JSngry

In St. Louis? I think you're thinking of Vintage Vinyl. Was in U-City when I went to Washington University. Yeah, Vintage Vinyl. Are they still around? Used to have some good jazz there.

All About Jung?

Yep, that's it. Mighty fine stuff!

Is Virgin Vinyl still around?

This got me to thinking aobut another meeting between Mingus & Cat Anderson from roughly the same time - the Newport In New York jam session that got released on Cobblestone. there was some magic happening on that gig, even if it was more of a group thing and not specific to either Mingus or Anderson. Mosaic Select, where are you?

Why does this album cover: Put me in mind of this one: Is it the similarity in color scheme, is ther something more subliminal at work, or is it just me? Looking for some real insight here into the finer points of design/etc. if there's any to be had., seriously. As always, thanks in advance!

You mean I done been lifted?

Yeah, I can go for that myself.

Yours, mine, and the world's!

When I was a teenager, I used to wake up with some sort of plasmatastic goo all over my groin area, like some ghosts or something had been visiting. It's been a while since that happened, but damned if I can figure out what it was or how it happened.

Maybe they should sign Santana?

Pops Poopadeaux - "Baby Pants"

Exactly! A lot of the recording techniques used then sound...."funny" today (but then again, lots of people can't handle the sound of 78 era material, & even RVG's style sounds odd to some of todays ears). And certainly there were any number of attempts at "commercialism" and/or a "contemporary" sound that were ill-advised (and even more illy-executed...). But, and this is my main point - you get all of that in all eras of music. That's just how it goes. What's interesting to me about the "70s" as it pertains to jazz is that in previous eras, a ot of the production choices were made to "whiten" the music. Even a seemingly benign choice such as programming a set of standards instead of originals could - could - be a move to appeal to a broader (i.e. - "whiter") audience. Monk's first two trio albums for Riverside were explicit attempts to do exactly that. Monk! The 70s, especially the earlier 70s, were often the opposite of that. Afro-centrism, Black Power, etc. were very potent social forces at the time, and plenty of African-American musicians felt empathy with a lot of this, even if they might have been of an earlier musical generation . so yeah, things got mixed in, and with mixed results, but the "attempt" here was to make the music appeal less, not more "white". What I find myself unable to totally disabuse myself of is the notion that at some level this whole "70s backlash", at least as it is played out in uncritical, non-specific blanket criticisms/dismissals of the music(s) made then is as much a rejection of the social impetus behind these moves as it is any musical considerations. What complicates it even moreso is that there are a lot of young listeners now coming to the music (hell, to life!) who have no real sense of what was going on with the various African-American "movements" of the time, how positive and how necessary so much of that was then (and how much the underlying need that motivated it then it still remains, even if the specifics have morphed over the years...). Between the legacies of Reagan & Marsailis, it's too easy for too many to just assume, often unaware, that things were a certain "way", accept the excesses as the norm, smirk, dismiss, and move on. A dangerous choice, that is... But no matter. It really bugs me that past historical moves to give the music a "whiter" appeal are frequently accepted uncritically (and often unconsciously), whereas moves to do the opposite fall under the umbrella of 70s Phobia. Never mind that Hard Bop was originally pretty much a militant music...

Wow, it's a drag that we don't have any board memebers who live in the U.K. .....

At some point before being bought by Fantasy, Milestone was a division of Audio-Fidelity . Whereher this was from the beginning or not, I don't know, but I have some early Milestone albums with the A-F info on both jacket & label.

And still is gonna be "my favorite" so far, I think. This new one is holding up well so far. But as time passes, Beautifully Human is sounding/feeling more and more like a masterpiece, I think.

Now that's what I'm talking about - lots of reactionary revisionism - in music as well as in culture as a whole - been going against people who don't know any better, and who come into a post-Marsailis jazz environment, and I've had enough, even though it's probably too late to do anything about it and as a result, I'm really not caring all that much any more except just to be a bitch about it 'cause I've been cranky. Even the 70s is old and over by now, just like the beloved 50s/60s. Nevertheless, the next time anybody "warns" you about any music in such broad terms as this, go on ahead and waste their ass, right there on the spot, and then call their woman up and laugh about it. It's the right thing to do, standing up for truth is.

Holy crap, Jim. Yeah, I know. What can I say?

Bobby's entry on the title tune, the way it just lays in the pocket, and the way the pocket lays around it...worth the cost of admission all by itself.

Like I said, nothing personal. Keep listening, there's a lot of different sounds to hear!

The album I was least familiar with is the one that I'm really digging the most - Power To The People. Damn if I know how I let this one (mostly) slip by for so long, but better late than never...

Thanks, Laz, but I think there's some confusion here. The Pepper/Marsh disaster I referred to was a bootleg I'd heard. Plus, I've got no more (or less) problems with "post-comeback" Pepper than I do pre. There's "problems" for me there either way, even though I enjoy a lot of all of it in spite of them. And I definitely do dig Pepper w/Elvin on those Vanguard dates! I'm with Allen about the sometimes hyper-criticality of some Tristanoites, Konitz in particular. I've heard (read, actually) him say some pretty...uh... ambivalent things about Warne, things that make me think that this is one of those guys who just can't help but seeing the glass as half-empty, even as he enjoys the drink. Comes with the territory, price of doing business, etc., but I wonder if he ever comments about how when he's not on, it's one of the most boring experiences in music? Just as when he is, its one of the most fascinating? I love the cat, but that's the truth.

Let me put it this way - if I get to choose two Cannonball albums to go into eternity with, and the choices are Waltz For Debbie, Know What I Mean?, The Price You Gotta Pay To Be Free, & The Black Messiah, I'm taking the last two, hands down, not because they're "better", but because, faults and all, they're further along Cannonball's path to finding his own true voice, whereas the first two, great as they are, also represent a level of "comfort" that, as fine as it is, and as rewarding as it is on its own terms, just doesn't "raise any questions". Now I know that not everybody likes for their music to raise questions, but I'm a fan of it, just because that's how I've always gotten moved along in life - questions come up, things get examined, and whether or not any final answers are forthcoming, you know more than you did beforehand. And I like that, always have. On the whole, I'd rather have questions to answer (and answers to question) than not, although I defintiely reserve some room for a Zen-like acceptance of all that is good, just because. But that's just me.

But all the way back to your starting point? And then staying there? Isn't that like saying that you shouldn't have made the trip in the first place? I mean, yeah, ok, there's no place like home, and all that, but you can't go home again either, so...