Shrdlu

Das ist Mnr Koers, nicht Herr!

Mine is a recent (digitally mastered, why?) LP. The notes are new, by one Andy Davis, dated 1996. The sound is fine, and though I would like to A/B it with an analog LP, it is good. Actually, as it is mint, I transferred it to a CDr, so it is definitely digital now.

Achtung Dr Redneck calling! Get you a good ol' Ford pickup (with a 460 of course), with a "tool" box and a whiplash aerial.

Wasn't that the idea of either the producer or John Lewis, Jim? From the notes, it doesn't sound as if any of the Beatles were involved in the production of this session. But you may be right. The album says "Produced by John Lewis. Supervised by Peter Asher". It was recorded in London, England (of course), at Trident Studios. Asher says "... John Lewis was just brilliant in the studio. He had everything mapped out and knew precisely what he wanted to do. ... I tried to use the modern facilities we had at our disposal. I had a rock 'n' roll engineer (Trident's co-owner, Barry Sheffield) to make it sound different, a bit 'bigger' than the MJQ's other records. ..." Then, the notes mention "The opening track, Lewis's 'Visitor from Venus', begins with the shimmering tones of Milt Jackson's vibraharp. In a reflection of the times, the tape then speeds up, racing towards its correct tempo, ..." This is not conclusive, and is the only information in the notes that relates to the topic.

Bill, stoppit, you're killing me! "Swinin' Swedes". You made my day. P.S. The school marm in me (ask Lon about that) has kicked in: it's Vogue.

Sandy, do you know that Mosaic will sell the books of out-of-print sets for 10 bucks apiece plus postage? It's a bit pricey, but I have done it a time or two. They are bound to have copies of the Morgan book left over, as it has not been out-of-print for very long.

You'll have quite a time finding these, Bill. Hope you are successful. I heard that these LPs are kinda noisy. Have you found that to be the case? (I've never even seen a live one, only pictures.) I loved your "Fats Saudi"!! I think we have all had far too much recent politics and world news! Time for a break.

Dave really does have a great sound. I have only heard him on the Miles albums, and he makes a big contribution to those performances. It's interesting that he played acoustic on those sessions, when the trend was toward electric keyboards, basses and guitars - and Ron Carter is said to have left partly because he didn't like being made to play the electric plank.

I love "Space". I had a review copy when it first came out. Recently, when I tried to get a CD, all I could find was a new LP release, so I got that. It still sounds great, and, there is no sign of any Beatle influence, other than the fact that it was their label. In the notes, it is said that Percy Heath has the best acoustic bass sound ever. I would not have written that, but can't really argue about it, either. He is wonderful.

Peter, I think some of the more recent Volvos have front-wheel-drive. (I know that the 400s do, but they are trash. My son had one, and it was a nightmare. I don't consider the 440s as real Volvos.) Brad, if you buy a new car, it drops thousands in value the moment you drive it out of the showroom. Better to buy a car after that drop. Although a used car can definitely be a lemon, these can easily be avoided if you get the car checked carefully, and/or buy from a place that you know. All my cars, except one, have been used. I guess the fact that nearly all were Volvos had something to do with it. Another recommendation: Toyotas have been superbly reliable ever since they first appeared in the 60s. There are other good Japanese brands: Datsun and Honda rate pretty well, I hear. I have never owned a Japanese car myself, though. Avoid: all French cars! The guys on "Car Talk" were right when they said "It's sad that the Peugeot has been discontinued in the U.S. - we can't ridicule them anymore."

It's already been well said, but I'll put in my thoughts. I never considered him to be an innovator - just a superb soloist and writer. After all, what innovations did he make?

I've got two good recommendations: (1) Get either the AAA or another independent mechanic to go over the vehicle; the AAA charges a fee, but it's worth it. (2) Go for a Volvo. I have owned them since 1974, and they are built to last. (Not the horrible 300 and 400 series though, I mean the 200s, 700s, 900s etc.) These last so long that the price of a used one is within reach of an ordinary mortal like me, and you can always get parts, both from dealerships and from salvage yards and people who "break" cars. My current one is an '86 760 GLE station wagon, and I'm not about to part with it. It goes like a bomb, still.

Ahh, Impulse. What an exciting catalog that is. I remember seeing those orange and black covers when they first appeared, and I still love their catalog. They were a bit more expensive than most other LPs, and, annoyingly, most of the details were sealed inside the gatefold cover. The production and presentation was second-to-none. The odor when you first opened those covers was fantastic. And the music! Although there were many Impulse artists, one mainly associated the label with Trane's strange new music, especially the Vanguard album, A-10. Thanks largely to Michael Cuscuna, we can get nearly all of these albums on CD.

That's right, Chuck. I have a stereo LP of the definitive version of Brahms' First Piano Concerto, by Artur Rubinstein with Fritz Reiner and the Chicago Symphony. It was recorded in 1954. Only the mono LP was issued at first, of course, and Rubinstein recorded the piece again in the early 60s. As a result, the 1954 stereo version was not issued until the late 70s (vinyl, that is). A (stereo) CD was issued, too, later on.

This re-raises the question of how much longer those master tapes will last. It seems that the record companies had better transfer what they still have to another medium while they can. The story about the Arthur Lyman tape sticks in my mind: they went to reissue the session, and one of the tape boxes was found to contain a tangle of clear plastic and a pile of iron oxide dust.

