JSngry

Cooperage used to be a blues bar. I worked there regularly with a band called The Vipers. Glad to hear they're still open, and at least they're providing music for an audiences. A lot of places aren't either one,... Sorry to hear about Bob Farley...I taught there when I was in town, and always got obscenely good deals from the place. The manager was a trumpeter named Pancho Romero, and he, with the store's full backing, put together the Albuquerque Jazz Orchestra, which was a fun gig. No idea if either Pancho or the AJO are still around. Farley himslef was sort of a patron type guy, opened a gallery and made it a point to always have jazz gigs at every opening, plus opened it up as a rehearsal space for people he (or Pancho) trusted. Good guy for a musician to know, for sure. Also sorry to hear about the whole Garduño's thing. When they first opened they were a BIG deal, the first real "upscale" SW cuisine place in the area in terms of "trappings". The food was really good too, although I understand it didn't take them too much loner after we left (1984) to devolve into a profitable mediocre consistency. And what's really funny is that when I was living there, a fair number of people were also trying to live in the last century!

I use a picture I have of me & LTB from before we were married, one night in Vegas on the way to a gig, from when I was working in a "hotel show band" & she was taking a month off work to hang out with me to see if we were really going to be in it for the long haul. Or at least ready to get serious about being in it for the long haul. You never really know how much long and how much haul until after the fact. But neither of us knew that then. I used to use one of her taken in Albuquerque, in front of the Sandias, during the day, from, like, the first week after I met her, but it is just too distracting, if you know what I mean. Same for the one taken on a boat from when we were on our honeymoon.

Nah, I got that from my kids. Them and the Mighty Morphing Ninja Power Turtles, or whoever they were. And Pogs. And...all that. All I need is a good offseason!

You spend your time listening to players for whom a certain amount of basic instrumental proficiency is a given. There are other players out there - many of whom gig regularly - for whom that basic level has not yet been met. I'm appreciative of the work it takes to get there, that's all I'm saying. I mean it, that's all I'm saying. Everything else speaks for itself.

Speaking in terms of instrumental proficiency, yes, great players. I will respect that if I don't anything else (which I pretty much don't...). Instrumental proficiency? At what? At playing their instruments. Instrumental proficiency is not musical proficiency, just as you can be a good carpenter and not be shit as an architect/designer/whatever. With Ellington, you obviously had both, but with LCO, you just get guys who can play clean and in-tune and not not swing (sic). Beyond that is a black hole of the deepest degradation of music, but you do have that much. I've played an instrument and attempted to be somewhat serious at doing so, so for me not to acknowledge what accomplishment is there while pointing out what is so abominably not there just doesn't seem personally honest to me. You don't have that baggage, so by all means, feel; free to call a turd a turd! I mean, it took a lot of dedicated effort and genuinely hard work to play that badly so well.

Speaking in terms of instrumental proficiency, yes, great players. I will respect that if I don't anything else (which I pretty much don't...).

Contemporary, original, and relevant: None of the above: "Great players" and all that, but...totally none of the above. Totally. None. And yeah, I know that comparisons are not "fair". Too fucking bad about that.

This.

Here's hoping my guys can avoid the sweep. Grrrrr Watching this series has to this point been kind of a weird schizo deja-vu for me, like watching the Good Rangers play the Bad Rangers.

Russell Means Art Modell Ahmedian Gas & Plumbing Services: http://www.yell.com/b/Ahmedian+Gas+and+Plumbing+Services-Plumbers-Birmingham-B111NS-5366820/

Norm Cash Norm Crosby NORM!!!

Serious question - is this the same Cepeda family that produced the great baseball player Orlando Cepeda? Orlando was a very enthusiastic amateur salsero.

Is Garduno's still there? The Cooperage? Bob Farley Music? Or was that all last century? Either way, Happy Birthday!

I rather enjoyed that game.

