JSngry

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RiAExfz82xI

Oh MILTON...

I'm getting a weird box where Mike Weil's post is, and the only way I can see the rest of the thread is to click the "Other Options" button, which takes me to this posting box. It's odd, there's no other thread where this is happening...

Is anybody else having this thread display weird?

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Speaking of spreading wide open... http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QGJuBI9mkWY...feature=related Can't say that I "like" this, but anybody with ears for harmony & voices oughta be able to tell that this is some flat-out badass shit.

Puerling subtly spreads "Prelude To A Kiss" wide open, and lo, her majesty resists not! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k8osz0PLgME

Got the Bird Verve box for < $75.00. Been meaning to upgrade from the old LP Box of the 80s & get all the "new" stuff" for, what, 20 years? Seemed like a good time to do so.

I thought it was gonna be about touring with Milt Jackson.

I believe it is me who is misremembering. Starlite it was.

I dunno, Gladys Knight, Jill Scott, & Maze, that sounds like a damn good time to me, even if it ain't "jazz". Peabo Bryson, too, although if he gets sick and cancels, hey... Those other cats, though... uh... No.

Alright, this type of thing will drive a lot of people crazy, I know, but...DAMN! http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vV6VKlz0rJk

Big difference for me between early Hi-Los & later hi-Los and especially Singers Unlimited is that the early Hi-Los stuff was quite often hardcore in-your-face altered harmony, where as the later stuff was all about being "lush", although, particularly in the case of the Singers, in some very advanced/sophisticated ways. Not to say that one way is "better" than the other, just to say that that's the difference for me, and although it might have taken more maturity to have done the later stuff, it definitely took a lot of youthful arrogance to do the earlier. I'm of the mind that the opportunity to effectively be youthfully arrogant is quite a limited one relative to the time one has to be mature, so whenever somebody carpe diems on it like Puerling did, hey, Love Points are earned. Either way, though, I don't think there's any question that the guy was a master.

Somebody? Anybody?

The Hi-Los Spotlite recordings are probably the most audacious vocal writing in the history of Popular Music, in spite of plenty of moments of androgynous piffle and/or camp that knows no shame. It doesn't matter, that stuff is off the hook, all the way. Their very first recording (not on Spotlite, btw, but today sometimes bundled in with those recordings), "They Didn't Believe Me" is just so....radical. "Outside the box" hell, these guys were outside the box, off the shelf, through the door, into the car, and on the plane, all in less than three minutes. (curbing impulse to rag on the wimpy Four Freshmen right now...) Singers Unlimited, I didn't dig back in the day, I might now, but maybe not. I don't dig Columbia Hi-Los as much as Spotlite Hi-Los. Maybe Puerling "got it all out" early on and realized that if he kept on doing it like that, he'd have to repeat himself, and eventually become a gimmick writer, so he decided on a more moderate approach that would surprise less but wear easier over the long haul. I don't know. What I do know is that the guy was a master of his craft, a knowing practitioner of his art, and that ain't nobody before, after, and quite possibly ever come close to what he did early on. RIP, and thanks. Big thanks.

Never Again! is a great album! If you don't believe me, ask Dan Morgenstern:

Haven't gotten this, probably won't since I have all the originals, but for those who are curious about those albums, pricey but available. Mr. Tanno, perhaps? http://www.dustygroove.com/item.php?id=tmn...%3Bformat%3Dall

Rickey Nize - Mistaken Identity

Sam's one of those guys who's gonna do what he does no matter what or where. As a result, most all of his recordings are "about the same" from a casual listening perspective. But what he does is totally in control, very, very high level musicianship in the service of a musicality that is equally high. So even if one wishes to say that "if you've heard one or two, you've heard 'em all", ok, that's a convenient way to skate around the reality that even on just those one or two, you've heard some of the most together, personal, and substantial music that you're gonna here out of an "improvisational musician". To the end of context, though, I found his playing on Hilton Ruiz' RCA sides of the '90s to be delightfully fresh and at times even startling in terms of the whole "expectations of context vs reality of solo" dynamic. Once again, Sam "just" did what he did, but where he was doing it was not where you would expect him to be doing it, and yeah!

I set up a Photobucket account, upload the scans to that, and then link them here from there,

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