JSngry

Franz Kafka Gregor Samsa Victor Young

With Jeff Lorber, Kenny Gorelick showed competency and a glimmer of promise as a funk-jazz light-middleweight. As Kenny G, he's shown....squat. Jack squat, in fact. So fuck him. Let him have his money, and let him just leave me the fuck alone.

Parker plays in much more "avant" settings, of course, but I just get a tone or timbre or "sound" that makes me think of Ware when I hear Parker (esp. in quartet CDs like Sound Unity). I hear a similar spirit in that they're both very "bass-centric" in their approach to the music. They're all about laying down the bottom in all the myriad forms available at any given moment - timbral, harmonic, rhythmic, you name it, they go there and make sure that there's a foundation there for evrybody else to work off of. Of course, I prefer Ware (Parker has me only 99% convinced, which is up considerably from a few years ago. That final 1% may or may not come, we'll see), but these are the type of bassists I prefer playing with, those who lay it down so the music can be built from the bottom up.

I'm reminded of an appearance by Sammy Davis, Jr. on the Letterman show from the late 1980s. Sammy Davis, Jr., the man who had by then gone waaaaaaaay past self-chariacture, sang "I Can't Get Started" with the house band. And he sang it splendidly, nailing the bebop-era chromatic ii-Vs in the A-section that have become de regeur for jazzers, but are liable to throw "show biz" types for a loop. He didn't do anything extravagant or flashy, he just sang the song. It dawned on me then that Sammy Davis, Jr., no matter how jive he had become over the decades, was at root a freakin' talented man. And just as importantly, he worked his ass off. After finding out his history, having been immersed in high level show business pretty much all his life, I realized that, yeah, this cat was a pro. NEver mind how ridiculous a "persona" he presented all those years, the cat had some serious chops. And that's something I got to respect, just because. Now, the Treniers were/are nowhere near as big a sellout as SDJ became. But they come from the same roots, the same traditions, and they worked with the same driving esthetic - that when you hit the stage, there's no time for bullshit or half-steppin'. Fun, yes. Goofing, certainly. But never, ever, do you slack off or do anything unless you do it all the way, and and all the way right. Such an attitude may well be obsolete in this day and time. After all, a lot of things have been exposed about our world since then, and perhaps there's no longer a need for confronting bullshit by entertaining it with a perfection that ultimately mocks the lameness of it all. But I'm old enough to remember when such a position was a point of pride, and I'm not so sure that we don't turn our backs on it w/o losing a critical weapon in the fight. But that's just me.

So Brown don't dig Brown, eh? indeed!

Put me down as a big fan of this band as well. Lon, how did yours ship - UPS or USPS?

Glad to see that this one is being appreciated! I would just like to amplify a little on Kalo's comment - Well, yeah. But for younger folk who have never really seen/heard "lounge music" as anything other than an irony-laden presentation of faux-cool (aka "martini culture"), that might not tell the whole story. The Treniers were from a time when good old-fashioned professionalism was the order of the day. Yeah, you could goof and be slick and all that, but it was all rooted in skill, in chops, in knowing everything that you needed to know, and then some. The "show" wasn't just a wink, it was a job. And you damn well took your job seriously. These guys were all that. Anybody who could take a hoary old tune like "Margie" and nail it, just flat out nail it with that perfect tempo and perfect Lunceford-esque execution that turns it into a genuine groovefest, has got to be more than a group of "lounge lizards". These muthafukkas were pros, and pros of the highest order! Terms like "show business" & "entertainment" get a bum rap in today's too hip to be cool world, and that's wrong, I think. What could possibly be wrong with presenting an evening of music and patter that exemplifies and delivers quality, skill, and good times? Sure, there's envelopes to be pushed, boundaries to be broken, and dragons to be slain. Of course there are, and those things need to be pursued with rigor, vigor, and a refusal to compromise. But even Crusaders need to kick back and get loose, dig? "Entertainment" is a good thing, a damn good thing, if what you're being entertained with and by is something that has at its roots the same integrity as that which you are trying to further. And The Treniers had nothing if not the integrity of skill and professionalism in the pursuit of excellence. God bless'em.

JimS., thank you for the synopses. I'm curious what you mean by 'Mr. Elegant'?? Just a tongue-in-cheek dig at his tendency to rely on his big ol' bag o'bass tricks rather than genuinely contributing to the spontaneous creativity. But I've listened some more, and I think Harrison is just not in top form, so maybe Carter's just going with the flow. It's a "good" side for sure, but like I said (and Mike Weill sung their praises elsewhere), the Nagel-Hayer sides are where the real action is.

