JSngry

DUDE!!!!

Crouch is not dumb. He knows quite a bit about the insides of the music in terms of both technique & personality. But he is an opportunist. That's not necessarily a bad thing in and of itself, but when you do a lot of collateral damage along the way, which I definitely think he has, then yeah, it is.

They could/should have last year, but they choked big time. I'm excited about this year's team, but until they show me they can do what they need to do all the way through, it's definitely a limited excitement.

"Well", I like to retort, "so is sex. Are you ready for that?"

Don't know that there's a lot of "general interest" in Sly's music (as opposed to Sly the "legend") these days. What's best known/loved are the hits, and those are well-represented & available. The albums are definitely for more "specialized" tastes (and I will be getting them), but really, for the long haul, the hits (and, of course, Riot) tell the story that most needs to be told. I will say this - if Legacy was gauging the market by that mostly P.O.S. tribute/remix/whatever side they put out last year, they shot themself in the foot big time. Other than a killer track of Chuck D. doing "Sing A Simple Song", that thing sucked donkey dix. Hardly a good way to stir up interest among new audiences.

Yeah, I'd recommend the albums just for those two. Everybody else, yeah, ok, but. The Wilner/Monk thing is ok, something to hear at least once, but for me, not a lot of it has real staying power other than something to pull out once in a while to see if anything's changed. Wilner's first project,though, a Nina Rota project, is much more succesful in that regard, I think. But good luck finding it.

Yes, up to a point, though your "as is any pop record" is both an exaggeration, I think, and an apples/oranges thing -- the goal/model for post-production manipulation in the classical world pretty much remains the "image," or an image, of what the piece would have/might have sounded like in a concert hall. That is seldom if ever the case in the pop world any more AFAIK. Moreover, none of this has any relevance I can see to the Hatto hoax, which involved the direct copying of issued recordings of complete works by other pianists, which in most cases were then digitally manipulated (sped up but without altering pitch) in order to disguise their origin and to make the results sound more virtuosic. The husband's claim that all this copying began because he wanted/needed to edit out from otherwise topnotch Hatto recorded performances his sick wife's coughs and cries of pain and then thought of Schwarzkopf dubbing in a high note for Flagsted in Furtwangler's recording of "Tristan" recording is absurd. Well, yeah. But... Personally, I think the use of "tools" to create an "alternate reality" in sound (as in pop) that might well not exist otherwise is a lot more ethical - and creative - than using them to create the "illusion" of a "true" reality that could exist if everybody played everything right all at once. Relevancy to the Hatto hoax? Minimal at best, other than instead of sending people off into a tizzy about fraud, it ought to get people asking what they've really been listening to all along in classical recordings, which many hold as examples of "pure music". Lots of illusions would/should be shattered.

"Little Rootie Tootie" & "Work", both on Prestige.

I've yet to hear anybody comment on how most (all?) "classical" recordings are as labored over & pieced together in post-production as is any pop record. Hell, most symphonies are recorded in bits and pieces & then pieced back together from multiple takes. Sure, they can "do it live", but they don't do it live for the record. But they posit the record as The Record just as much as does any pop artist. Or fan. A dirty little secret (except for Glen Gould & a few others), or what?

Genres are useful for marketing, and marketing is useful for getting stuff heard, so that's not at all a bad thing in and of itself. But genres as a means of identifying yourself, your soul, hey, that's death. Unless one chooses to become one's product, in which case, hey, go for it. Sucker.

I have widely mixed feelings about Metheny, depending on the specific performance/album/whatever, but anybody who's thinking about music in those terms...

Paul Jeffries Jack Jeffers

Hey - being in a hot, sweaty bed alone at midnight is a totally different psychological dynamic that being in a hot, sweaty bed with somebody you're...well, you know.

Not sure how "complete" it is, but it sure as hell is credible.

Ah, well someone else needs to answer this. Sounds like they play the tune to me, but what do I know about form? MG Well, I thought so too until I listend closer, and then I wasn't so sure. Sounds like they hit on all the key parts of the song, just not necessarily in the order/duration of them as it was originally written. Kinda like Grant and/or Larry had heard the song a few times but not really learned it "proper" and put together a homemade arrangement that met their needs. But I'm not totally sure about that, and ultimately don't care. I just think it's kinda funny (as in laughing, go-ahead-on-with-your-bad-selves funny).

Screwball Slider Curve

True, but those same houses accomodated the heat by allowing people to leisurize in relative comfort while "other people" did the work. Those "nice old southern houses" weren't built by & for the working class. And besides, I've spent enough time in enough of them over the years Denton back in the day was full of such that had been turned into rent houses, either in toto or broken up into quasi-appartments) to know that no matter how relatively comfortable they are during the day, in bed at night, if you're upstairs, the only way to get your mind off the fact that you're hot and sweaty until at least midnight is to have somebody in the bed with you to provide an alibi for the sweat...

Edit: I once spent a summer in Houston. I have felt your pain. Houston is quite a bit worse (IMO) than the DFW area. The humidity's alot higher. Absolutely correct. DFW is just Hell. Houston is Hell's VIP room.

You know, Lorez has never really clicked with me (fine singer, but I dunno, just doesn't connect on a personal level as deeply as others have. My problem, no doubt), although she did a side for Argo w/the Ramsey Lewis trio that comes as close as anything. It's called Early In the Morning, & iirc, Ghost featured some of it on one of his shows. Check it out. You might also well enjoy this one: Part of an Ace/BGP twofer: http://www.acerecords.co.uk/content.php?pa...mp;release=4754 or as a single King CD that was released in the early 90s.

Althea is not a good singer by any stretch of the imagination/definition, but I feel her soul anyway, and it touches me in a totally non-musical way. Which is more than I can say about that Tequila chick on the Fuel albums...

Yeah, & that's why I'm asking. Seriously. it sounds like they kinda "interpret" the form...

I wonder.

I'm at a loss for words other than the one that keeps being used here - sad.

Are they really that bad compared to say, NYC? Guy Well, there are trees and stuff to help keep it cool in NC. But we get long stretches where the heat index exceeds 105 F, and we still have summer (less brutal but still summer) in October. Brace yourself. I feel no sympathy for either of you.

And that, dear friends, is something that is so obvious, yet so overlooked by so many when it comes to "other musics" & "comparing" them. I'm not a big Norah Jones fan, but I got the fullest respect for that comment.