JSngry

I used to buy them at a Firestone store. Really. In fact, the very first jazz record I evr bought was a Crown/Dave Brubeck thing at that same Firestone store, . I remember feeling like I had crossed some sort of major threshold, almost like Art Pepper felt the first time he shot up, all like "This will forever more be my life, and things will never be the same again". Back then, actually buying a record, especially an album, was an act of committment and investment, since my high-school-freshman-allowance in 1970 was about $1.00 a week. I had only been hearing jazz for for about 4-5 months, so to do the spending thin, hey, that was a life-decision, dig? In facct, when I bought my next one a few weeks later (a Capitol Duophonic issue of Kenton's Artistry In Rhythm with a 60s cover but the original 40s back), my buddies were all like, "Wow, two of those jazz records in a row, what's that all about?" But the Crown was the first, and I'm wanting to place the date at December 26, 1970. A Saturday early afternoon, and I had some Christmas money and the Firestone store was just a few blocks away (they also carried two Woody Herman Cadet sides too, I eventually got one, and my buddy got the other, which I borrowed from him and never returned since he got shot a few later attempting to hold up a 7-Eleven by using the old finger-sticking-out-of-your-pocket-looking-like-it-might-be-a-gun trick, and no, I'm not making any of this up...) So the Crown came home, and Side one was some weird version of Angel Eyes NOT by Bruneck- George Nielsen or somebody -, but there were two nice cuts after that, one of which was the very special "Sacre Blue" that didn't even have Brubeck on it, but I dodn't know that and thought that he must've been playing the french horn-sounding thingy because how do you have a Dave Brubeck album and have cuts without Dave Brubeck on it, huh Crown? But the pressing was SO bad, and Desmond played SO good, that it really was some form of junkie-isitic buzz, beleive me. And when side two of that Crown was the sidelong "At A Perfume Counter", well, that was that. A whole side of a record with just one song of guys just making it up as they went along, especially that longass bangy piano solo that was really REALLY out, with an audience that made noise. That was some cool shit right there, jack, and almost immediately, I started buying more jazz records everywhere they existed, which, musch to my surprise, was more often than not in the cutout bins. Thanks, Crown!

They did, but I've never found them.

Oh yeah, Altschul You Can't Name Your Own Tune on Muse (later on 32), one of the better records most folsk have never heard.

Anybody puts those Japan-only Circle sides out, I'm buying.

Anybody heard this guy?

Possible biright side - the attention being paid to "oversupply of CDs". BN's allegedly always been ran tightly with usually realistic budgeting supporting usally realistic sales projections. Not a big "winner" of a line (except when there's a breakout like Norah or that Cantaloop band, sorry can't remember their name right now...Us3?). So, if ownership is looking at overestimation and overproduction as the problem du jour, BN decidedly does not come into that picture. Then again, this is the music business. all bets are off except that somebody's eventually gonna do something stupid.

OTOH, have you considered that in fact Britney is "role-playing" the ten thousandth performance of "child star achieves great success, can't handle it, descends into booze & drug pit of despair"? Sure, that's a given. But not my point. OK, and my reaction to the fascination with Brit doesn't have anything to do with "conformity" or enjoying someone "pay the price" but rather that it is nothing other than the same instinct to rubber-neck at the site of a car wreck. Indeed, which is why I said "a lot of people" as opposed to just "people". But believe me, in small towns across America, there are oodles and boodles of people comforting themselves with the notion that whatever dreams and/or ideas that they might have had but didn't follow through on, well, it's all for the best because the more you get the more you want and pretty soon you end up wanting it all and if you get it you'll just end up like Britney Spears so ain't we got it great right here right now? Even if their dream was just to not be where they are now when they got to be this age. Even if their idea was to get to be a not so big fish in a not so small pond. Trust me, "these people" are my people, and I know it's going on. It always has and it always will.

Yes, but I also think it might have been along the lines of Betty Grable and Harry James. Only prettier (in the good sense), I would hope...

Some, not as much as earlier. I'll come back to it later this year to see how it's feeling. FWIW though, Beautifully Human is still tripping me out. Playd it just last week and still got the goosebumps. In for the duration, I think it's gonna be. (Miltonic Inversion!)

