Rabshakeh

Canadian guitarist. I know next to nothing about him. Does anyone have any suggestions for him as a leader or sideman?

I'm excited about this one.

Chris McGregor's Brotherhood Of Breath – Live At Willisau Another spin of this new acquisition. Disappointingly muddy sound but great music. Perhaps better on the old CD I had.

Noah Howard – The Black Ark The 2007 Black Ark reissue.

Riot – Thundersteel

Frank Wess – Yo Ho! Poor You, Little Me I haven't listened to this in years. What a great record.

Pound for pound, this might be my favourite Art Ensemble record. What's the story behind this copy?

Charles Mingus Presents Charles Mingus I've had terrible experiences with this one in the past. I bought a copy from Chiswick car boot that was a boot, gave it away and the bought another copy from Jazz Messengers in Lisbon, not realising that such a fancy and overpriced record shop would sell euro-knock offs. Nice to finally have a decent Candid, which sounds a lot better.

Please accept my apologies for what I have done.

I've heard it, but I don't own it.

Now on: One of my favourite Lee Konitz records.

Art Ensemble Of Chicago – Message To Our Folks Cheaper option Affinity pressing. I actually prefer to cover to the BYG original, and it sounds reasonable.

Has anyone had a listen to this yet? I generally enjoy Brian Blade releases, because you know you're going to get something with interesting shifting rhythms.

Just read this. Required reading indeed. So scungy.

This is a good one. Abercrombie on electric mandolin.

Just listening to the 11th disk, and I notice that all of the tracks are 11 minutes long. Not exactly, but between 11:00 and 11:59 minutes. Are there any other quirks like that which anyone has noticed?

I hadn't realized that Sahara was such an important point for Tyner. It is probably the jazz record I loved the most as a younger jazz fan. I had assumed that his career was fairly steady, with the Blue Notes slightly more prominent than the Milestones, and that my enjoyment of Sahara was just a personal thing.

Got it.

I saw this on Jazz Wax recently. How is it?

Which records are those?

I don't know them. But he's good on Hill on the 2020 records. Two more Braxton sets to add to the list...

I like them. I have the second one. Still young and the thrill of discovery, even if the discovery is sometimes different kinds of saxophones. What is the the CIMP release? Sorry. Being dense.

The Leos I mean are the 3x4CD sets from 2003. 12 CDs of the stuff. They have similar modern artworks as covers. I think that they are pretty wretched. It's Braxton playing mostly GAS type standards with a Tristano-type guitar trio behind him. His playing seems to me to be very sloppy / clumsy, and he keeps repeatedly tearing off on saxophone squiggles that don't relate to the tune and get boring very fast. The poor band is basically nailed in place. The 2020 set is quite different. The tunes are more interesting - as you say. Arguably many are not really 'standards'. It's more 'Braxton plays other people's tunes'. And the playing is consistently excellent, even emotional, from everyone involved. I initially only skimmed this set, partly because I was sick of the heavy Braxton splurge of releases at the time, and partly because of my dislike of the Leo CDs. Are the Steeplechase the In The Tradition ones? I like those, although some of the horn choices are a little gimmicky. Also the Charlie Parker Project and Tristano sets are good, I think. They're more obviously provocative.

I actually don't think I know the records he produced with it. What are good places to start?