Big Beat Steve

What a pity. Saw him several times from 1990 through approx. 2005 when he was on tour with the re-formed Comets, and it was always an incredible act, considering the average age of the musicians. And Marshall Lytle and Joey D'Ambrosia always were the ones who really pulled it along despite their age even at a time when Frannie Beecher and (the late) Johnny Grande were already economising their efforts and Dick Richards very much was on his last legs by the standards of stage strain. Thanks for great shows, Marshall, and you will be missed even by the much younger and the really young 'uns in the Rockin' Scene!

I dimly remember seeing one or two rare eBay auctions of originals of "In Action" at the time I bought my facsimile reissue (about 10 years ago), and they fetched steep prices (several hundred $).

:tup On a more serious note, though, reports over here had it today that a NEWBORN child in a maternity unit in Poland was diagnosed with an alcohol level of 0.45!!! (no, not 0.045 - really 0.45!) This because the mother who had collapsed SLOPPY DRUNK in public had to be rushed to the hospital to have the child delivered in an emergency before more serious damage was done. The poor newborn is still in critical condition, though. Wonder if that "mother" has a driver's license and whatever she might have been up to at other occasions .. On the actual subject, beats me how ANYBODY can make enjoying themselves at whatever party or public event depend on gulping down alcoholic beverages. Is that really THAT necessary? Can't these characters loosen up and enjoy themselves without resorting to "little helpers" like that? And what's this thing about ruining club/restaurant business? Are there that many who feel they are being sneered at for being "weaklings" if they limit themselves to soft drinks or whatever non-alcoholic stuff whenevery they have to drive? Maybe a reevaluation of the company they're keeping might be in order, then ...

...an original pressing? I'm no expert but it has a red label with the Studio 4 logo on it and a number of XCTV-97116/7. Is that an original? And no VSOP 1 indication anywhere? I have a VSOP facsimile reissue with the original Studio 4 cover art and red label and it says VSOP in several places on the cover and label, so no mistaking there. The numbers you indicate figure on my reissue too and seem to be the matrix numbers for side 1/2. But wouldn't these be uncommonly complicated matrix numbers for such tiny labels of that era? Were there several reissues, maybe? A question to the experts re- "The Message": How does the Xanadu vinyl reissue (Xanadu 126) hold up soundwise compared to the original or other reissues? I have no intention of forsaking my vinyl (it sounds quite decent to me) but am just curious ..

So you've changed your avatar, Aloc ... Quite OT I know, but here is something somewhat jazzy to underline your avatar ... Have fun!

For how many decades has Gunter Hampel beein involved in a music that is US-American in its origins and therefore essentially uses English as a "lingua franca"when it is being talked about? Alas the way Gunter Hampel's message is worded it comes across a bit awkwardly in that respect ... Seriously and honestly, beyond the understandable and regrettable demise of jazz clubs, however, where has Mr Hampel been all those decades? Where and when has there ever been a "jazz TV station" in his HOME country? I dimly recall a time when SWF (J.E. Berendt's "home TV station") was BIT more active in getting jazz programs on the screen, but that was how many decades ago again? And beyond that, what was there? (Not counting the TV/radio stations' big bands playing semi- or 3/4-jazz tunes here and there to spice up otherwise MOR orchestra programs) And as for Pops' "scepter" being handed down to Mr Hampel (directly, even? ) to spread the gospel of jazz ... Does he (or most others) realize the stylistic divide between Pops' jazz and Mr Hampel's jazz the way it invariably will make itself felt to newbie listeners supposed to be introduced to jazz as a music that is relatively new to them? Not an easy thing to manage if you want to win new fans over at first listening. Jazz has taken on an exceedingly wide spectrum of stylistic meanings that are all supposed to fall under the all-encompassing generic term of "jazz". But are all specific types of jazz just as easily digestible or accessible to a given newbie listener? It isn't all the same with jazz and objectively speaking the stylistic differences can be far wider than between, say, death metal and rap, so what kind of jazz are we talking about? On a local level in Mr Hampel's home country, there IS a subculture of clubs and events where live swinging jazz is being played, including to listening audiences but also (but not limited to) to the entire swing and lindy hop dancers' set (just had to skip such an event locally last night here), so there ARE bands and fans out there who find venues where to have a good time to unpretentious (!), swinging jazz music. You just have to be alert to it and want to search it out open-mindedly. Talking about Göttingen, just THIS tiny example for a taster (as yielded by some QUICK googling): http://lindyvirus.com/ Maybe too mainstreamish or (to use a favorite term of oldtime D.B. reviewers) "derivative", and certainly not experimental enough to Mr Hampel's (and other's) jazz ambitions but oh well ... his loss, not theirs. This is just what the problem is all about IMO. Jazz has become so very many-faceted that one common denominator (as if this was ONE style of music) just won't fit the bill anymore. (Actually it hasn't fitted the bill anymore at least since the 70s) Isn't it just so ... you can very well like 2 or 3 or 4 styles of jazz while at the same time disliking (or being bored or annoyed by) 2 or 3 or 4 other styles of jazz and STILL be a jazz fan. Hardly anybody embraces ALL styles of jazz to the SAME degree. Now if this leaves the avantgardists out in the cold right now, then this is just a coincidence in time because at other times avantgarde, experimental, free, collective whatever were all the rage everywhere and anybody going for more "traditional" swinging styles of jazz found themselves being sneered at everywhere by the self-professed "enlightened" jazz circles .... There just ARE some jazz fans who would prefer Scott Hamilton over Peter Brötzmann ANYTIME (or maybe Lionel Hampton over Gunter Hampel ). (The opposite stylistic preferences have long been taken for granted, but some developments in jazz and its styles and tastes just run in circles - "back to the roots" - instead of in a linear manner - "far and ever farther out" ) Sorry, but simply had to get this off my chest ...

