JSngry

Electric, not "electronic", this shit is STILL loud!!!! It took me a track or two to remember what it was like hearing it for the first time, but yeah, I remembered. Happy memory!

It's a moot point most of the time, since the tenor players gonna play what they play either way. I do very much enjoy that Wilbur Little guy, though, the less sound that blocks hearing that, the better!

Like it after first listen, like it just fine. Attacca Quartet hella band, and Shaw has very clear ideas about what goes where and why not anything else does.

HONK HONK

The Match by Colson Whitehead https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/04/01/the-match short story excerpted from an upcoming novel. can't recall the last time i read a "new" novel, but if this is any indication of the quality of writing, i might read this one.

Yes, Phillies, forget about racist episodes in your past, nobody's looking at you right now, it's safe! Yeah, but for me it is. Really, it is. This other stuff, this move to the 21st Century is all well and good, but I have ALWAYS ahted that version of that song. Seriously, hated it for as long as I can remember it. If White Nostalgia has to depend on Kate Smith to survive, it's more than half-past dead. Plus, I really, REALLY like it when teams use local talent to sing that song. Sometimes they're great, sometimes they suck, but at least they're real people who are actually in the same space as you are. Or even better than that - sing the song yourself, baseball fans! This Kate Smith, shit....yuck.

So is 6 Braxton or Noah Howard?

Bumpy, yeah. But nobody falls up.

That (physically unattractive) was not exactly the punchline...compared to Lena Horne, most everybody was. I know I still am. And if you don't start taking better care of yourself, you will be too! As for never marrying, is it possible that she was not hetero? No matter, if you gotta go to the mat for anything with Kate Smith's singing...let me get out of your way, you can have ALL of that mat. There were better options then, there are better options now.

Solo piano?

My initial response was that between some lost Herbie Hancock BN session or Paul Bley record from the late 1960s, I'd heard the gist of all this before, and maybe that's true. But continued listening is showing some subtle compositional constructs that those earlier musics didn't really have. so,,,game on, keep listening.

Last live appearance where? Doing what?

Sounds like a hit record to me!!!!!

The Glory Of Love, might have been A&M/CTI. But yeah, CTI. Yeah, here we go: An interesting mix of people on that one: Personnel Herbie Mann - flute, arranger, conductor Hubert Laws - flute, piccolo Ernie Royal, Burt Collins - trumpet, flugelhorn Benny Powell - trombone Joe Grimaldi - saxophone Roy Glover - piano, organ, arranger, conductor Paul Griffin - piano Roland Hanna - organ Jay Berliner, Eric Gale - guitar Ron Carter - bass Herb Lovelle, Grady Tate - drums Ted Sommer - vibraphone, percussion Ray Barretto, Johnny Pacheco - percussion Herb Bernstein - arranger, conductor Earl May - bass Roy Ayers - vibes

There's uncredited organ on there as well, sounds to me like it's Herbie. ...and I would say that it sounds like a reaaaalllllyyyyy stoned CTI album, but that comparison is dulled just a little by the fact that Mann's own/one CTI album sounds nothing like this. One of Nat Adderley's maybe comes a little close...and here/now we're talking about William S. Fischer, and that's somebody who doesn't get talked about very much. But there's definitely a conversation to be had, should the desire arise.

There was a local saxophonist named Ron Brown who was on the band in the mid-70s, and every time he'd come home/back, we'd hear the inside skinny. Nothing scandalous or such, just that the business was really complicated. Mercer wanted to resist becoming a ghost band, and that's about all the marketplace had an interest in. Mercer was really hardcore about it too, and as best I could gather, the business sides of The Worlds Of Duke Ellington got a little, uh...frictional, which didn't make anything easier for anybody. So yeah, Mercer has a lot of interesting things to say in this book. A lot. It's a real time look at all the currents that were already beginning to swirl that you hear on that The Last Trip To Paris record. It didn't end when Duke died, and it's not unfair to ask if they've ever really stopped completely.

Strong Seconds for the Mercer book. 1978 was a very "interesting" time in Post-Duke Ellington world, and the POV that Mercer's bringing here definitely reflects that. I got the old DaCapo paperback back in the day, and I think it's still available in copious quantities at popular prices? Very highly recommended!