Ok, kinder, gentler version: I'm not fond of "broad generalizations" unless they're copped to in advance as being such, and I really don't like being placed under/inside one of them things myself based on little or no "deep background". Without getting too "personal", let's just say that, for a diverse number of personal/cultrual/geographic reasons, the disconnect between "assumptions" and "reality" have been the bane of my existence, and if I had back all the time I've had to spend disproving or otherwise working around them, I'd probably be half my current age. Also, I find the linking of "classical" music and "lasting value" (or whatever) to be alarm-raising in terms of my own personal sensibilities, which have consistently & constantly evolving away from a, for lack of a better term, "Euro-dependency" for a good long while now. I certainly respect the hell out of that tradition and all that it offers, but I have come of age in a time where "other options" - beginning, for me, with jazz - have presented themselves with enough ongoing access & depth/breadth of availability to make the formulation of a viable personal esthetic not tethered to "classical" music both viable, sustainable, and, above all, wonderfully open-ended in terms of discoveries both internal and external. The "classical" tradition of course has deep and lasting value for those to whom it has a deep and lasting relevance, but any implication that it is the only one that does (and/or that jazz is more or less equates with "the same thing", when in fact, if it is, then lots of other things are too...) will be met with no small lack of... kindly acceptance by me. It's a bigger, older, deeper, and broader world than any of us know, that's all I'm saying. We all have our "answers", but let's not confuse our answers with the answers when it comes to determining who is what and why. Because you may be right, but you may also be very, very wrong. And hey- being right is where it's at, ain't it? :g :g

Substitute "free jazz" for "smooth jazz" and I'm with you..... Uh oh, a wink...a seemingly sincere friendly gesture... Dude, I read the board and post in a " top down" order. So when you read a not-quite "winking" response I gave you in another thread "above" this one" keep that in mind ok?

OTOH, have you considered that in fact Britney is "role-playing" the ten thousandth performance of "child star achieves great success, can't handle it, descends into booze & drug pit of despair"? Sure, that's a given. But not my point.

As for the time/resources/reward thing, all I can say is that I've been blessed to be able to have spent approximately 30 years not doing too much other - literally - than exploring music as a player/fan/listener and being a husband/father. I think the odds that I know about the whole time/resources/reward as it works for me are better than even. One thing I've learned is that deep and narrow ain't really no different than wide and shallow. Yin & yang, front and back, same thing from different sides. Myself, I've tried to travel wide and deep, often at the expense of more...earthbound chores. I have succeeded some and failed some. But I have put forth an honest, earnest, and not unfocused effort. Now, what's this about "the extra-aesthetic functions of pop music work against aesthetic experience to a far greater extent than in jazz and classical music"? I'm not at all sure about that one...all musics have "extra-esthetic functions", an if you think that hearing the jazz of, say, 1965, or even 1975, and definitely 1955 and forget about 1935, carries the same "esthetic function" today that it did then, I think you're wrong. And let's not even get into the "extra-aesthetic functions" of "classical" music. We don't have enough time or bandwidth... I am slowly becoming of the mind that the "effect" of any music is at least as dependant on the recipient of the music as it is any intrinsic quality of the music itself. That is, I'm begionning to believe that claims of inherent/congenital/whatever "qualities" of any music are just so much projection. Which is to say that ultimately music is a vehicle rather than an end to itself. Any rewards we do or don't get from any music reflect our relationship to that music at least as much as any "essential" quality of the music itself. That's not going to be a popular notion, and I'm not 100% sure about it myself, but the harder I try to "prove" it false, the more I fail to do so. Personally, I think that anybody who can wax rhapsodic about Bach and shit and not get a raging hardon for a good James Brown cut is either culturally limited/isolated/deprived (in which case, hey, not your fault or problem) or, more likely in these days and times and world, is just faking it and is having a programmed response and is getting a 'nother kind of hardon from being a "good boy". But that's just me, mind you, and no way will I claim that that line of thought is my A-Game. Other than that, you are making a whole lot of assumptions about where I'm "at", what my musical motivations & interests are, have been, and likely will be, and my personal/esthetic relation to "pop" music at this moment. I daresay that none of these assumptions are even 50% accurate, but I'll not attempt to dissuade you of these notions, if only because I doubt it to be possible. Why? Because in my experience, anybody who "questions" somebody else's taste by playing the "what I like has Proven Lasting Value and everything else, well, it might be "good" and all that, but brr argh cough spittle piss etc" card just don't even want to entertain the notion of even thinking about other possibilities. If you like Music A, it must be for Reason C, and so on and so on, and if you say otherwise, well, ok wink wink wink if that's what you tell yourself, good for you. Anything else cannot be real because...it can't be! Now, am I making assumptions about you that are not true? Could be. But I wonder why you see fit to "question" my - hell, anybody's - current (or otherwise) interests and project all sorts of ready-made scenarios onto the whys and hows thereof. If I told you about the immense musical interest I have in the "dance underground" shit I've been into (the only even remotely "pop" music I am currently actively interested it, btw, and if media exposre and access is any indication, calling it "pop" is due more to a failure of imagination than it is any keen powers of discernment...), if I broke it down into highly specific technicalities, would you believe me? Or would there be this continuing underlying condescension of assumptions about "motivations" and such? If I told you about how I personally relate to rhythm and texture, and how in certain hands they can all by themselves speak to me every bit as deeply and meaningfully as melody and harmony can in other people's hands (and how yeah, it's nice when you get all four in one place at the same time, but I myself don't have to have that to get on board for the ride), would you hear me? Or would you start up again with the Match Reaction From Column A To Motivation From Column B Then Compare To My Game game? In short, could you even begin to conceive, never mind perceive, a reality that is every bit as true - not more true or better true, just as true - as yours that is not yours? Am I making assumptions about you that are not true? Could be. But whenever somebody accords me the high honor of taking my "claims" at "face value", well, let's just say that it takes a big woman to weigh 300 lbs, but it takes an even bigger wheelbarrow to carry her around in, and let's just leave it at that, shall we? I myself don't understand how people come to value the "forgone conclusion" game as much as they do, especially as it pertains to who/what they're going to "allow" themselves to be. But it sure is popular, so I guess there's something to it.

