JSngry

Does Noah Jones still sell records in notable quantities? Serious question, I have no idea.

Any idea how that Paul Horn side ended up on Everest? It was done for Hi-Fi Jazz, produced by David Axelrod, and then ended up on Contemporary. Maybe a few other records took this route from Axelrod to Everest...Jimmy Witherspoon, and a King Pleasure (iirc)...any others? And why them? And who was on the Everest side for this?

I don't necessarily equate "smooth jazz" with "cheese" (although god knows it's a well-deserved conditioned relex/survival mechanism to do so). What struck me about this record (or the first disc, anyway, as far as I've gotten) is how "large audience ready" the whole thing is. I mean, it's all there but the sing/clap-along. And that's ok with me, I mean, if you can get a lot of people to listen to something besides metronomes and fascistic diatonic assaults, good for you. I was just sorta taken aback at how...un-austere the whole thing was. I've not listened to Gararek for a loooong time, when was It's Ok To Listen to the Grey Voice? I liked him, precisely becuase of his austerity. He had a sorta "bleak vision" thing going on that seemed quite real to me. But there's nothing like that here. But, as "friendly" as it is, there's no cheapness, none. So, yeah, Do it like that. Cheapness sucks.

Sounds/Feels like "smooth jazz" to me, but not in a derogatory way.

Wait - a dance club hired the band to play for their dance, right?

Thoughts? I tried to get started, but there was no traction there for me...maybe I gave up too soon?

But I've not yet murdered anybody (that you know about, anyway!). Credit where credit is due, ok? Oh, please. There's a simple procedural ploy here that you could have made months(S) ago and still can make. If you stop whining about a marginal pop talent long enough, you can still figure it out. Hell, there's two procedural ploys that you can make to get what you wnat. But you have to ploy them, don't whine to me about shit and then expect me to help you with it. Whining is the most impotent way to get shit done.

Maybe...but Joe got his bouquets while he was alive and actively playing. Hank, not even remotely so. Hank will forever have "cult appeal". Joe...maybe not so much? Especially since you can still get most of the records in some form or fashion. Business-wise, really - who is the target market for this set, in this format, at this price? And how many are they going to have to sell to break even? Ok, if you can make your money back, there's that. But then what?

By all accounts, Spector was living large well into the last part of the 20th Century, probably beyond. Large, lonely, and deranged. He had owned the label (Philles) and to my knowledge never sold it. Plus, he "attached" his name to a LOT of the hits. Publishing, I'm not sure about. But he never ran out of money, at least not that I've heard. Also, remember, he was producing both Lennon & Harrison post-Beatles (to varying effectiveness) and still got projects/offers with some periodicity through the 70s. Some, like the Leonard Cohen album, worked, some, like the one with Dion, did not. And some, like the abandoned project with Cher, show a guy losing focus, but not skills. But focus, losing it big time. Distracted, paranoid, all that good stuff. That single with Cher is marvelously intricate and emotionally chilling (and totally devoid of commercial potential), but I guess that was all Spector could really get done. Marathon, obsessive studio time with first call players wasn't as cheap as it once was, and a crazy man who's no longer on top...patience thins quickly. And it should. Method to the madness only works when the method gets results. And "the industry" had definitely moved on/past him in any number of ways. Stories of a paranoid (possibly coke-fueled) gun-nut were "common" even then...and then, Ronnie began to talk...to be honest, when he committed the murder, my first reaction was "well, THAT took a lot longer that I expected it to". But as far as money, the guy knew how the business worked, and guys like that never run out of money.

So, I'm thinking that something here is Mickey Fields? The one I thought was Stitt?

My first exposure to him was on some Atlantic record that did not reach me at all, so I filed him away in my mind as one of those commercial guys who just took a pop song and played "bluesy" over it and that was supposed to be all that was needed....years later, reality came calling. OOPS! MY BAD! RIP.

Oh well. Stanley Cowell equivocates to Helen Reddy, my bad.

Let it stand. To that end, if anybody feels so strongly about it, they can start their own Hellin Reddy, RIP Magic Chanteuse thread right here in this Artists thread and it will go unmolested. I mean, I'll laugh my ass off, but what would that matter? I don't get that at all. Before he was a murderer, Phil Spector ws a psycopath. Before that, he was deranged, and before (at tiem during) that, he was a creative force whose legacy remains to this day. So, c'mon people, compartmentalize.

Tell you what - get me the tapes/video of Helen Reddy singing with BB King & the MJQ (again, yes, it happened), then we'll have another look at that. Until then, Helen Reddy was a "talentedish pop singer". Phil Spector was an artist, a radical re constructor of what energies could be conveyed on a 45 RPM record, a true architect of sound. Don't get hung up in the means - songs, singers, teenager emo, just dig the sound, the end.

You're right!

Phil, you're gonna scare people with this... Hal Blaine, Weapon Of Mass Destruction. We need to invade Gold Star, it's a national security imperative.

Personally, I think that linking "Confirmation" to "Twilight Time" is a bit - or more - of a reach.....

It sounds so easy...

There will be no Bill Barron set, even if they do a Norah Jones set.

Phil Spector was the healing force of the universe:

and then there's...