Why is this topic OUTSIDE the music section? And how about some nicely non-P.C. 40s/50s stuff? "Explicit" (what an EXCEEDINGLY puritanly silly term in ANY era!) lyrics were not limited to the 20s AFAIK and in a way seem to have been just as revolting to the sedate set in the post-WWII years (witness the crossover of the music to white listening audiences - and the reactions by the teens' elders - when R'n'R was born ). Some of the more obvious ones: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W19KDTz6iVE and so on ... BTW, as for Lucille Bogan's Shave Em Dry, the respective chapter of Paul Oliver's "Screening The Blues" would make for VERY interesting reading and for more versions of that song.

My point is that the Jutta Hipp CD was already discussed last fall. Plainly and simply. Just a statement of fact. No totally unlike all those other threads here where a topic that had already been discussed in another thread in this forum was invariably linked to (maybe - a bit understnadably IMO - to avoid atomizing related discussions in a zillion separate threads). Like it or not.

Not quite so new. Thsi label has been discussed here:

OMG, JSngry, where did you dig out these abominations of the type we had to wade through in so many record bins in the 70s (and even today in used record clearout bins)?

I think we misunderstood each other. What I meant to say was that I realize those Rischka LPs were very rare but your statement in your post of 3 May that European jazz LPs had such small pressing runs (which no doubt basically was true but cannot be generalized IMO, at least not in the case of German 70s jazz) cannot have been that true in the case of Dauner's OTHER 70s Eurojazz LPs. Because, like I said, "Knirsch" und "Oimels" (and probably others) were all over the place wherever you looked in the German record shop jazz sections throughout the second half of the 70s (and beyond). Same for other German jazz releases from that period (and I am NOT talking about Doldinger's Passport, of course ). (I know - I VERY often checked out the entire "German jazz" bins in search of specific Telefunken a.o. reissues in those years but to no avail - only found them secondhand much later - and therefore remember having to flip through countless 70s German free/fusion etc. jazz releases in those bins ).

Agree about Adrian Rollini, but talking about bass saxists form that era, I think Joe Rushton was no slouch either.

Strange about Dauner, though ... I cannot recall those "Rischka" LPs at all, obviously, but remember seeing "Knirsch", "Oimels" and probably one or two other of his early to mid-70s records in the "Dauner" bins of the jazz sections in our local record stores for AGES throughout the second half of the 70s. Never bought any of them because I wasn't into that stuff but his records sure were all over the place. (Or was this that much of a local thing in his hometown?)

Weren't Wild Root the ones that sponsored Woody Herman for a time? (Hence the title he recorded) As for "Tavern In The Town", suggest you listen either to the Bar-X Cowboys' recording of 1937 or to the one by Leonard Feather's "Ye Olde English Swinge Band" (same year). That should brighten things up. Re- hair grease, in my teen/twen/student days I used to take our local brands (sold in tubes) on specific occasions: "Brisk"; "Fit" or "Flott".

