Rabshakeh

Anthony Braxton – Quartet (Standards) 2020 Something's bitten me recently and I have found myself going through several large box sets of standards by major artists, despite really hating the format. Revisiting this for the first time since lockdown. Has anyone else gone back to it yet? I really think it is towards the top of Braxton's more recent output. I normally blow tepid on most of Braxton's standards records. In particular, I think that the previous 12 CD splurge on Leo (which I have also revisited this August) was one of the weakest things he has done. This set is seems much stronger overall. That is partly because the band is stronger (not least our very own Alexander Hawkins) but I also think Braxton's own playing is more inventive here.

I've had a listen to the first volume of the Carl Fontana and Arno Marsh record, and this series seems to be the motherload for Vegas jazz, in an informal small group setting. Clearly a small circle that jammed together frequently. Do you rate any of them in particular?

I guess there is a question over whether the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra could be considered a ghost band or not.

I'd also put Old and New Dreams in the category of "spin off" rather than ghost band. Not least because they weren't trying to use the Ornette name.

Agharta is one of the first MD records with which I really connected. Also the first album I heard on vinyl.

What is the film?

How do you find it?

I think that's all pretty likely, as you tell it. What surprised me is how little it was like Hot Rays though. Or it is all like track 2 of Hot Rats. Agreed. I was disappointed with Dunbar, who I like a lot on Chunga, but who only really turns up here on one track.

Frank Zappa – Funky Nothingness Just finished my second listen to the core album. I find it hard to understand what to make of it. It is being billed as Hot Rats II or Chunga's Revenge the Prequel, but it is really heavy on blues tunes. I guess Zappa did blues tunes from time to time (Trouble Every Day and Willie The Pimp) but the sheer amount of blues and blues rock on here is not something I associate with Zappa. What do other Zappa enjoyers make of it? It being the core album, rather than the outtakes and b sides packaged with the record. (I know many on this forum dislike him and his music for reasons that seem pretty understandable to me, but I have deep seated tribal loyalties in this one case, even if it mostly adds up to early Mothers purism these days.)

Thanks. On my list to check out.

Kids in a bad mood so I'm letting them spin records to cheat them up. First up daughter (3) with a cover she likes. Gone down well for a first listen. Second up, son (5) wants the "really good one with American peoples and they're looking down at the city and it's really... beat-ey". Some imagination and I figured it out...

Bonzo Dog Band – The Doughnut In Granny's Greenhouse

Bill Watrous Combo With Danny Stiles – 'Bone Straight Ahead Jonny Teupen – Harpadelic On first stream of this, I assumed it was some modern Dorothy Ashby retro thing, executed well. I was surprised to find it is actually an MPS production from 1969 made with Dave Pike's set. The Beatles cover at the start should have alerted me, because no BandCamp spiritual jazz has Beatles covers.

The Shaolin Afronauts – Follow The Path (2014) A 2014 rehash of Fela Kuti's sound, with some funk tracks in there too, to my ears. Actually a record I enjoyed listening to with lots of baritone saxophone all over the place. I doubt I'll revisit it when the originals are all streamable though, but it's got reasonable soul to it.

Self-explanatory title. What are some records by bands released after the death of their leaders that you consider to be good? Some obvious examples that pop into mind are: Mingus Dynasty - Chair In The Sky Sun Ra Arkestra - Swirling

I don't know this set, but I love this stuff. Mass market subscription box sets of recreations of swing standards is what actual jazz history is made of.

But were the big bands of the late 1960s and 1970s connected to these other backwards-directed moves from the mid-70s onwards? I don't really see the music of Don Ellis or Maynard Ferguson as having much in common with the great American songbook turn or with the revival of bop or In The Tradition type avantguard jazz. The one connection that there might be is with the growth in jazz education, which produced players for the big bands at the same time as pointing towards the the past and helping spur interest.

That's fair. I didn't realise Terry Funk just died. I had it in my head he had died a year ago or so. Maybe I had read a report of an illness or something. That's a shame. He was consistently my favourite wrestler across the ages.

Max Eastley / Steve Beresford / Paul Burwell / David Toop – Whirled Music

Going to watch the AEW All In show at Wembley this evening. It's a massive event. I can't believe the size of it or the quality of the card. I haven't been to see wrestling since my son was born (5 years ago) and that was small British promotions linked to NJPW, so this is a big deal. Very excited.

What's the concept? Is it lesser known African American early jazz groups? Or is it more chronological? I used to love those box sets for early blues and roots etc. They were a huge deal for learning about that stuff, even if I tended to stick what I liked on a comp. But in those CD buying days I was not listening to early jazz at all. I missed out. I see it is streamable.

It seems an obvious thing to say, but listening to a record on CD, vinyl, tape/minidisc, download or streaming is a very different experience. Sound quality is nothing to do with it. Some records "work" on vinyl but never worked on CD. I stream a lot, mostly whilst sat in front of a computer watching my life tick away, but almost never in my life have I managed to sit still at a computer to listen to a downloaded or ripped album from an MP3 library in full. I don't know why, but it is just like that.

Keith Jarrett – Keith Jarrett At The Blue Note - The Complete Recordings I-VI (ECM, 1994) I'm not really Keith Jarrett's audience, but a recent attempt to reappraise Braxton's Leo Standards megaboxes has brought me back to this too. The quality throughout this one really is very high (although it does nod at times). It seems to me (and others who like later Jarrett more than me may have more informed opinions) that it really dwarfs the other Standards Trio records in quality, as if it were a self conscious Great Work. In contrast, I'm not at all a fan of the Braxton Leo standards boxes, despite liking Braxton's music more, and despite enjoying his other, more targeted, standards sets from around the same time (Tristano, Parker Project etc). So I have found revisiting this record and Fred Hersch's Songs Without Words a salutary experience. Overall, any massive box set grates a bit for me (why not make your statement concise? Or, if you're going to record 16 albums of doing the washing up because listeners deserve your Genius, split it up, as a concession? ("Solo (Kitchen) 2019, Vol 17")), but some records are massive for a reason. "These are the Alps", to use a line from Basil Bunting, in reference to another baggy and enormous Great Work.

Quite a coat. Thanks!