My BN's from the 1500 series are all CD versions, and so most are stereo where stereo exists (from about May 57 onward). I don't recall any sounding bad to me, but it is known that Rudy never liked the Hackensack stereos. The only bad Hackensack "stereo" that I know is the individually available CD of Trane's "Settin' The Pace" album (Prestige, of course). This is taken from a rechanneled LP master, and there is some annoying phasing in the cymbals. (I had the LP with that problem - it came out in the late 60s.) The box set version of this session is real stereo. Strange. (Rudy did not start stereo for Prestige and Savoy as early as he did for Al Lion, by the way. Most, but not all, Prestige sessions were mono-only until about March 1958. An early Prestige stereo is "Wheelin' And Dealin'", again by Trane, and from 1957.)

... and then there's the "Patterns" CD! (I liked the way you described that once, Tony. You said that it had a somber undertow, or something like that. That described it precisely.)

My wife's uncle lives in Windsor, ON, and used to be a Canadian customs officer on the Ambassador bridge between Detroit and Windsor. He was a real zealot, and would have searched his Mom. My wife told me tales of how residents of SW Ontario would go over to Detroit to shop and then sneak all sorts of stuff back. The women would take Canadian clothes labels and sew them onto U.S. items before returning! But Uncle Clare could spot U.S. clothes a mile off. No need for sniffer dogs in them thar days.

Thanks. He is definitely on my "want to hear more" list. He was good on the Bill Evans album ("From Left To Right") but not really featured on that; his work there didn't grab me like his playing on the McFarland LP.

Mike, I just meant that the Miles CDs were not real stereo until the most recent one. That box set is both fascinating and exhausting. There are so many snippets. They are not arranged in the order that I would prefer, so I play the set on my multi-CD player and have to do a lot of programming to get the bits and pieces in chronological order. It is time-consuming, and not something that I have time to do very often.

This is all very interesting. As I recall, the CD reissues of "Miles Ahead" were all mono until Phil Schaap spent ages with surviving tapes and was able to produce a stereo version, the first ever. Thanks for posting the fact that the Disney CD is mono, Kevin. I have never heard that CD. How's the sound on that? There have been complaints about the sound on some of those older, purple-bordered Columbia CDs, though the ones that I have heard sound fine to me. (I am glad to have the older CD of "Armstrong Plays Handy", as it has some different takes from the later, admittedly definitive, CD reissue.)

Thanks a lot, Mike. That almost settles it. Your observation about fake stereo probably not being put out as early as 1957 is pretty decisive. We all know that stereo LPs were not in great demand as early as that, and so Columbia probably would not have felt under pressure to issue a mono session in reverb fake stereo back then. The bad LPs of "Miles Ahead", "Milestones", "Jazz Track", "Armstrong Plays Handy" etc. did not blight the scene until well into the 60s, when Columbia must have thought that people would not buy an LP if it was "only mono". The sleeve that lists the Disney album as being available in stereo is that of "Gone With The Wind". I can't date my LP copy of that. It is a six-eye, but with a silver and red label rather than black and red (which was the original color scheme) and the stamper numbers are 2F and 2AD. It's definitely not a first pressing. As for the "In Europe" album, this was recorded in Copenhagen, and, as with the Mulligan Concert Jazz Band tour recordings (1960), it is likely to have been a mono recording. (But it was recorded in 1958.) ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- That's very interesting about the alternate take, Marty. It also happened with "Autumn Leaves" on Bill Evans' "Portrait In Jazz" album. This was because Riverside's stereo tape recorder broke down during the master take; they did another take in stereo, and only used the master take for the mono LP. I think this also occurred with the "Mulligan Meets Monk" album.

I'll try some of that next time I'm in a cleaning mood. Sounds like the best solvent/cleaner, and is also good in stews.

This is a great Brubeck album, and includes a superb version of "Some Day My Prince" will come. I have a mono LP, which has excellent sound. On the sleeve of another Brubeck album, I see that "Dave Digs Disney" was put out as a stereo LP, CS 8090. Does anyone know whether this was a genuine stereo LP, or just another of Columbia's horrible fake stereo efforts? The album was recorded in 1957, about a month after the "Miles Ahead" project, and we now know that Miles' album was recorded in real stereo, although never issued on LP in real stereo. It was put out as a fake stereo LP in the 60s, but its CS number was much higher than 8090, which is an early Columbia stereo number. So, it is possible that the Brubeck did come out as a real stereo LP. There is a fairly old CD of this album, but even if that is stereo, it would not necessarily tell us anything about the LP. Thanks for any help anyone can give. BTW, I might ask the same of "In Europe", "At Newport" (58) and "Eurasia", all of which also appeared on "stereo" LPs. (The LPs after those are safe.)

Miles played a hotel manager (or desk clerk?) in that Vice episode. As Jimmy Cobb said, "a whisper with attitude"! I have all the "Wise Guys" on tape. (Insert "smug" smilie.) Well worth a reissue. Those had some great guests, including Jerry Lewis in prime dramatic form (none of the baby voice stuff). I'd like to see some classic fifties B&W stuff, like "77 Sunset Strip", "Maverick" (Garner only, please!), "People Are Funny", "Wagon Train" et al. It's much more recent, but did anyone catch "Land's End", with Freddie Dryer? It was set in Cabo, in Baha California Sur, and the scenery is terrific. Nice sounds, too, including some Spanish guitar. It's a shame that it only ran for one season. Another one-season-only classic, also recent, was "Mr Chapel", with Michael Madsen as a tough guy who sets things right for victimized people. Very amusing show.