYs. Thanks for any suggestions/thoughts/advice!

Or maybe based on ...

Seeking recommendations for music on this label. Open to all genres. Thanks!