JSngry

Ra was about getting away from this world to get to a different one that surely must exist, because this one is built on death. Kenton was about staying here and manufacturing better new things, because there was nothing wrong with this one that couldn't be fixed by manufacturing it in a more new modern way, so we could keep on keeping on in this, our ever shinier, ever newer, ever better version of the eternal here for the eternal modern tomorrow. Portraits On Standards is one of the best big band albums ever. Hair is one of the best desperation albums ever. The Graettinger stuff is some of the best Be-Careful-What-You-Ask-For music of the 20th Century. Live At Redlands University is one of the best comeback records ever. And so on. And in between, there were more good to great records, great to greater bands, and some noble failed attempts, and some truly ignoble sucky failures. But yes, there were always trombones, always. And I have come to really dig that about Kenton, those five bones, with bass trombone(s) (and sometimes tuba) at the bottom, that was a sound, always. I started a Dick Shearer thread here for good cause! But Kenton himself...not so much a vision as a set of executable neurosis that he harnessed into an executable style, a "concept" if you will that he could always find willing and able high-level (usually...) recruits to execute to everybody's mutual satisfaction. And I don't meant that as a did, either, just that when I say that I keep Stan Kenton in my jazz section, it's not because I think he's playing the same games rooted in the same impulses to the same ends as as many/most of the other people I keep there. I keep it there because that's the medium he was using to play his own games. I used to love the music. Then I hated it. Then I wasn't sure. Then I got to where I could go case-by-case. Now, it's just...it's never going to be what I myself really want as fare as a life partner, but I think I've made it final and lasting peace that it was what it was it was always going to be taht, o don't get up set for it because of that. Fish gotta swim, birds gota fly, Kenton gotta Kenton. Tell you what - there are some moments, often in some unlikely places, where it all comes together, and then you got something. Right now, the version of "Girl Talk" from The World We Knew is running though my mind...imagine an Ahmad Jamal/Vernel Fournier type beat used, not as a springboard for a groove, but as a basis for mathematical extrapolation, the point around which all the other maths revolve. And then bring in all these totally objective melodies in not so objective colors played with their individual maths as being the only thing that matters - colors saying one thing, maths saying another. When it works, and here, it definitely works, and it's something you're only going to hear on a Stan Kenton record. So...points and props for the lifetime that contained those moments. All the other stuff, hey. Kenton be Kenton. Deal with it.

Amir @ the label requested screenshots, which I sent, and there is now a security certificate in place. However, I submitted an order and nothing happened, the page kinda flashed and then went right back to where it had been.. .so I submitted another one and the same thing happened...might be getting two of these...or none at all. We shall see. I've sent anohter heads-up email requesting clarification. I will say that they seem to have a genuine concern for getting it right, so I don't mind working with them while they do.

I don't know what it took to get a bug up Bill Crow's ass, but it seems like maybe not all that much...no matter. RIP Buddy DeFranco, a man who led a dedicated life to be sure. I never really "felt" him, but found no deficiency on his part (nor on mine) for that being the case. And let's not forget his bass clarinet work on Vee0Jay, with Lee Morgan on onboard! As for Tony Scott, though, I've heard his earlier work and his later work, and the criticism of the earlier seems pretty much well-founded, but something happened to him, Zwn Vervitation or something, who knows, and all that silliness went away, to be replaced with a pretty damn strong personal voice of substance, imo. The devices/mannerisms were still there, but the timing and the energy had deepened, and stories started being told, yarns spun, recounted. There was gravitas in the house.

The Folks Who Live On The Hill Old Folks Small Fry

Hop Sing Skip Nelson Gordon Jump

What do you want - good grammar or good taste?

This was the sketch...not one shooter, just, yet still...had no idea that anything like THAT was coming, and the timing, perfect.

