Guy Berger

Yeah, not a bad album by any means! But RateYourMusic has it scoring higher than Point of Departure, Black Fire, Andrew!!!, Judgment, and Shades. Vox populi, vox dei! Guy

Anybody else find Dance With Death somewhat overrated?

Afro Bossa is a great album. Afro Eurasian Eclipse has higher highs and lower lows.

Pax is fine, but it feels like a Blue Note pickup date more than most of Andrew's BN dates. There are a lot of AH albums I would pick up before this one. The recommendation of Black Fire is right on. This is one of the very best AH recordings, period. I would put Judgment and Andrew!!! (along with Passing Ships, which you have) pretty close in the next tier. Compulsion is also in that next tier, but it's more firmly in the avant-garde category than the other recordings I'm mentioning - not sure if that is a minus for you as a listener. As far as post-1970 AH, Shades (w/Clifford Jordan) is a fantastic date, albeit much more straight-ahead than the BN stuff. And I love Dusk too.

That was my initial instinct but I read somewhere that McHenry has only a limited role on the album.

I had a very different impression of this band on record, and live. Different strokes etc

Has anyone listened to this album? I know Relyles wasn't crazy about it which leads me to think I should skip it. Guy

The Evidence reissues are great, but I would note that Heliocentric Worlds Vols. 1 & 2 are on ESP and I'd put them, especially the first one, up there against anything else I've heard from him.

Absolutely agreed with Jim. We live in a world where Yo La Tengo is covering "Nuclear War". It's hard to judge what the best starter is for Sun Ra without knowing where the listener is coming from and what they think they're looking for. When I started listening to him, I was instantly gripped by Atlantis (which strongly resonated with the Floyd fan in me, and which I still enjoy) but was not terribly interested in the wonderful Chicago-era stuff. Holy shit, I just realized I've been listening to SR for 17 years. I'm old.

538 had a fascinating article on how Curry doesn't shoot enough. Pretty interesting contrast to the decent Warriors team of 2006-2008 which was chock-full-of-chuckers (Baron Davis!).

The corollary of this is that KW could still have good or even great marketing support behind him that's not being wasted on record stores. Also, related but unlikely (but someone more familiar with the production side of physical media can chime in) - it may be that the CD is selling so well through other distribution channels that there simply isn't enough stock available to supply a random record store.

Maybe the audiences for the two are different. Easy to imagine that some older shoppers (like ECM fans) still like to frequent record stores whereas youngsters (Kamasi fans) do not. It might simply be that ECM's distribution network is suffering from inefficient inertia.

I haven't heard it - but to be fair, it's not like the lyrics on the original trilogy of Santana albums were un-trite.

He's hit and miss as a live performer. Sometimes I've felt the way you describe; but I thought his playing during the WILD MAN DANCE performance at the Temple of Dendur in the spring of 2015 was outstanding.

We should have a contest for which of these sub tropes seems most applicable

Yes, SPECIAL EDITION is an exceptionally good record. (And the other 3 SE albums on ECM are nothing to sneeze at either.) Guy

I agree. He's a fine straight-ahead drummer, but his strength lies in various post-bop styles. One of my favorites.

I suspect a lot of it is typical fandom behavior - a discomfort with an influx of newcomer fans who haven't "paid their dues" by genuflecting to the "fandom canon".

low expectations...

My wife and I caught the Lloyd-Frisell duo yesterday. It was an enjoyable concert, though I've seen better performances from both musicians. They played: Voice in the Night Requiem Of Course, Of Course Monk's Mood Dorotea's Studio In My Room Island Blues Come Sunday

I see him as this generation's Medeski Martin & Wood. This is a good thing.

Can you talk a little further about Cohen's group? More ECMish than the Billy Hart and Mark Turner groups which have also recorded for ECM? They have a new album coming out which I was excited about, but your review makes me think I should cool my enthusiasm.

OK! Would love to hear MomsMobley's opinion as well!

Hey guys, I'm interested in exploring the world of Monteverdi madrigals. Question 1: Is there a strong reason to venture beyond books 4, 5 & 8? Or are those three enough? Question 2: Who do you prefer as performers? The two main options I'm looking at are: Complete madrigals (12 CD box) by La Veneziana <--- overkill? Books 4 & 5 (2 CD set) by Consort of Musicke Thanks!

Agreed, this is a real head-scratcher. (Though not 100% insane - replace "oil" with "home" and...) This may reflect the fact that trading commodity contracts, low-quality corporate bonds issued by energy companies, and sovereign debt issued by commodity-exporting countries has been a large chunk of the income for investment banks during recent years. The world you're familiar with and all that... Also, to some degree people are blaming the wagging tail (falling energy prices) for the dog (China's economy slowing and becoming less ravenous for commodities) and in some cases getting the attached animal totally wrong (the energy price decline is a function of not just demand but also supply).