JSngry

I think all the great movements in jazz (as well as the non-great ones) had/have more to do with "defining of self" than they did "aesthetics". And I think it's important to keep that cart before that horse, lest we shift the game from the universe to the parlor, as well as losing the right to reserve the right. But alas, here I go getting all polemical and shit. DAMMIT!!!! :g:g

It does. And it's taken the fun out of it, or at least a lot of it. Not just the fun, but the joy (fun is kinda cheap, ya' know, nothing wrong with that, but...). Seems like whenever and whatever you play, the expectations (of everybody) is that you "be" something. Pop gig, lounge gig, jazz gig, it's all about role-playing in the playing. Which is ok in one way, I mean, yeah, if you got people paying you, or even just giving you the compliment of giving you a place in their plans, of requesting your presence instead of somebody else s, they got a right, and if you don't feel like being that, then lord knows, other people need the gig and the money, but.... I've yet to come up with a real solution/replacement, though, but that's my problem. And I realize I'm being a bit spoiled/petulant/goofy here, so enough of that. But please, just...stop it, everybody, audience and players like, with this "everything's got to mean something" business. No, it doesn't (and if it does, it will, regardless of what we "want" or "think"), and besides, you get out of something what you go looking for. The more I live, the more I'm convinced of that. Nature abhors a vacuum, etc. You can convince yourself of anything if it's what you want to believe. In the meantime, life goes on, and if you don't believe that it does, try and stop it. I dare you! Just remember that everything was perfect in the Garden Of Eden until people started fucking around with "knowing" instead of "being". They thought it would be better, right? Well, maybe not so much, eh?

Royalties don't matter any more because musicians don't matter any more. The product is out there and it is owned, so now it's on to maintaining ownership of both product and market, both of which are analog in nature. And that is all about convincing people that "digital music" and "digital product" are the same thing. I find it amusing, albeit sadly comic, that many people who are embracing this "digital technology" would run screaming from a room where actual digital music, music that reflects a people whose basic cores have been altered to think in terms of a multi-planed simultaniosity was being played (hell, Cecil Taylor was ALL about that, so it's not the "product" that's at issue, because a lot of people still want to run screaming from the room when HE plays, but enough time has passed where they'll just leave at the first convenient opportunity). People want to say, hey, it's a reduction to 1s & 0s, but, ok, that's analog thinking right there. The reality is that it's about "there" or "not there", yin-yang, complmentary opposites, can't ahve one without the other, blahblahblah. That's digital, not all this 1 & 0 techno"logical" stuff. But hey, it's ok, let me hear Sidewinder (or Point of Departure or whatever) on my computer for free without having the clutter of CDs and stuff, and hey, wow, look at me, I'm living in the DIGITAL AGE! REALLY!! WOW!!!!

Feed you ego, Chuck. Go ahead on! Ego is not a bad word, and it's good to see one in the service of actually making new furniture instead of just rearranging the old stuff, which, by the way, keeps getting more worn every time somebody uses it. At some point, it will have to be replaced, but by then, the only people who will know how to build new furniture instead of rearranging the old will be making stuff that the people who have worn out the old stuff won't want to use, so...onto the floor with their sorry tired asses, and careful not to step on them...or not!

Guilty here, yes. Pleasure...maybe. Thad Jones did a few of the arrangements, so I got curious. It don't suck. The title cut, btw? Arranged by Gerald Wilson.

hmmmm... on the one hand, yeah, ok, sure, and sometimes you need to take a stand, but on the other hand, that can all get in the way of being your natural self, and not just in music. "How old would you be if you didn't know how old you were" just as easily translates into "who would you be if you didn't know who you were supposed to be". And of course, the more that the "supposed to be" comes from externally, the less natural to self it becomes, except in the sense that there's always somebody looking to fuck somebody up for some reason. not proposing a solution, don't have one, but it seems to me that the less often people respond to the external "supposed to be"s, the more pushed back upon they become. Hell, I like the Ronettes, Sonny Rollins, Steve Lacy, The Beach Boys, George Jones, all kinds of House music, all kinds of Jazz music, just all kinds of MUSIC music, and I'd love to have a band that lives in a world that has a sustainable business model for servicing the live musical needs of people who are likewise so inclined. But that's who I "am", and I'm not "supposed to be" that, at least not if I want to have what I want from the world as it exists. Try playing "Ghosts" & "Goodnight Sweetheart" back to back for any kind of audience except one who's looking for "irony", and see how far that gets you. And even for the irony-seekers, hey, sorry, there ain't none there except what you project onto it. So in the end, you're fucked there as well, because no fool like to be called a fool, except by a fellow fool who's looking to join the club. So what do I do, make some kind of manifesto-polemic and create a bunch of contrived music about what I'm not and what I don't like and how what I do like is SO much better but NOBODY GETS IT BUT ME, and how what I like and what "the world" likes is constantly at odds except in polarized little cubbyholes? Yeah, I could do that, but how natural does that end up being? How is making music - and seeking a business opportunity - in response to everything I don't like preferable to making music in response to what I do like, other than doing the former serves the needs of the marketplace, which is always looking to stir up some shit, because stirred-up shit always sells, at least in the short-term. Why, I don't know. It still smells like shit. stirred up or not. And inevitably shit gets stirred up, because even if you do just do what comes natural, somebody is going to be looking to use it as a business opportunity to "make a statement" against what THEY feel is fucked up. So...there's no escape but back into yourself, and that only works if you know what you're getting into by going there. Be prepared! I think the only statement that I have to make at this point is that I have no statement to make, and no, that is not intended to be a statement in itself. Definitely not. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NmOE92ACzZY Are these "statements" or are these just natural, beautiful expressions of who people are? I think it only becomes a "statement" when somebody needs it to be, for whatever reason, and that's when the door gets opened to the forces of "supposed to be". Lord we don't need another "statement"...we just need people to be who they are. If that's too hard to figure out on its own terms, if life is too obtuse on this plane that it needs to be reduced down to a "statement", then walk away from that shit, and the faster the better. Ain't no need for it to be like that.

This.

Don't really have anything to add to the particular discussion at hand, just want to highlight this amazing descriptive phrase.

Yes, fight, Butch, fight!

Melky Mesa!!! He made his MLB debut yesterday as a pnich runner in the 14th inning yesterday, and on a hit he missed third. He at least had the presence of mind to backtrack and touch third, next guy gets a hit... Actually it was an error by the Oakland first baseman, but since the Rangers seem to be taking a non-working vacation in Seattle, who cares? A's lose, (although they did their damnedest for a while not to.), so who's quibbling?

Don Pardo Mel Brandt Bill Hanrahan

W.C. Handy W.C. Fields Jack Parr

Without Elvin, I think the thing might not be more than a near-miss curiosity. But with Elvin, it's a VERY SPECIAL curiosity.

Of current labels issuing exclusively new material, Pi, most likely.

I'd pick three and then sneak in Moon and/or Alamac when nobody was looking.

...flirted with musical and cognitive dissonance.

Who knew?

Dennis Charman Sophie Charman-Blower Angie Dickinson

My Astros highlight of the year was watching them represent the old Colt .45 unis tonight. Full-frontal smoking gunnage. Amazing!

Don Myrick The Phenix Horns Arizona Dranes

Sylvia Kristel Kristel Moreno Arte Moreno

And oh, by the way - Yu Darvish.