Yes, and in doing so, it actually raises the bar, not lowers it. People will at first think it's better to go under the bar, but once motherfuckers start getting ahead by going over the bar because its soo damn crowded under it, things will get back to forward. Period of transition, that's all this is. Comes with every paradigm shift, and it might take a generation or century or so before it happens. But happen it will, because happen it does.

And yet, back in the day, the difference between Herbie, Chick, & Zawinul was obvious no matter what machines they were using. Same with Bernard Worrell. Same with a totally plugged-in Miles, or even Don Ellis. And especially Eddie Harris. I'll recount a story told to me by Dave Liebman. He was talking to Miles and expressed his frustration that he couldn't find anything new to say on "My Funny Valentine". Liebman said that Miles fixed him with a look and said, "Don't blame the tune.". By the same token, the new technology has made it easier for everybody to get the same basic sounds, and since most people ahve the same basic ideas, well, there you have it - nothing has really changed as far as "individuality", what's changed has just been taht it's easier for the uninspired to present the impression of basic competency. This in turn simply reinforces people's basic urge to identify with themselves and not have to be challenged with their own "averageness". It was different a while ago, because if you had nothing to say and/or couldn't really play, it would be obvious soon enough. People don't want to identify with "bad". But they will gladly identify with "good enough". You think that most people can tell the difference between competency and inspiration, between style and substance? Not only not now, no, but not ever. So AFAIC, all that technology is doing today is exposing a mass lack of individuality that has always been there. I don't think it's contributing to it at all, not in the sense of turning people from creative to zombie. They were already zombies, there was just more stigma to admitting it. The individual's basic direction is still their own choice to make. Plus, a big thing is that a lot of players who "come to" electronics/digital don't always feel the need to get fully immersed in it, often because it's not their voice, they jsut want to "experiment" with it. Whereas, you get these young folk that digital is more or less all they know, hey, they're not experimenting, they're doing. A lot of "under the radar" stuff going on that might sound all the same to us old folks who will never be able to fully "hear" that way, but...it's not meant for us, nor should it be. Everything is a tool. Everything. Your single coil P90 pickup is no less nor no more a tool than is the laptop that one kid is using to "battle" another one with with their "beats".

Always enjoyed his work, all of it. Very sorry to hear that he's left us.

I had not really seen Cincinnati until last night. That's a strong looking team, in terms of both tools and attitude.Lose your ace after one batter. Oh well, let's play ball! Looking forward to seeing the Nationals for the first real time too. Somebody needs to stop the Satan Louis Cardinals!

I wonder if people said the same thing about the printing press, and how people were getting all self-absorbed with their books now. I know that television made people stay at home more and socialize less. So, cell phones and such, not so much a new trend as the continuation of a long arc of a trend. Meaning that iof people need an excuse to be self-absorbed and disinterested, they'll use whatever means the technology of the time allows to so be, But back to the music - That Paula Morlenbaum record is really good. Insidiously good. Check it out!

I just reflexively look for the original cover http://www.amazon.com/Sound-Jones-Lewis-featuring-Brown/dp/B0000658GK/ref=ntt_mus_ep_dpi_21 But hey...

A bit more than I care to pay at this time, unfortunately... Apparently there's different lsitings for this CD on Amazon, found one with much better prices here: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000005HBD/ref=s9_simh_gw_p15_d0_i2?pf_rd_m=ATVPDKIKX0DER&pf_rd_s=center-2&pf_rd_r=1CCNT5P0H5WTXRX0XMS7&pf_rd_t=101&pf_rd_p=1389517282&pf_rd_i=507846 Gracias beaucoup, Paul!

"Machines and gadgets" got nothing to do with anything. They're just tools, means to an end. If you got nothing to put in, that's what will come out - nothing. OTOH: Different in the morning, yet by the end of the day, still the same.

This is good stuff. FWIW, I don't think of it as "Disco" nearly as much as I do just one type of "dance music". Maybe takes away the stigma that might interfere with experiencing it for what it really is, same as with any "label" we put on any music. But yeah, good stuff. Them Philly cats was doin' it.

Dewey Terry Terry Riley Riley Keough

SS1 gotta be happy today!