Rabshakeh

His Paul Horn flute record did eat a lot of jazz column inches, and he is headlining jazz festivals these days, so it does affect the likes of Iverson a bit, I guess. Probably more Kamasi Washington than Iverson, but that record has had a big impact on the kids. Probably not Shipp, so much, as you say, but then Shipp has strong ideas, particularly about piano, which don't stop at the merely musical, and I guess he finds Andre 3000 acting the piano dilettante to be offensive.

Fair dos. I have always had severe space issues and tend to panic if I have more than one record by the same artist, so I'm always interested in others' collecting habits.

Out of interest, why own this on five versions if you are comfortable with one particular version? Do the others have special bonus tracks or something?

I do find it a bit weird how the negative crits have focused on how he is "not a pianist" rather than that he can't play piano well or an interesting manner. Plenty of good piano jazz records out there by non-pianists (e.g. Mingus).

One thing that is interesting about these records is that they form such a strong cross-genre continuum. It isn't always easy to tell what's jazz rock and what's prog.

September – Zadnja Avantura A recommendation from the Euro Fusion thread.

Mind you, I would still take Andre 3000's anodyne piano music to the releases by other legacy hip hop artists this week...

It ends with a list of reviews from publications, all glowing, and then comments left on the YouTube video.

I haven't actually heard that one. It's on my to stream list.

That's right.

Please don't tell anyone. I have a reputation to keep up.

Enrico Rava Quintet – Tribe This one is a really great record. Rava really worked magic on ECM.

Andre 3000 is coming out with a piano record now. Matthew Shipp wrote a review on Facebook: "so a friend called me up and mentioned that Andre 3000 has a piano album out--i was like what. I checked it out on youtube -- my impression of it. I think it is complete and utter crap -horrific-god awful insipidly wretched nothing. oh my fucking god this is some atrocious shite --- is he some type of fucking asshole ? is he a complete and utter dilletante ? I could go into detail about why each cut is stillborn --but why bother --it does not even deserve the attention of a critique it is so dreadful. the guy is not a pianist -that is the beginning and the end of it ---what an ugly piano sound -- lets not even talk about telling a story with harmony ---sounds like he listens to a bunch of music gets a couple of gestures in his head sits down in a stream of consciousness and gets at some gesture for a few bars of something that he has not internalized -and barely knows on the most superficial level and then he loses the thread--of course there is zero composition going on in the improvisations --no language to speak of just a few cliches in his head that he can't actually play the cliche but he hits and tries at it until he peters out quickly --- wow -- he is so horrible at playing harmony --so many horn players that piano is not their instrument play so much better --- this sounds to me like pure fraud what a lack of respect for the discipline by someone who in my opinion is a complete asshole for doing this -- it is depressing that this garbage will get any attention because he has a name and fame --- there is nothing refreshing about the naivety of it --it is just downright dreadful and awful--true fucking crap insipidly wretched nothing -" It's a shame that he didn't say what he really thought of it. Hard to tell whether he liked it or not.

Derek And The Ruins (Derek Bailey, Masuda Ryuichi and Yoshida Tatsuya) – Saisoro A long time since I revisited this one (thanks to Tzadik now being on streaming services). Great record. One of Bailey's most successful of the later pairings.

That's an interesting combo of musicians.

Roscoe Mitchell - Old / Quartet I had this on the clear out pile, but I lost heart. It's just such a good record.

So where is Hazel Scott?

I can't find it. I've tried Google. What's the record?

There's the Borca connection again. I'm still meaning to check those records out. Is that her hooting away? What a great sounding recording.

Chicago - III Uri Caine - Gustav Mahler: Dark Flame

Inherited that one from my late father in law.

What is this one? Looks fun. Why is Zappa I American?

This one is good. As I said above, I do like Joel Ross. What I really don't like is that feeling that I am going to a jazz gig to learn and improve myself: Straight faced and studious players, opening with a speech about the importance of the music, and total silence solemn from the audience. That last factor has become a particular bugbear for me. I went to an Evan Parker show recently at OTO and accidentally fell over someone on my way to the loo. I tried to apologise (quietly) and the person I'd squashed actually shushed me. Fingers on the lips, like I was a schoolchild. I think it is a great thing for a musician to play the music that he or she loves, and hard bop and post bop is music that I love to hear. The tradition to which these musicians have decided to dedicate themselves is a raucous one where the music was played to be enjoyed. Quality wise I think that these modern Blue Note records can be hit and miss, but I do make sure to check them out, because they're rarely rubbish and some are good. I think that the hit rate is probably higher than the likes of International Anthem or Clean Feed. That doesn't mean that they're all great but current output is pretty good.

I think Jazzbo is right in his description. It is modern post bop and studious with it. I personally found it very boring. Whilst it certainly is "intellectual" I found it perhaps not creative or very fresh. Everything is in the mix and played with slick facility but my feeling was that the songs aren't great and excitement doesn't even seem to be a goal. However, that is just my idiot opinion. I am at any point in time slightly agnostic about these players (I quite like Ross and Wilkins), so if you normally like these musicians a lot it is worth probably following Jazzbo's tastes over mine. In any case, it is streamable, so there's the opportunity to give it a go and see who is right.

Johnathan Blake – Passage Amazing to think that jazz used to be a disreputable party music. Listening to this record is like being stuck in a stuffy lecture theatre.