Dan Gould

Might scare people to consider this but this roundly abused disc is going to expose more people to jazz (or should that be "jazz"?) as Ken Burns ever dreamed.

Its legal because no one is forcing you to use ebay. Of course it sucks that its just ebay getting money out of every aspect of the transaction ....

I know! So much new data to enter!! Thanks, I got that LP as soon as it came out. Would GHF do anything else? What I said last year! Hope it's a great one! The short answer is the same as last year: a resounding "No". They did. Its pretty good. ************** Seriously thanks to all for the birthday wishes, 46 wasn't much different from turning 45. So far I've done best with the gifts I got for myself: The two recent Brian Lynch CDs and Chuck's Eddie Johnson CD. Looking forward to listening to those, and what shows up in the mail from the straggling family members.

I have to say that I dig almost all of Jimmy's career until the Stax recordings. Some of the soul/blues recordings are stone classics, like "My Answer".

Bring a sammitch.

How predictable was it that Lester would pitch like the incompetent pieces of motherfucking shit he's surrounded by? I'd say the odds were "mathematical certainty" which are the precise same odds they have of clearing out their lockers on September 29th and hitting the links September 30th.

A week from tomorrow Comedy Central will air their Charlie Sheen roast, which took place last night. Sounds like Sheen had the better writers though: Entire AP report here.

And so the slog to the inevitable continues. Youkilis out with a reported hip + sports hernia/groin problem. Bedard skips a start for a sore knee; now he has a strained lat muscle too. The offense hopeless. The starting pitching worse. And the Rays get another crack at us before there is any chance of any critical piece being back on the field. I'm done. Someone beat the fucking Yankees, PLEASE.

The Red Sox start was 2-10, which is the equivalent of 0-8 except that two more games were knocked off the schedule. Thank you for recognizing the fundamental truth I spoke of in April. Its damn fucking hard to overcome such a terrible start, because an equally bad segment of the season is still likely to occur later on, and a combined 4-25 stretch (or whatever) is an anchor around a team's neck.

And let's not forget that the Red Sox are collapsing like a wet taco and if they don't manage to win at least once in Tampa (huge question mark considering the state of the pitching and recent offensive incompetence) the WC lead will be 3.5 with 17 to play, and four more against Tampa. They are in deep fucking shit with Beckett out even if they make the playoffs but it wouldn't bother me in the least to see them complete this craptastic season in ignominious fashion.

J.H., you presuppose classiness which has never been in evidence. Which is not at all surprising when he somehow equates "class" with "culture". A credit to his city, such as it is.

Actually the things I miss from the days of record stores would be pets.com and Monica Lewinsky.

If anything the advantage is that there isn't a whole heck of a lot of time for the rest of the league to dissect his strengths and weaknesses, which means he may get some key hits on mistake pitches he'll never see in 2012. And didn't he hit both homeruns to right field? Shouldn't even count ... and if that's what he does I wouldn't go looking for people to pitch him away at Yankee Stadium. Let's see him prove he can handle hard stuff in.

And the hits keep on coming: Bedard being skipped for his next start as the knee that required surgery is acting up. And now Beckett waited until September 5th for his traditional injury: His right leg, his push-off leg. They are completely FUCKED. They will stumble into the wild card if they are lucky before being rudely dismissed in the Division Series.

Since when does anyone need to request a review? Its not just the manager who can do it. Umps also have the power to decide to review, and more importantly home run calls are also non-home run calls. Back to Maier: What if he interfered, pulled the ball toward him, but his glove hits the wall, ball bounces out, and amazingly, the ump calls it a double. They can't review that? Are you fucking serious? This is correct application of the rules and I will bet any amount of money the Phils protest will come to nothing, and Joe West won't be told not to do it again.

