Guy Berger

In the case of the Mahavishnu, probably a lot of people have heard the music in question. The band sold a lot of albums by jazz standards! Anyway, "classic status" is pretty loosely defined. I'm taking it as music that's exceptionally good and memorable, that draws me in again and again.

A few more: Mahavishnu Orchestra, “The Dance of Maya” Keith Jarrett, “In Flight” Stan Getz, “How Long Has This Been Going On” (from BLUE SKIES) Paul Motian, “It Should’ve Happened a Long Time Ago” (TRIOISM version, not the earlier version on ECM)

Being a terrible person to others has become a way to affirm status and affiliation. "Vice signaling."

Miles Davis, "Pharaoh's Dance", is imho one of the most exciting jazz recordings of any era, pre or post Coltrane

Russell’s late 1960s / early 1970s music is some of the most exciting/vital of that era. I would much rather listen to it than to anything under Evans’s name.

A few things here. First, yes, cases are significantly undercounted (though less so than in March). There are multiple true COVID cases for each single measured case. As a result, the case fatality rate (CFR; COVID deaths as a share of measured COVID cases) is much higher than the infection fatality rate (IFR; COVID deaths as a share of both measured and unmeasured COVID cases). One of reasons the CFR has fallen a lot in recent months is just because we're testing more; testing is no longer limited to the very ill. Most estimates of the IFR range from something like 0.5%-1.2% (whereas earlier in the epidemic you routinely saw CFRs above 3% - think of NYC, Wuhan, Lombardy). The IFR *may* have been going down recently - possibly due to better treatment (we have a few effective therapeutics), maybe hospitals being less overloaded, maybe the cases skewing younger than before. Second, deaths are also undermeasured (though not nearly as much as cases). Attribution of deaths that are probably due to COVID varies from location to location, but excess "all-cause" deaths are much higher than official COVID deaths, suggesting many people are dying of the illness untested. Third, "COVID truthers" sometimes misleadingly compare the CFR from the flu to the IFR from COVID to suggest that COVID is equally or less dangerous than the flu. This is misinformation. The flu, probably even more than COVID, is massively undercounted - how many people do you know who have the flu and bother to get tested? COVID is way worse than the FLU.

Listening to THE HILL w/Richard Davis and Joe Chambers. Really good, one of my fave of Murray’s later Black Saints. Davis en fuego.

I'm worried about schools in person too, especially since we aren't doing even the minimum necessary to make them safer. Like a lot of the other reopening we've experienced in the US, it's founded upon magical thinking. This story from exurban Georgia was really jarring: "North Paulding High School, about an hour outside Atlanta, reopened Monday despite an outbreak among members of its high school football team, many of whom, a Facebook video shows, worked out together in a crowded indoor gym last week as part of a weightlifting fundraiser. Within days of that workout, several North Paulding players had tested positive for the coronavirus. The school’s parents were notified just hours before the first day of class. And multiple teachers at North Paulding say there are positive tests among school staff, including a staff member who came into contact with most teachers at the school while exhibiting symptoms last week."

I liked this one.

I thought the first one was a little too "slick", but the 2nd/3rd/4th ones are GREAT. Also, the two David Torn albums with Berne (Prezens, Sun of Goldfinger) are outstanding. And out of the 3 Michael Formaneks, the 1st and 3rd one are superb. Love it!!! And even among the more stereotypically "EicherSound"y records, there are some where it works fine and others where it IMHO damages the music. BTW, my biggest gripe of all... why do we spend so much energy and time talking about ECM relative to Black Saint/Soul Note... or Pi... or Intakt... or... there are a lot of great labels out there actively recording & releasing music, some with a currently higher batting average.

If Firebirds had been on Blue Note, it’d be regularly as a freebop classic. Ancient Ritual is excellent too.