From https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monty_Python%27s_Flying_Circus

Vernon Baird James Beard John Board

I can answer the question about Python, since I accidentally was watching when it made its American debut - on KERA, Dallas' PBS station. It caught on so quickly because it was funny as hell, simple as that! I was calling people up, like, 10 minutes into it telling them to turn their TV to Channel 13. And people afterwards were, like, WTF was THAT? OMG! Only we used words, not acronyms back then. If you want to get analytical about it, I suppose it was a matter of setting up expectations, diverting them, and then replacing them with this out of left field wacko stuff that was as literate as it was surreal. And, perhaps most importantly, the timing was perfect...if we want to think of a laugh as an involuntary response to a sensory stimulus, then I think you can consider that there's a "neurological pipeline" at play, and like any pipeline, the flow can be impeded, or even stopped, by any number of things. A connection with the basic setup of the premise in able to appreciate the payoff falls to the receiver, and the timing, putting the material into the pipeline at a rate that achieves maximal flow/minimal impedance, falls to the performer (and timing is not just verbal, it's physical as well). Timing really is everything, I think. Written humor depends on a certain rhythm, and rhythm is all about timing, yes? Why it resonated as it did here, in the time that it did, I think was possibly due to our post-Watergate/Viet Nam sense of life already being absurd, surrealistic, psychedelic, whatever. The first episode shown here was the one where the detective came into the room and soon started shooting people at random, just because. THAT was, for me, a reflexive belly laugh, because this guy was incompetent, arrogant, lethal, a total buffoon with the power of life and death being wielded totally arbitrarily, and that was like, spit-take funny because, so real and so absurd, so totally absurd, and so real all at once. How do you not laugh at that?

14/15, but I doesn't can know which one was I got wrong.

Also, if you want to get really wonkish, you can create a playlist using an m3u file...but that will not play in WMP. http://www.filetypehelp.com/create-m3u-file/

You can stick with MP4 & iTunes (which you seem to be suggesting ain't broke, so...you know) or you can create playlists for your FLAC files in WMP http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/create-change-media-player-regular-playlist#1TC=windows-7 If you use other media players, I'm sure there are playlists options in them too. Ultimately, I'd say it comes down to which player you enjoy the most.

Trying not to LOL at thinking that what if Jackie Paris had been Tony Bennett and vice-versa...I'm glad it ended up like it did, but still, it's a hoot to think about. I love Mingus, really love him, and this is the one chapter that I never had a really clear picture of, so...good times ahead.

Sid Melton Mary Grace Canfield James Monroe

The Byrds The Cyrcle The Pharcyde

Grammar and Grammper are both deceased, they all four got ran over in the rain, they deered, but thanks for asking. No need to apologize, you had no way of knowing.

Entertainer here, which I think is more a reflection of how messed up medieval times were than of anything else.

Play it Loud. Play it VERY loud!

I think so, pretty much...the laugh reflex seems to bypass even more "appropriateness filters" than the sexual stimulation ones. Of course, that's not to say that there's not room for appreciating the things that make for a good laugh, namely context, references, and timing, but all things being equal, two people can see/hear the same thing and one will do a pit-take, OMG THAT'S FUNNY, and the other one will jsut say BFD. And then when it gets into "what do you mean that's not funny, what kind of a pilkikrank are YOU?" and "oh, I see, you find gishicans acting like a foopledart funny, I never (or even worse, ALWAYS) figured to be a creepylesserhuman, and then, look out, no walking back from that shit, it gets real in a BIG hurry.

I've learned - the hard way - that comedic tastes are every bit as personalized, perhaps even as primal, as sexual tastes. Nobody's going to "get" anything unless they feel it inside. Argument is futile, argument for the purpose of conversion potentially volatile, if not outright dangerous. Some of the strongest arguments I've observed and/or been involved in have been generated from the that's funny/no it's not dichotomy between individuals. Ultimately, comedy is an instinct/reflex first, an idea (if even that!) second.

Posting about having other ways to waste your time is one of the best wastes of time imaginable!

Freddie Redd Ruff and Reddy Helen Humes