Big Beat Steve

Still a cult record for me. The VERY first modern jazz record I ever bought in the mid-70s at the age of 15 (maybe going on 16) about a year after I had started buying and "collecting" jazz records. I had read about Bird and Diz (notably in Berendt's "Jazz Book") and was rather curious but preferred to ease my way chronologically into this (for me) "new territory". Regardless of what everyone had written by then about this revolutionary (and revolting) upheaval in 40s jazz, my initial listening impressions were that all this was quite a logical extension and continuation of swing (at least of whatever I had been familiar with in early 40s-style swing at that time). Intense music (not just "Things to Come") but certainly not disturbing or unsettling and quite accessible. (Eventually I even picked up a spare copy of this twofer when a clean and cheap copy came up at a fleamarket.) So the path for further explorations was set (I think one of my next bebop acquisitions were the Dial recordings by Dexter Gordon reissued on Storyville). And @Gheorge - never mind if Diz never was a Prestige artist (well, almost ... check out that final session of 1950 on side 4. It was actually first released on Prestige): Blind Lemon Jefferson was no Milestone artist either. And yes - those twofers were a godsend at the time (and I still look out for them).

Surprising that this one hasn't come up yet:

Not really my cuppa nor field of interest, but I find this approach excellent and worthy of every bit of support by those even vaguely interested. These bits of history need to be documented to flesh out the overall picture (which did not happen in the capital of the country only) and they certainly are not for the "locals" only. Not least of all because this kind of club/live gig scene happened in similar ways in other cities too (and many of those probably will never be documented). (FWIW, and in a similar - jazz - vein, I do not regret one bit having bought Bill Birch's "Keeper of the Flame" though I have no particular connection to Manchester. But it does complete the history of UK jazz in a well-done way.)

I am not so sure about that. In the end I will of course bow to the judgment of TTK, the expert in this field , but while my original of the Dr. Kildare LP has a few pops and crackles the music comes through well enough for me to feel this is yet another "westcoast jazzy mood theme and soundtrack" LPs. Look at it - you will see that quite a few of the tracks there are not exactly supposed to be set to a "Twilight Zone" mood (starting with the Shirley Temple Show - which of course as such doesn't mean anything to you or me over here but still we do know who Shirley Temple was - even in later years, right? ) In fact I find that LP even less "crime-y" or "twilight zone-y" than the "The Wild One" (Leith Stevens) or "Hot Rod Rumble" soundtrack LPs (two of few LPs in that genre I have here), for example. Even the Aaron Bell "77 Sunset Strip" LP would fit that category better in comparison, I think.

+1 !!!!!

Getting back to an earlier point of the discussion (which apparently I never saw at the time - a long 15-16 years ago): I have the Donahue Hep LPs ( LP 2, 5, 25) with the Navy band plus capitol T-626 with various 1946-47 studio recordings. I had owned and loved the Heps for quite a while when I dug up the Capitol LP (and was smitten by that one too, admittedly in a somehow different way). Whenever listening to these albums I've always been wondering how these Capitols came about. To me many of them sounded very much like civilian reinterpretations of the Navy band charts, and whether you prefer one or the other depends on what you use them for IMO. The Capitols do sound a bit more straightforward and "cleaned up" (or "condensed" if you will) and the Navy recordings are looser, but the Capitols still are great for dancers (with enough stamina ) whereas the Navy band recordings might be even more challenging for their looseness - or even less suitable actually. "Pale" therefore is all rather relative, depending one's points of reference, and sometimes it pays to try to listen to recordings such as these with ears "in tune" with the ears of the listeners of the time (and not so much - at least not always - with the ears of latter-day listeners weaned on all sorts of later jazz). So ... It makes me wonder which commercially released recordings exactly the discussion was all about.

Recommended listening as a good example of Kovac's (no, not Kovacs' - that's somebody else - talk about the use of apostrophes, ha! ) Fifties recordings: His sessions for the MOD label of Cologne. Available in the HUGE MOD Records box here, for example (some copies are also avialable on Discogs): https://www.amazon.de/Records-Cologne-Jazz-Germany-1954-56-Vinyl/dp/B011DF2RJM A somewhat more (but not quite) complete listing of his output is here, of course: https://www.discogs.com/de/artist/51855-Roland-Kovac

I have an original pressing of the LP - bought in decent condition for a decent price on eBay long ago. Must say I initially bought I mainly for the cover art, though it is intriguing to listen to. It is rather "far out"' for its time. And though I am no expert on the genre at all I do not find it "twilight zone"-like. FWIW, the DB review (2 1/2 stars) was rather lukewarm (which was warmer than the reviewer found the music to be).

Never mind the blowback ... probably by people who are unable or unwilling to approach historical facts in the context of their times. I'll be looking forward to this opus that I have preordered.

I doubt, though, that there are THAT many out there who ALL follow that path. Because Mosaic CD sets minus the large box and book really are common on the market. I wonder who long it will take for Savory sets amputated like that to appear on the market ...

