dnsrrlls

Not really related to new releases, but rather a lack of them: does anyone know what happened to Astral Spirits? They seem to have largely gone dark this year after one release back in March.

Gotta say, while I'm mildly interested in what made the cut (and am also guilty of being a collector of absurdly expensive free jazz records), I'm not sure what the purpose of a book like this is other than as a "flex." The title deems these as 100 "essential" recordings, but the majority are almost certainly going to be prohibitively expensive, collector-chased items and not anything practical for someone interested in the actual history of the music. I can see some argument for it being a NWW-list-type guide for future enthusiasts who don't care about acquiring OG copies of things, but at the end of the day this feels more like boast from the authors than anything truly in service of the music. (And if you actually are a collector and don't already own these records, prepare for it to stay that way...🤑)

My copies just landed today! Digging into the Kaučič first.

I will third the bass playing. It's a very strong album overall, but really is Janson's show.

This may be a long shot, but I'm trying to see if anyone had a lead on digitized copies of Rubberneck magazine, which was published in the UK by Chris Blackford from the mid-80s to around the turn of the millennium. In particular, I'm trying to track down issue 19 from 1995, which had a long piece by Nick Couldry titled "Turning The Musical Table: Improvisation In Britain 1965-1990" (see scant info here).

The group Mujician (with Keith Tippett, Paul Dunmall, Paul Rogers and Tony Levin) has several great albums on Cuneiform.

Just got hipped to Charlotte Keeffe via @colinmce's list. The first of the three discs of Live at Plus-Etage is a lengthy duo with Andrew Lisle that's really quite wonderful.