One more for the Mann-Curious:

People who enthuse over the "debut album" formula of some standards, some blues, and just a few originals, hey - here's your record, formula all the way. The only problem is, it's the "formula" inclusions that bring the record down. Cutely arranged standards, etc, they sound like the belong op\n a Bennie Green record, except Priester is not Bennie Green. Bennie Green is Bennie Green, Bennie Green had all the Bennie Green covered, ok? So what's left are a few originals (mostly without Jimmy Heath, which works out just fine in this case) that are above-average in terms of interest, very nice pieces. But as soon as you get ready for the next one, UH-oh, here comes that "formula" again and jeezeys crapappers, Orrin Keepnews, this is why Riverside never gained the cachet that Blue Note did, because Albert Lion probably would have crafted a better presentation for Julian Priester's debut album, simple as that. At least in theory. Riverside was where Priester had his hookups, Griff, Max, Wilbur Ware. That's how it works. And that's why Jimmy Heath is on this record not adding anything except being there and playing well enough on the tunes he plays on. Records be business too, not just music.Julian Preister WAS going to be on Riverside for his debut album if he was going to be anywhere. In spite of all that, the opportunity to hear the Jones Sam and Elvin commiserate on every cut is indeed a rare and true delight!

I have an actual Atlantic CD reissue dated that's complete in and of itself. That's the way to go, I'd think, if it's still easy enough to find. I very vividly remember finding the original LP at Record Exchange in Roanoke, VA for $4.50 (mono) and then another one (stereo) a few years later at Vinyl Fever in Tampa(?) for $2.99. Neither store was remotely aware of what a cult record this thing was or how scarce it was. I don't know how many copies Atlantic pressed, but it was OOP almost immediately, if I recall my Schwann research correctly. Atlantic did that with Max for whatever reason. The only one that stayed in print for years and was easy to find was Drums Unlimited. Even Lift Every Voice and Sing, from the 70s, that one was ALL over the cutout bins after not too long. I really, really like this record. Hasaan was a major local influence around Philly, anybody you ask from Philly in those days damn near reveres him. Whatever personal idiosyncrasies kept him from being "marketable", the musicians themselves valued his music and his teaching quite highly. Leave it to Max Roach who was full frontal We Insist about his recording presentations to use his contract to make this record. He insisted! As for the music itself, hey, Duke to Monk to Nichols to Hope, there's a continuum there of what "jazz piano" "is" when not forced to engage in the marketplace of "others". It's percussive (since after all, the piano IS a percussion instrument), it's harmonically blunt, it's overtly two-handed, it's as dissonant was it wants to be (because, dissonant to who, and why?), it's very, to use the culturally recognizable label, "Black". This is very "Black" jazzpiano music. Cecil might have coined the phrase "88 tuned drums", but he hardly birthed the notion.

Glad I took my time on this one. also glad I got it really cheap.

This album is waiting for you, when you're ready to get to it: Get the Quad mix if you can make it work for you.

"aggressive music of rhythmic amplification" says Mr. Litweitler, in the liners. Indeed it is. It is also sublimely conversational. Very interesting to hear Walter Booker get in between Higgins/Walton/Mobley and add his own thing without distracting from theirs. Amazing how there are no horns or hands or fingers on this record, just rhythmic sounds that come in and out of each other, any one of them never blocking any of the others.

This is like listening to a really good pop record, only without the annoying LCD accommodations. Good tunes (Hello Roland Alexander & Charles Davis!) unexpected production appearance by Russell Jacquet, and oh look Gold Star Studios. So it IS like a really good pop record, now we can have an allowable # of degrees of separation between Mingus & Cher! How many would that be, 4? IMingus - Illinois/Russell - Gold Star - Cher, right? I had bought a pretty plowed LP of this back in the 70s, remember liking a lot, playing it a few times, and then putting it away, glad to know THAT happened, etc.. Got this OJC god knows when, one of those file-away-until purchases, never opened it until today. Well, it's still good, and now all the scratches are gone. Win!