JSngry

No, not at all. OTOH, if I have a choice between playing for an audience that consists only of knowledgable listeners or playing the exact same music for one that consists of that same group plus, say, five times as many more who have little or no "deep" knowlege, well, I'm taking the latter, at least on an ongoing basis. The cycle of complaining that you can't get people in the house, and then when you do, complaining that they don't really get what you're doing is one that I'm all too familiar with, and frankly, I'm tired of it. If you need to be loved or "understood", take it up with your wife, if you know what I mean. But play whatever music you play because you love doing it, not because you want to be loved for doing it. Don't get me wrong - any fan who really understands your music is a blessing, and one can never have too many blessings. And too many "fans" who don't have a clue can be a bummer, no matter how positive an outlook you try to keep about it. All I'm saying is that the fans who don't get it can put money in your pocket and gigs on your callendar just as easily as those who do. More easily perhaps, since there's always going to be more of them. So some perspective is in order, I think, as is some gratitude to balance the cynicism. Both the gratitude and the cynicism are valid, but when one gets out of balance from the other, perspectives get warped and that's when shit starts getting really wierd. Bottom line for me - be true to yourself, take what you can get, get what you can take, and run like hell with it to the bank.

Zippy Hippie Nipsy Russell

She's young, cute, funny, and projects warmth. She'll hopefully land on her feet and hit the ground running.

Mr. Sipiagin is doing his own Artist Share project ( http://www.artistshare.com/artist_project_...=97&selection=0 ), and according to Monday, she's doing drum programming for some of the selections. I'd wager a body part of substance that it's not going to be anything trivial. I think I'll be getting in on this one.

I've only got it as a tape dub, but my notes for it list both Uniteledis & Base as the label. Any idea what's up w/that?

Well ahem.... Don't get me started on the texture-phobia os so many of today's "jazz" musicians, either as individuals or as groups. Don't get me started... Really, though, isn't all this what Miles was up to in some form or fashion from On The Corner and beyond, all the way up until the end? It's only fitting that On The Corner has proven to be so influential in underground dance music, which influenced Monday, who is now brining it all back into a music that could easily translate into "jazz" (and often enough can't be called anything else, if only because there's no other word for it). The circle, as they say, is unbroken, even if it's going places where we might not automatically think to look.

Maybe you can get a gig as a Sony janitor then.

Indeed. And the fact that she can take those songs so many different ways and have them all retain that core no matter the "style" tells me that phobias about this and that technology and "culture" are so much Luddite paranoia. As little as a few months ago, I'd never even consider the possibilty. but now, I can't see it any other way. If you've got "it", then you oughta be able to keep it and do whatever with it you want. Any and all limitations, fears, and other hangups are entirely your own. She's convinced me of this.

Well, the rub there is that karaoke is one of the last vestiges of popular interest in "live music", no matter how loosely it fits the definition, being featured in "general" clubs in most towns. And going to a public place specifically to hear "live music" is rapidly becoming an extinct notion as it is. The behavior of a culture constatnly evolves, true enough. But I'm not so sure that if you wipe out karaoke (a possible scenario if a "war" develops over licensing) that the eventual cultural trickle-down will eventually hit us. We're already half-dead as it is!

And license them with ASCAP?

Well, I'm thinking that there's absolutely no reason now why good, innovative, contemporary jazz can't also be good, innovative, contemporary dance music. We've withdrawn from this type stuff for decades now, and with good reason - the tools gave every indication of being oppressive, and the results inevitably, partially or wholly, confirmed that they were. But now, all bets are off. I'm probably too old (and too machine-inept) to do it the way I'd really like to hear it done, but there's really no more excuses for the technologies and techniques of contemporary dance music and creative improvised music to remain enemies. None whatsoever. I've heard a few bands lime MMW hint at the possibilities, but hint is all they do (and that's probably the best that their essentially "traditional" mindset allows them to do. No dis, just an honest appraisal. Everybody's gotta be somewhere.). Nevertheless, the bar has been raised. Will it be "jazz" as we've known and loved it? No. Definitely not. But so what?

The Deer Hunter Catfish Hunter Trot Nixon

Not so sure that I'm applauding as strongly as you are, Greg... Don't the same rules apply to clubs that offer live bands? I mean, I occasionally see a club that's got an ASCAP sticker on the window, but rarely. So what's gonna happen next - I'm playing a standard in some club, an ASCAP cat is in the house, puts the shakedown on the club, and next thing you know, it's curtains for that type of music in any form. Music is not why most people go to clubs, doncha' know. Plenty of other ways to get them inside. Proceed with caution, I say.

I've been checking out a bunch of house music (and variants thereof) lately, and it's driving home to me just how special Monday's music is. That stuff has definitely got the beats, but it's usually lacking in full-bodied songs to go with them (not the object of the game, I know). And the beats, no matter how layered and subtly varied they are, and no matter how propulsive they are, still have a "machine" feel to them. Not that that's at all bad, because I'm hearing stuff, great stuff, done with machines that you'd have to have 3 or 4 live drummers to pull off. But the feel is definitely "different", which is no doubt a big part of the point. But Monday uses the same machines and a lot of the same beats, and she makes them feel "human". I said a while back that she's done for drum machines what Zawinul did for synthesizers, and the deeper I delve into the club music that inspired so much of her earlier work, the more vivid that point becomes. She not only tweaks the basic beats, she tweaks the timing and force of the elements like nobody I've yet heard and makes the shit breathe. From here on out, there's no excuse for drum programming not to groove (not "sound like", but feel) in a way that is wholly human. Plus, she's got songs, real songs with melodic grace and harmonic sophistication. People like me, who (used to) think that drum machines were soulless tools of the devil and that club music was an opiate for the masses, are missing out on something here. The fear of the future being cold and inhuman has been elevated to a challenge to use the tools like they need to be used. Not only are the machines and the genre capable of being used to warm, humanistic ends, they already have been. Having now heard some really good club music, I realize the error of my previous impressions. But nothing (and nobody) is doing (or has done) such a mindfuck of the medium as Monday. If that were all she was capable of, it would be impressive enough, but to effortlessly go from such a machine-based music as that on Double Image to a fully live thing such as Epsidoes In Color w/o losing any creative or spiritual punch takes a spirit that is as free as anybody could possibly want to be.

Grandpappy Amos Luke & Hassie Pepino

Didn't those three also record for Concord as well? All four of the three did. MG Well, I consider Miles a Sony act.

Maybe you can get a gig as a Sony sales rep.

Yep.

Didn't those three also record for Concord as well?

Nor I!

Red Rodney Rodney Kendrick Bebe's Kids

Lee Hazelwood Lee Greenwood The Blackwood Brothers

Only $1455.00! http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/CatalogDetai...59-70f6fc51b800 Actually, it's a handbill. Other Miles posters, etc. available: http://www.wolfgangsvault.com/Catalog.aspx...goryID=&is=text Such as these:

MJQ MFQ NRBQ