Amazingly I will defend the normally execrable West. From the MLB.com report: Clearly it was a case of fan interference on a potential home run ball and absolutely falls under the rules as they currently exist. Think about it in an only slightly different situation: Asshat in the Phillies shirt deflects the ball into the stands, and the call is "home run". They shouldn't take a look at that and determine that it was fan interference instead? That was the Jeffrey Maier playoff game, and while it took them ten years, its infamy was a big reason why "fan interference" was written into the rules as something that can be reviewed. Good on you, Country Joe!

Until someone explains how this has anything to do with the music, I'll continue to find this a total waste of time. Gay, straight, "queer" or "bi-sexual" (I put that in quotes since Albertson won't acknowledge its a possible category), it all amounts to a sideshow of no possible significance unless its that important to have a "full" picture of people, in which case Albertson is doing yeoman's work to correct the historic record, and for that I'd have to say: But the fact remains that if you can't identify someone as gay in a blindfold test, what the fuck does it matter? Same exact thing as distinguishing white jazz musicians from black jazz musicians, except that the distinguishing characteristic isn't totally obvious on first sight.

And just as I predicted it has started and continues. Two series against the Yankees and Rangers, 4 losses. Game and a half deficit, hasn't been that big since July 5. With the Yankees playing Baltimore and Boston facing a Toronto team smarting from a Yankee shellacking, the deficit will only rise before the Yankees go to LA and Seattle starting next weekend. And it will only do the MFs proud to win the division despite such futility against the Red Sox. If they'd only played them a little tougher, they'd win the division by six or eight instead of the three games that will separate them. Let the MFY get Verlander. Maybe if they are really lucky the Sox can manage to win in Arlington in October.

Keep in mind that they keep the ad copy on file for the next time it shows up in stock. So even if it is OOP and relatively rare, it could show up again with the same stupid shit written about it. For a knowledgeable store like that to not know Rockin in Rhythm as a Duke cover is pretty lame. If you tell them I bet they change it to something like "you might think the title is misleading but actually its a cover of a Duke Ellington tune and its pretty rockin'!"

If you read the article you'll figure out that its his run support over his current 12 game winning streak, so its not season-long 9 and a half runs per game. But it is enormous run support over a streak that has produced 80% of his wins on the season. He wasn't so spectacular when he wasn't getting this many runs per game.

Actually I think they keep trying to squeeze more toothpaste out of the tube.

That's the quietest 15-4 record I've ever seen. You look at it and your first reaction is "how did that happen?" More here. And that's not an early-season article, it was written August 27. A lot of pitchers would have great records if they averaged almost ten runs of support per game. Hell, Tim Wakefield would be way past 200 wins and adding to his new franchise-win record if he got 9.5 runs per game.

I hope you are right because fucking away a game like the way they did last night, when there is no margin for error in the race, is a good way to make sure you're the wild card and not division champs. Fuckin' pathetic. Yankees would have been on the ropes and instead they face Toronto and we get Texas and I'll be shocked if they don't take over first place before they leave for L.A. a week from now. And Dave James, none of those pitches were strikes. The closest one was the one that ended the game but none of the pitches Ellsbury took were close.

Mom had power restored sometime yesterday, but its still nearly 40% of the town without, and the surrounding towns are all around 50%. Pretty bad considering that most power lines are buried.

I might be less interested in winning the division if it weren't between us and the Yankees, but I am very torn about which matchup is truly advantageous in the first round. No one can match the Tigers for being able to throw Verlander twice in a short series. Then again the Yankees always found a way to beat the Twins when they had Johan Santana. On the other hand, the Rangers don't have that singular ace to be frightened of (maybe Wilson but he's not the same AFAIC), but until last week they were beating the Red Sox consistently for the last two seasons. And any calculation can't ignore that the Red Sox have the best road record in baseball and were on a streak of like seven road series wins in a row. If any team could get through to the World Series as the wild card it should be them. So while I truly would love to see them beat the Yankees for the division, I can say I'd honestly fear the end result if they face Verlander and the Tigers in the ALDS. Then again the bottom line is that you got to beat the team that is in front of you, and if you can't do it you deserve to go home for the winter.