Not wanting to discourage you, but looking up the track listing in the discographies and imagining what the title of the LP might hint at (not that rare to see this term used in that era), to me this sounds very much like one of those "mood music" LPs that were turned out ever so often in the 50s featuring sax artists that you normally associate with much meatier and grittier material. Sam The Man Taylor, for example, did several like this. I'll be glad to be proven wrong but somehow have my misgivings.

EURO-JAZZ, which always equals a very keen group of Asian buyers and collectors on hand. And the seller in this case is one who knows his stuff (and the scene) inside out. So there MUST be a market. I understand, though, that this CTR release is supposed to come with the cover below. So ... that price for one without a cover?

Look .. all I wanted to point out that we are talking about a VERY elusive NON-COMMERCIAL pressing (see above) where - life being what it is - there just might be cassette copies floating around (or some good soul maybe share their good fortune of owning that LP and let somebody else listen in). This is NOT about some seedy grey or black market bootleg release that undermines the work of other, more deserving reissuers that did all the hard work with making a recording available (again) and where you can rightfully frown upon piggyback riders who want to cash in on it by doing COMMERCIAL unauthorized reissues. I can perfectly well understand that in such cases of reissue ripoffs a line has to be drawn and such shady practices should not be endorsed by mentioning, linking or advocating them here unduly in public, but does the above timid question voiced by the thread starter really fall into that category? I don't really think so.

Ah c'mon ... No doubt a CASSETTE copy (for strictly private use), for example, would have been quite sufficient for the thread starter ... Just for curiosity's sake to listen to the music of a NON-COMMERCIALLY released (see link above) platter. See, everybody, why I did not want to become a mod?

And I just noticed I was wrong about the Fresh Sound CD of this Reese Markevich LP. It is in their catalog - BMCD1608.

Actually that Reese Markevich LP has been around on the reissue market for some time. Fresh Sound did a facsimile reissue LP in the late 80s. No idea if they ever followed up with a CD when they started re-reissuing their vinyl catalog on CD (it's not in their curent catalog). (corrected - see below)

I am very honored to see me mentioned but I just have to decline. For one thing, there are many threads that I simply do not follow, and there are limits to the time I spend (and can spend) on this forum anyway. Besides - believe me - I decline because I know myself and how I can come across, and at times I can be confrontational, maybe too much so. I try not to exceed certain limits but I do like to speak my mind, and I am afraid by the standards of this forum (which quite naturally is U.S. in spirit after all) I am definitely not P.C.-ish enough. So - thanks again, but sorry, I can't - it's better that way, I am pretty sure.

Well, listening to the vinyl and CD reissues, I think they did there ... But how could you have "joined up" a 13-minute tune on 3-minute 78rpms anyway? You had to cut somewhere. After all this was no studio recording where they used fadeouts between Pt1 and Pt2 or whatever ...

Don't confuse the Sextet with the big band. Charlie Christian was the B.G. SEXTET guitarist, not the (regular) big band guitarist throughout. According to the discographies, he just appeared (as "featured artist"?) on part of the big band recordings on some sessions and live appearances. Mike Bryan was the regular big band guitarist through a good deal of the "Christian period" (from the fall of 1940), and before that (mid-1939 to April, 1940), the discographies list Arnold Covey (Arnold Covarrubias) with the big band. From July, 1941, one Tommy Morgan is listed as the big band guitarist, as he also was part of the Sextet in the October and December 1941 sessions. Dave Barbour is listed with the big band from June, 1942, and Allen Reuss recorded with the orchestra and the quartet and quintet from June, 1943.. Mike Bryan was back with the sextet and big band in 1945. As for Billy Bauer, he is present in the B.G. discography only in the Sextet/Septet/orchestra recordings of the Gray/Hasselgard period band of 1948. A LONG time after Charlie Christian's demise.

To be more specific: What Is This Thing Called Love (excerpts issued as Unfinished Bopera) Perdido (excerpts issued as Wild Bill) Merry Go Round Blues (unissued) Blowin' For Bass (unissued) Am just trying to make up my mind now if I'm going to make it hard on myself and listen to the music piecemeal (like they did way back...)

So ... where is this available as a DISC rather than just an mp3 download (as shown on amazon here)?