Indeed! Thanks! Miltonic, as in John Milton? What, was he the first guy to do it?

I did that a while back. Lots to cringe at, but still, some real spirit that remains admirable. And Buddy, for all his Buddy-ness, drove that band like no other. Major props from me for that. I guess you could say "love" without "like", or vice-versa, depending on how you look at it.

Thanks, Larry. I gotta wonder what it was like succeeding Ernie Kovacs as a life-partner. Talk about following in some footsteps...

Word. And I'm not nearly as opposed to the concept of "smooth jazz" as I am the actual results....

Yeah, Corre w/Rich struck me in a positive way early on too, that's why I ask. Thanks!

Where instead of saying "I cannot hide my love for you" you say. "My love for you I cannot hide"? Or something like that. Seems like that's a fallback position for a lot of lyric writers when they need a rhyme to K.I.S.S. The rules, regulations, and terminology if formal grammar and sentence diagramming were a loooong time ago for me...

It's a vicarious kick for a lot of people to see someone "live the dream" & then "pay the price". It confirms for them that their "normal" life of unquestioning conformity & role-playing is really the best that life has to offer, and that they really shouldn't try to do anything other than stay right where they are. Unfortunately, that ends up framing things like "effort" and "success" in totally unrealistically magnified mega-terms, and the very real pleasures of rewards of smaller scale/less recognized "personal progress" end up getting lost. And so do"the beast" and his minions claim more souls. Britney's just the bait.

This has long been a favorite of mine, and let me reiterate again that Cannonball's playing continued to evolve "outward" until his death, even if the settings he put it in could and did go all over the place (but oh my god, check out the best cuts from The Black Messiah and gottDAMN is that some hot shit!!!!) . There's a story there, although what it is and who it might be of interet to is in no way a fixed quantity... And yeah, hot, bashing bands that feed off of the audience, whatever happened to those delightful life-affirming creatures? For that matter, whatever happened to those audiences? I've actually played rooms where whooping at the music is grounds for expulsion but quietly (and not so quietly) ignoring the band is actually encouraged. WTF is that all about anyway? "Popular", "populist", even "pop", these are not intrinsically bad things, and "we" wish them away at no small risk to the musico/socio-ecosystem...

Where is Jay Corre today, and what is he doing?

Was it Pete or Conte who was married to Edie Adams?

Bingo.

To what end? No minds will be changed, and stereotypes will just be reinforced all round. Hardly seems like a productive use of resources. I will say, however, that there is/has/will probably be enough (and even a little is enough, really) of musical interest in various types of pop to merit keeping an ear open when something good comes along. I for one am always interested in "what's going on" as a matter of personal curiosity, not some out of some "aging hipster" bullshit. But those who seem to love nothing more than to fall for/into the preordained roles of what people are "supposed" to be are going to say that that's ridiculous. Fine, but I think it's even more ridiculous to let your tears, fears and prejudices turn into dogmas about "age-appropriate" tastes in music. Like there's not already enough bullshit telling us what/who we "should" or "shouldn't" be. And the whole "dancing" = "idiots" thing, here we go again. What a fundamental misunderstanding of the human spirit that line betrays... Sad... It's really easy to generalize and stereotype, if only because the generalities and stereotypes exist with good reason. But they're in no way the whole picture. To advocate open-minded/ended curiosity in some areas of music and disdain it - not just cop to it not being one's preferred taste, but actually mock it - in others seems a bit...hypocritical? Self-serving? Unable to conceive of a reality beyond one's own? Bottom line for me - the "Pop isn't reality" line is both obviously true and less obviously a wicked lie. One fails to recognize - and explore - the spectrum of implications that follows from that at one's, if not exactly peril, then at least the risk of developing a social myopia disguised as smug self-justification masking an incapactity of broad-based empathy. Or maybe it's the existance of same in the first place that leads one down that path. Chicken or egg... Ok, so maybe that is an argument. Probably is. But I still say - to what end? No minds will be changed, and stereotypes will just be reinforced all round. Hardly seems like a productive use of resources, especially since one windbag such as myself will no doubt trigger others to cycle around again. In the meantime, I've got a dog to walk and a wife to hug. Life is sometimes good and simple, just like pop is. Sometimes.