Teasing the Korean

This should have been the album cover: https://www.listal.com/viewimage/7651708 Or this: https://www.listal.com/viewimage/17185133

As a kid, before I knew what it was called or where to look for it, I was a sucker for that upbeat, optimistic 1950s pizzicato orchestral music, along the lines of "Holiday for Strings," that suggests the bustling metropolis, happy shoppers, shiny new appliances, and progress. Much of this music was written for libraries such as KPM, Chappell, etc., and I probably first heard it on 16mm educational/health & safety films in elementary school, but it nevertheless made an impression on me and probably on many of us within a certain age group. One of the devices those arrangers often used was voicing the strings to form 4 or 5 voices of a pentatonic chord, in open voicings, resulting in mostly intervals of fourths. The string section would then follow the melody up or down the pentatonic scale, continuing to use open harmonies and lots of intervals of fourths. It is one of the trademark sounds of that style of music. Fast forward a few years: When I first started getting into jazz as a teen, and I heard the classic John Coltrane Quartet, one of the things that drew me to them was that McCoy Tyner's piano chord voicings reminded me very much of that happy postwar pizzicato string writing that I so loved. I'm curious if McCoy Tyner ever commented on this, and if he realized that his approach to piano chord voicings followed the string-writting approach of several postwar composers and arrangers who wrote production music.

Seriously. Style and aesthetics are important to some of us. Respectfully, that is not how film score/soundtrack albums work. I recognize that you may not listen to many film score albums, but some of us do.

And what a false pretense it was when the album you bought was a single 12" slab of vinyl, rather than an album of 78s.

I find it disappointing that they are not titling this release "Cat in the Sack" I assume that they will not use images from the film or poster are the album cover. This will affect my perception of the music.

Which is good, because I don't like Mosaic's approach at all.

Most of the Blue Note that I have is on LP, so I am tempted to pick up a couple of these. So they use the RVG mastering but contain no bonus tracks? That is weird: I thought the whole point of these bundles was to move existing stock, rather than creating more stock. Also, I have several "Original Album Classics" sets which do indeed contain the bonus tracks. Still, a few of these are tempting.

Which makes you wonder: If those are fake names, why the fake names? If for contractual reasons, how many African drummers were signed to a label in the US at that time? Olatunji and Guy Warren? Speaking of Guy Warren: I listened to the 10-track Congo Percussion/Taboo, and one of the tunes is very similar to Warren's "Love, the Mystery Of." I also feel that the 10-track album is a single session, and that the six additional tracks on the Subri Moulin/Sabu album are from a different session. Here is Congo Percussion. The track that sound like "Love, the Mystery Of" comes in at 26:28.

Yes, I have both Taboo and Congo Percussion, with that same back cover! Note that the back sleeve credits Cawanda's group on both pressings, even though the label on Congo Percussion credits Chief Bey.

Well, there is currently a copy of the original "Jungle Beat" LP on eBay with a nice scan of the back cover, and no personnel is listed. Oh well!

I would argue that it is more confusing, because we don't know who some of these artists are, and we can not even be sure that "Sabu" is Sabu Martinez. The various track lineups, spellings, and titles further confuse things. Virtually any reference you find to Cawanda or Subri Moulin leads you directly to this album. Who were they? Now we're getting somewhere!

I can't think of one that has made the rounds as often as this one, and also with as many different artist names from one release to another. I've since found out that there were even more issues than the ones I listed.

What do any of you percussion cats know about this budget-label wonder that was reissued multiple times? It has been released, in various configurations, as Congo Percussion, Taboo, and Jungle Percussion. Taboo - Promenade 2125 - 10 tracks - Credited to Cawanda's group. Congo Percussion - Pirouette RFM 11 - 10 tracks - The back sleeve credits Cawanda's group, with the same graphics as the back of the Taboo album, but the label credits Chief Bey. Jungle Percussion - Clarity 812 - 12 tracks - Credited to Sabu - This version features 6 of 10 tracks from the aforementioned albums, but adds 6 different tracks on side 1. They don't sound like they are from the same session, but they fit in well enough. Jungle Percussion - Tops 1709 - Credited to Subri Moulin. This is the same 12-track variation as the other Jungle Percussion. This album was also released on other labels, including Omega.

I have a room filled with LPs and CDs, and I'm pretty sure I don't have anything in stereo predating Fantasia (1940).

Thanks, but the act I'm referring to is an obscure group that basically went nowhere. Their manager thought he was doing them a favor by not letting them get exploited, but it had the opposite effect.

No, there have been plenty of stories about this over the years.

Which was the band whose manager didn't allow them to be recorded or filmed - and as a result, they slipped into obscurity forever?

it was admittedly less exciting than the French box, but the price at the time was right, and I was excited about the album cover artwork, which is at least half of the reason why I like any album. The Vogue Andre Hodeir album was not included in Jazz in Paris. The film score discs were my favorites in that series.

What non-LP stuff have you found in LP crates? The two obvious candidates, because of their dimensions, would be old-skool laser discs and calendars. Digging through LP crates years ago, I was fortunate enough to find the Rod McKuen Animal Concern calendar from 1974. How about you?

Well, I was discussing Vogue box sets here. I tend to discuss things of interest that may fall through the cracks and consequently get overlooked.

"Collector" carries certain implications that don't apply to me. I am ruthless when it comes to thinning the accumulation in any and all genres. BTW, I have far more jazz, classical, and film score LPs than "space-age bachelor pad" music, for whatever that is worth.

I am the former and not the latter. These Vogue sets, with their range of music, low prices, and ORIGINAL COVER ART, are perfect for me. Those would be hippies, and I am the opposite of a hippy.

Who are "we?"

It is FRENCH, so that means that it is way cooler than either me or you.

I bought both boxes when they came out and I think they sound fine. I'm sure they are from the masters - or at least whatever US masters were sent to France. Well worth picking up. Also, the original sleeve art is reproduced for many of the titles.