Assuming these are no (incomplete) sets that "fell off a truck", hasn't this been discussed before elsewhere? There seem to be a lot of orphaned sets around that may have been sent out as promo copies (where the contents may have been reduced to the actual music and bare-bones discographical details in the small booklets in the jewel cases) or that may have been sold off by Mosaic through special deals at one point (Wasn't there talk of a mismatch of the manufactured totals between produced books, huge outer boxes and discs?). The "Classic Capitol Jazz Sessions" set I bought on eBay several years ago (2-CD jewl cases withn the CDs and small inlay booklets with discographical info as well as small drilled hole in the upper corner of the jewel cases but no huge book and box) certainly loooked like a promo or sale item to me At any rate, it IS puzzling. One might almost be tempted to think Mosaic at a time wilfully tore sets apart in order to ship "missing", "damaged" or defective" parts of the sets to existing customers and then sold off the incomplete sets at a discount later on. Or else there is indeed a total mismatch in the number of produced individual items that go into making a full set.

Adding one more here, maybe? https://www.merkheft.de/index.php?cl=details&anid=1173057 Just thought I'd mention it in passing because a price reduced by close to 90% might make it worthwhile to some who ARE into his music.

Point taken.

Or to put it even more to the point: "That begs the question" means "isn't it so that ...?"

IMO It still is a stimulating book (of a slice of history) to read today. I can't quite imagine in what way Mezzrow was criticized "a lot" for (except maybe by those who fail to see that books like this need to be understood in the context of the times and without the bogging down by hindsight) but a quick check showed that the (fairly brief) reivews both in the All Music Guide to Jazz, 2nd Ed. (1996), and in the Down Beat Music 8th Yearbook (1963) sound fairly positive and appreciative (except for Mezzrow's stature as a jazz musician, of course).

Nor to me. All that is needed is NOT to give in to the reflexes of what has been seen often enough "must be right" (which it still isn't). The same problem exists in the German language too, BTW, where it is even more of an eyesore because an "s" separated by an apostrophe is much more of an anomaly than in English anyway.

Reminiscing about the vinyl treasure troves I unearthed in London in the 90s I do think that these LPs ended up in the shops because there were quite a share of (probably older) collectors out there who, for example, dumped all their swing vinyl as soon as they were able to replace them by buying the entire Chrono(lo)gical Classics series instead. But his may have been a niche among collectors too.

In the US and UK maybe, but over here I'd bet it was far from "most". A certain percentage of collectors - yes, and many in the field of classical music, but in pop, rock and jazz? Nah, not that many. Many may have stopped buying vinyl at some point in favor of CDs (and some may have ruefully started again later on) but they did not dump wholesale what they had - the way this apparently happened in the US or UK - or else the secondhand record shops or record fairs would have had to bust at their seams (like Mole Jazz did in the 90s for a while). Anyway ... I don't really get the cassette nostalgia either. I never "embraced" the prerecorded cassette format and cannot recall having ever bought any prerecorded cassettes. I did dub a huge lot of music onto cassettes (off the radio) to preserve interesting music I heard on the radio, but this was just for consumption (just like the cassette mixes I made for my players in my cars). And in maybe one or two dozen cases I actually copied the contents of LPs owned by friends onto cassette when no vinyl copy was to be found anywhere. But this was a not very satisfying stopgap measure from the start and I was VERY glad to dump them as soon as an affordable vinyl copy turned up. Which is why the cassette resurgence among youngsters today does baffle me. But for "nostalgia" reasons I see it with some fondness anyway (a bit on the premise that "anyone who is into cassettes cannot be a bad person at heart" ).

You are way off with that link. Obviously it has been discussed within the classic car fraternity when it made the headlines a couple of years ago and while everyone who is halfway sensible will agree that car safety has made enormous progress and to have that spike of a non-collapsible steering column point at you in a head-on crash is no fun at all they also agree that this crash test "comparison" was a fake. Expert eyes who look closely at the 59 Chev will notice that car was a patched-up and glossed-painted-over dog in the best tradition of most U.S. "restorations" up to, say, the 80s or sometime in the 90s. I.e. there are many moments where it is evident that rust has taken a hold at and deep inside the seams, and this DOES weaken ANY car's structure. FWIW, and not wanting to get too off-topic, but I feel safe enough in my own 1958 to 1960-MY European classics even in today's traffic because they teach you to drive carefully, defensively and with perspicacity - and yet you can advance well in modern-day traffic on the typical European city streets here where most others in their rounded, potato-shaped and more and more inflated modern motor gizmos just have no clue whatsoever where their car starts and ends and therefore come to a dead stop in situations where you - in your 50s car that not only has a comparatively narrow track width but ALSO enables you as the driver to actually see ALL of your FOUR fenders - will be able to just whiz through (in all carefulness, of course). P.S. Nothing against some thoughtful mechanicals/electrics updates to improve reliability, but restomods of the kind that you describe are an abomination. Just for posers ...

So you don't like Madeleine Peyroux either, then?

Of course. Instill fear into the hearts of the unwary ... Let's face it, copying music (and the potential revenue losses that may have come with it) in the age of the musicassette was a laughable affair compared to today ...

Huh ...? Write "Preussisches Quartet ...", then, if you don't have the "ß'" on your keyboard (because that's what a "ß" equals) ...

Yes, that's been discussed here too. As far as record covers and related ephemera go, the "High Fidelity Art" should supersede just about all of the rest (the author actually hints at this in his inside cover text)

Ouch ... I had hoped this was not going get even worse ...

Something that the above-mentioned Uptown label (said to set standards) can be faulted for too. On the occasional release by them the booklet (including the texts) is a HUGE letdown compared to their usual (excellent) standard. Not to mention that even the "big ones" don't always go overboard in their pictorial efforts for their reissues either.