Guy Berger

Man... that groove they lock into at the end of "Your Own Special Way" (disc 1) is great. And I dig the funky "Now's the Time" -- did Bobby Timmons ever do this tune? Guy

I'm actually going to the Jazz Standard to see Ben Allison/Medicine Wheel. I'm not sure if I can come down earlier but if so I'll meet up with you guys. Guy

I think I'm on the same page as you... given limited budget and limited listening time. Guy

Obviously extremely speculative, but given the path that a lot of other jazz revolutionaries took in the 70s and 80s, I think that to some degree he would have moved back toward the mainstream. Guy

No, that's not a snare. It's a prototype drum machine being played by Dexter Gordon, who wasn't credited when the album was released. Miles Davis took credit for the idea in later interviews. Guy

Well, well, well, Who got b***h slapped today??? B-) Yeah... if the Pistons are lucky enough to have Shaq injured, they'll definitely get past Miami in the playoffs. Guy

I only have the original domestic issue of this, which I got via a Columbia House order. I remember that at the time I was interested in his more adventurous stuff -- this one and Destination Out were the only ones available. I'm a big fan of Jackie's more extreme playing here; in fact, when I first heard Destination Out I was very disappointed that he was toning things down. Billy Higgins is great here, as is Herbie Lewis. I'm indifferent to the piano player here, Walter whatever Jr. (can't remember whether it's Bishop or Davis). He plays pretty well (particularly on the first two tunes) but is a little too old-fashioned for the date. The last two tunes could have comfortably been tackled with a trio. "Melody for Melonae" is my favorite Jackie tune -- Mingus influenced, I think, with the sequenced sections. The version of "I'll Keep Loving You" is beautiful. And the last two tunes are cool too. "Rene" has a bit of a Monkish flavor, while "Omega" is just set up perfectly with Herbie opening the melody before Jackie jumps in. One last thing -- I really like Jackie's liner notes here. More albums should come with a mission statement. Mission accomplished! Guy

Is anyone else planning to attend one of the evenings? I might be going to the night with Medicine Wheel (Thursday?). Guy

COOL STRUTTIN'? ARIC IS THAT YOU????

The Spurs dethroned the Shaq/Kobe Lakers, in 2003. Guy

So, I take it you have bought all the cds you want and are looking for more. Why do you say that Chuck? Are they trading officially available material? Guy

Occasionally. Charles wrote his own liner notes (interesting ones, actually) for All My Relations. Guy

Great choice! Guy

I have two -- Sam Rivers and Chico Hamilton, both of which I picked up because the music was unavailable elsewhere. (Most of the Rivers stuff has been reissued since then.) I'm completely indifferent to the aesthetics and they tend to be pricey. I wish they included the original liner notes and artwork! Because of the "completeness" factor, sets sometimes contain music that's not that great. (At least, that was my experience with the Chico set.) I'm also a little leery of box sets in general, unless the music is uniformly of high quality. That said, the recent trend toward Selects is to my liking and there are also a few of the big boxes that I want to get. Guy

Chuck is actually the owner of the Russian record store that Delay visited out there. I heard some cash exchanged hands... Guy

Mike, I disagree... this isn't a thread about why Jarrett makes noise or whatever, it will hopefully be a useful guide to prospective, not unlike rating live recordings for "sound quality". Guy

Rating his albums for grunts is hard enough work without having to figure out how many there are! I see Sidewinder has already contributed. Keep 'em coming! Guy

I've had this half-joke, half-serious idea for a while and a suggestion on RMB pushed me to get the ball rolling. A lot of people bitch about Keith Jarrett's noisemaking on various albums, something that puts off a lot of Keith Jarrett newbies but clearly varies a lot from recording to recording. So my challenge to the other board members is: go through the Keith Jarrett recordings in your collection (incl. sideman appearances) and rate his grunting on a scale from 1 (not obnoxious at all) to 5 (extremely obnoxious). I guess 3 would be "mildly irritating". If you don't have the patience to rate everything, rate as much as you can be bothered with. I think a lot of prospective listeners might actually find it useful. What won't be especially useful to Jarrett neophytes is a debate on Jarrett's grunting. We've had those a million times before, search the archives. Some people can't stand it at all, others aren't bothered a lot by it, and some people actually like it! If you find it extremely obnoxious everywhere, then rate all his recordings "5". Also, this isn't a thread about the guy's music. Some of his albums might have great music but level-5 grunting, others might have little noise but bad music. We care only about the grunting. Some criteria: frequency, volume, and general obnoxiousness. Looking forward to peoples' responses! Guy

Wow... this is terrible news. I'm glad I participated while it lasted. Guy

I think that's exactly what it means. Both New Jersey and Indiana would've done the same thing to the Lakers. The Lakers last year were playing on their reputation and the Spurs bought into it and got psyched out. Same thing with the Kings two years before that... sometimes the better team doesn't win. The Clips finally passed the Lakers in the standings. By the way Baron Davis was insane last night. 40 pts, 13 assists. If he's healthy the Warriors will be really good next year. Guy

You know it's going to be a rough night when you have 59 pts at halftime and are trailing by double digits. Guy

Interesting that the group chose to perform only Monk tunes, given that he hadn't experienced the Riverside breakthrough yet. I remember listening to this and being somewhat disappointed after all the hype. Hopefully the Miles performances from '66 and '67 will see an official release one day -- they're smokin'. Guy

You're all going to laugh at me, but I want to see the last Star Wars movie. I don't expect it to be very good, but as long as it's as decent as the last one, I'll be satisfied. Whoops, I'm an idiot... Lon put this on his list. So please. laugh at him first.

I think this comes down to how closely you share Lon's feelings about the music. If you love the sound of this group (and they play very well here) then this is essential music. For what it's worth, the "box" replicates the two sets, so you might just want to go for one, see how you like it, and then later on pick up the other. The price differential is small -- in fact, when I picked this music up, buying the 2-CD sets separately was cheaper than the box! Guy

I think the Spurs were overall a better team and choked. Guy