JSngry

Ajaye was also one of the orriginal writers on In Living Color. But he left after the first (or second?) season, didn't like all the "buffoonery", wanted there to be room for some more subtle, cerebral humor as well. Oh well. But yeah, Franklin Ajaye is an undersung hero of American humor. Those records he made for Little David aren't revolutionary or epochal like, say, Richard Pryor's WB records of the same time, but they do presnt a very unique, subtly funny comic perspective. So, whatever happened to Franklin Ajaye? And how's that for thread-drift?

I met Carter, too----by the cube by St. Mark's place, both of us listening to Vincent Herring as a kid. That was where he played and made a name. Carter sat in, I think. Real nice cat. Sad that he died so far from home. In Poland, I think. \ I really did like Woody's band. I heard them in the earliest 80s, the first time I heard Mulgrew Miller. He played 'Bye Bye Blackbird' by playing the melody on the last A up a b5, so it sounded Lydian. Carter was probably in that band. I remember Steve Turre being there for sure. I saw Woody twice, once w/Carter & once with Turre. Not sure if they ever toured w/Woody at the same time or not. That would have been interesting to hear if they had, that book scored for three horns live.

And I swear that whoever did that PC music lifted that lick of a Roy Wood/Wizzard record, exactly. Except Roy Wood just used it for a few seconds and this other motherfucker probably sen his kids to college and bought a bigass boat with it! And you wonder why cats get evil sometimes?

Besides, I met Woody one time. 1978 or so, Oklahoma City, of all places. He was really nice to me, both him & Carter Jefferson. But then they decided to look for somebody who was from the area and knew where things were, if you get my drift. Conversation over, immediately. No big deal, it wasn't like I couldn't relate, ya' know? And ditto if he would have gotten evil. This shit happens. And I'd be a liar if I said it has nothing to do with the music, at least socially, as far as who hangs with who and where all that leads. Sometimes anyway. But c'est la fucking vie about that. It is what it is and you figure out what works for you like that, make your peace with it, and go on ahead accordingly. They're both dead now, and I'm not, so score one for me. Then again, they were, and will forevermore be, Woody Shaw & Carter Jefferson. So score one for them. I'd have done some things differently, they probalby would have too, but in the end, we are who wwe are, we do what we do, and that's that. Now about the Mickey joke, it's preceded by a long bit about Ajaye and his buddy Trey dropping mushrooms and going to Disneyland. 'Nuff said.

Hey man, Woody's dead, god bless/rest his soul. We're here now. Party on, ok? While we can.

Why? Because we like you.... J S N....G R Y.......M.O. = "U.S.E."* * Unusual Situations Explored You ever heard the Franklin Ajaye bit about Mickey Mouse? I won't give away the punchline here, but a little 2ng hand sleuthing might yield this: in which case, carpe diem & laugh your ass off at what happens when Mickey goes to get it on with Minnie.

Reading Micheal Cuscuna's notes to the Shaw Mosaic says it all, I think. Woody Shaw was a brilliant man and an often troubled man, sometimes by his own doing, sometimes not. Cuscuna got to see all of it more than a few times, and he still feels the love for Woody in spite of the bad times. I can (and have, and probably will again) put up with some really obnoxious and/or troubled people in the name of getting to be a part of some good, at times possibly even great, music. "Nice people" are cool and all that, but when it comes time to play, give me anybody who can do it, I don't care how big of an asshole they might have been five minutes before downbeat. Now's the time, not five minutes ago. And oh, did I hear somebody say "Ellington Orchestra"? If "hurt feelings" cwere worth destroying a musical relationship, that shit would have been long gone before it really was.

IIRC, Farrell was living in Malibu then. That's what "Skateboard Park" was all about, I think.

So remember boys and girls, not all great musicians are nice (or even untroubled!) people 100% of the time!