I went on a somewhat crazy CF binge this week, ordering: Mark Dresser, Nourishments + Sedimental You + Cyber Coup Marty Ehrlich, Frog Leg Logic + Trio Exaltation Dennis Gonzalez, NY Midnight Suite + Idle Wild + Live at Tonic Chris Lightcap, Deluxe + Epicenter Herb Robertson, Elaboration + Real Aberration Steve Lehman, Dual Identity + Manifold Sclavis/Taborn/Rainey, El Dorado Trio Jacob Sacks, Fishes Tony Malaby, Tamarindo Ches Smith, Hammered Pharoah and the Underground, Spiral Mercury more acquired since: Tony Malaby, Incantation Suite Tony Malaby, Somos Agua Tony Malaby, Scorpion Eater Tony Malaby, New Artifacts Dennis Gonzalez, No Photograph Available Ralph Alessi, Wiry Strong Tony Malaby, Novela Tony Malaby, Tamarindo Live Vinny Golia, Sfumato Eric Revis, Sing Me Some Cry Eric Revis, Parallax Eric Revis, In Memory of Things Yet Seen Michael Attias, Live in Greenwich Village Ken Filiano, Scenes from a Clown Car Michael Attias, Renku in Coimbra Michael Attias, Nerve Dance Michael Attias, Twines of Cohesion Angelixa Sanchez, Wires & Moss Michael Attias, Credo Tony Malaby, Voladores

Chuckling at the thought of "hot air" and ECM in the same sentence. I'm guessing Manfred Eicher would regard the controversy positively, as amplifying the label's "brand" I'd say 1-4 depending on the day. There's a lot of music on the label that I really love. I also think criticism of the label is often on the mark, and it's probably overrated relative to its peer.

A new list, 13.5 years later Still on the list: Charles Lloyd, Canto Paul Motian, I Have the Room Above Her Jack DeJohnette, Special Edition Abercrombie/Holland/DeJohnette, Gateway Dave Holland, Conference of the Birds New to the list: Bennie Maupin, The Jewel in the Lotus Billy Hart, One is the Other Art Ensemble of Chicago, Nice Guys (the entire late 70s AEoC trilogy is great) Eberhard Weber, Silent Feet Edward Vesala, Lumi (love this guy's work) I've lost a lot of interest in the Jarrett trio stuff over time, it's kinda bland, despite great respect for the musicians involved.

Horrible

Somewhere upthread an individual argued that excess all-cause deaths, which are much higher than official COVID deaths, are actually due to lockdowns causing deaths (whether through suicide or loneliness or...). This is almost certainly false. Official COVID deaths by state are extremely correlated with excess all-cause deaths.

This unusual recording popped up on bandcamp the other day and might appeal to some other people here. A weird, intense mishmash of prog rock epic, heavy metal, free jazz, electronic music: https://daily.bandcamp.com/album-of-the-day/neptunian-maximalism-eons-review "Accordingly, there are times when Éons roars like a herd of shaggy, stampeding beasts. But there are also sections of the album that evoke a fire-lit religious ritual (complete with chanting and ceremonial drums), and others that sound like Ascension-era John Coltrane enveloped in a bewitching swirl of black magick. The clanging lurch of “Lamasthu” brings to mind drone-metal masters Sunn O))); one track later, “Ptah Sokar Osiris” offers up a healthy dose of freewheeling, horn-charged groove that’s more aligned with a globally inspired band like Goat than with most drone music. It’s that dichotomy that makes Neptunian Maximalism so interesting: one minute, they’re a hulking ship scraping its metal sides on the way out of the harbor, and the next, they’re the weird interstellar dance party happening down in the hull. Perhaps calling them the Sunn Ra A)))rkestra is a little too on the nose."

Interesting to go back and read this thread. Vandermark's career has taken such a turn-toward-low-key over the past 10-15 years, I wonder if he's due for a reappraisal.

RIP to a very underrated musician.

Late Bill Evans = Weekend at Bernie's of jazz?

This is one of the funniest posts in the history of this forum.

I have recently discovered Liberty's first three albums for Pi: Tactiles, Ophiuchus Butterfly, and Radiate. IMHO each one is better than the prior one. The first one is relatively straight-ahead, but MBase and Henry Threadgill influences become increasingly pronounced thereafter.

I think the "died with COVID / died because of COVID" debate is ill-served by being too binary: A person has pre-existing condition X. Getting COVID significantly increases the chance of somebody with pre-existing condition X dying. When we look across the population we see a lot more dead people with a pre-existing condition X. For any individual dead person who had pre-existing condition X, it might be hard to 100% attribute their death to COVID vs. pre-existing condition X.

I think you're misunderstand Ghost's comment. Dead bodies are dead bodies. There are a lot more of them piling up now then before. There's no cause attribution involved in this measure. The extra number of dead bodies in the United States since significant community spread began in late February is much higher than the historical baseline. The timing of these deaths is super-correlated with the official COVID death count. This phenomenon is apparent across the world, not just in the US.

Same