I liked them, yeah. Definitely not the same old same old.

Lena Horne Fred Sanford Whitman Mayo

How did they "pick up" something they helped create? Seems to me that Limelight was a sort of "boutique" label for Mercury, with the emphasis on ultra-deluxe packaging. But maybe Mercury picked them up almost immediately after the label's formation? Can somebody get ahold of Jack Tracy? If anybody can speak authoritatively on the matter, it's him!

Ok, case in point - Woody's Big Band Goodies, a collection of the Philips-era band (and with, I believe, at least some material left over from other Philips sessions) was originally released in 1964 (while the band was still releasing sides on Philips) on Mercury's "budget" Wing label. Details here: http://www.cosmicsounds-london.com/DUSKO/wgoodies.htm Now, maybe this Philips/Mercury thing was strictly American. I don't know. But it's what prompted my curiosity as to whether or not the Limelight material might be included in this set. That, and how Dizzy went straight from Philips to Limelight (a subsidiary of Mercury, which was at least somehow connected w/Philips at the time), w/o skipping a beat have me wondering.

Not sure if it was a distrubution deal or what, but Mercury & Phillips stuff (jazz stuff, anyway) in the 60s were "intermingled" in the sense of advertising on inner sleeves, etc., at least as best I remember it. There was also a commonality of design when it came to providing label address info on the back of album covers and stuff like that. I'm thinking that the Dizzy Limelight stuff was more of a "shift" from one family label to another, like Booker Ervin's shift from Pacific Jazz to Blue Note, than signing with a totally new company. But I could well be wrong. Perhaps Chuck or Jack can expound on the specifics?

Wow, boinkosity! I'm thinking that if webcam functionality could be enabled in the live chat room...

But...Mercury & Philips were connected by the time Limelight came into being, at least in the U.S.

Blue Mitchell Steve Blow Yuri Horn

Is Limelight material being included?

Mercury Limelight's older half-brother from a previous marriage.

The Lennon Sisters Larry Sheets John Coltrane

Ding-Dong! UPS calling! That sticker still doesn't say anything about the stuff being produced by Miles, though. I thought that was the point of contention. Oh well!

Trombonists get no respect!

How's the bulk of the Phillips material? Most of what I've heard has been fine, but somewhat truncated in terms of time per cut and, perhaps, a little "compromised" in theme. No doubt, radio-friendly considerations were at play, and hey, it's still good, but...

Yes, Cecil was extremely cordial, which resulted in some extaordinarily flowery praise for the host which showed that the Ellington influence extends into his verbal as well as pianistic expressions. It would be easy to think of it as a put-on, and although I don't think it was, I've gotta be thinking that the motivation was at least as much gratitude for the exposure as it was musical appreciation. The duets reminded me of a middle aged spinster getting her first hint of a taste of Wild Monkey Love. If this had been an altogether different (in every aspect) milieu, I do believe that Cecil could have turned Marion out. She was just all giggly and flusterated and Cecil was all "you like that, huh? Well, then...". If you know what I mean. Actually, I enjoyed the Costello show, as the emphasis was on songs and songwriting. I know that's not the usual and/or stated purpose of the show, but it's an area in which Marian has no little expertise/affinity, and I felt that they did a good show on that theme. Costello is no slouch as a songwriter of either rock songs or more traditional pre-rock type popular songs, and I thought they both gave good show and presented an excellent selection of material.

Don't know too much more about her other than I've very much enjoyed all of her work that I've heard, and that Dusty Groove seems to be on top of handling her releases.

Thanks to this thread for sending me off on a three day saturation listening to this album. It does ramble in spots, but such a glorious ramble it is. What I was most struck by this time around was how much detail and activity there was on the inside of the music. Not in the horns, mind you, but in the other inside - the rhythm section and the various "odd" instruments like the harp and the violin. Seems like there's all these details going on that just add to the overall color and density. It served to remind me yet again that the Evens of the 70s & beyond, which was often all about color, density, and interior detail from the non-horn parts of the band, was not a sudden dereliction of duty, but a natural conceptual evolution. And "The Barbara Song" still takes me to a place that no other music does. It was this one and "Bilbao" from Out Of The Cool that prompted me to check out Lotte Lenya's Weil readings (the Columbia sessions). To hear the originals is an ear-opener itself, but to hear how thoroughly Gil reimagined them is even more of one. If you're not at all familiar with these songs in their original form, you're missing out on both ends, I tell you.