All well, good, and certainly understandable, but I believe that if you're going to put your name on something as a leader, then you should be as ready as you can be. Anything less, I dunno, it just seems a bit of a vanity effort to put something out just because you can. I mean, ok, you're old, sick, just out of jail, whatever, in the process of discovering something heretofore unknown (oops, wrong century!), something like that, hey, it ain't gonna necessarily be "prime". Understood. But sometimes I hear people and I think, hell, know, that a month, hell, even a few weeks or so of heavy shedding would have made things so much better. And yeah, I know, sometimes things pop up at the very last minute, but still, that don't happen all that often. Not for a cat to get together a leader date. But then again, these are very trying times. But then yet again again, all the more reason to try to get it right, w/o excuses or fallbacks.

I like Jemeel Moondoc just fine as well, no way I'd call him a BS-er, that's waaaaaay harsh (and not true) but.... I'd like him a lot more fine if he'd clean up his fingers just a little bit. The ideas are definitely there, and the execution is too about 95% of the time, but it's that 5% that bugs me, since it sure seems to me that it's shit that could be cleaned up w/o too much trouble. Sometimes you fumble just 'cause your mind gets ahead of itself. Can't do too much about that other than chase it and see if you can eventually catch it. But sometimes you fumble just cause your fingers get just ain't fully conditioned. And that you can fix, just by practicing. Trust me, I speak from plenty of experience about this...

Kay Starr is not an artist away from whom I would reflexively turn.

A massivehigh ceilinged chamber inside a fish's head to make the point that we have severely underestimated our size relative to the fish, otr else the fich has displayev enormous courtesy all thee yeasrs by not disrupting pout landbond lives with his clearly superior ability to use his held as a world-classmeeting center and novelty tiurest attractioin. You've noit livreed until you've seen the sunrise while flying through the sy sitting in the fishes eye, the eay the sun and the 35 foot top-iuo-bottom range of the fishe's head feekibg to all the world like a goof bottle of caberneight savignnuon being used the way for which it was intended, that is to say to maximize a fishes' tru potetnial as luxury resorts. You'll not want to miss this chance to live life through the eyes of the unencumbered fish of thi world.

Welcome aboard, and draw your own conclusions!

When it comes to CTI, the internets is your friend.

Now, if it's really kinda creepy you want out of a Scopitone, try this: Kay Starr - Wheel Of Fortune Then again, it's the oddity of the whole Scopitone production values that keep them "interesting" today, no? So many of them play like stag films trying to not be stag films. That's always gonna be awkward, like walking up to the altar to take communion with a hardon you get from watching the minister's daughter a few pews in front of you... But ok, here's a truly creepy Scopitone: It's like Devo before anybody even thought about Devo, and if that's not a disturbing notion...

Dude, watch it again - she pulls him down. What I found kinda creepy was the little post-it notes washing down the gutter with things like LOVE & LUST handwritten on them. The rest of it was pretty much cheesy imo, not so much creepy as just plain Ed Wood-ish bad. I do like that record, though. Never heard it before. Very much a period thing, but very nicely so.

Nooooo, NOT banned! http://www.organissimo.org/forum/index.php?showtopic=648

Raney did a few sides for Capitol with Nelson Riddle doing hte charts, and they're all dandy, what with Riddle upping his game just a little bit, always a sign of his respect for the musicianship of the talent. That's borne out by the fact that for years, Raney was Riddle's female vocalist for his assorted pick-up gigs where he'd front an orchestra playing his book for various social functions. So yeah, Sue Raney's got skills, no doubt.

But sersiously folks, that's a pretty nifty production in that genre. Did a little research and found this: http://www.sueraney.org/liners/aliveliner.html Hey....

And now....................the REST of the story:

I think that Farrell himself had a glass eye, that's why it turned up a few times on the CTI covers. Or so I've been told.

Aw man, don't be. I mean, I dig and respect Brian, but hell, sometimes you just gotta call him on his bullshit, just so he knows that you know, if you know what I mean