Uncle Skid

The correct way to say that, I've been told, is "go boldly," rather than "boldly go." I can remember one of my high school English teachers complaining that Star Trek had caused millions of people to use adverbs incorrectly. I should have known better than to rely on popular culture for my rules of grammar. It's kind of like a black fly in my chardonnay -- ironic, really.

Fun quiz, Rooster. There were a few I wasn't sure about, but I still got a GOD rating. I assume that rating means 100% correct? That was an easy one! Anybody remember that April Wine song? Star Trek fans should find #11 pretty easy.

If your friend has any interest in guitar, how about Jimmy Smith's The Sermon? I agree with Dave -- the melody is important. This one has some great melodies, and some great grooves as well.

"I'd rather have my rectum scraped with a rusty shovel...."

Temple of Freedom™. Very strange. But, it's hard to argue with How's this for bizarre: Jesus Was Gother Than You.

I'm not offended, but I think you should dump it. Think of it this way -- would you be comfortable having that image on your name tag at a board get-together?

I think so -- the way I understand it is that FICA and Medicare are taxes on *earned* income only. Since capital gains are considered unearned income, those taxes would not apply. Usually, employers handle all of the required deductions of those taxes (straight percentages up to $87,000 dollars), so most people would not have paid too much or too little over the year. Since I'm self-employed, I get to pay *twice*: 7.65% for me, and 7.65% for the "self-employment" tax. I'm sure the answer is there somewhere on irs.gov, but I'd be surprised if it was easy to find.

That's good to know. I thank you, and my worn out Visa card thanks you!

J. Hale Music Supply* * I'm not associated with this company, just a very happy customer. I bought an Ultrasound amp from him last year, and he has some really nice Heritage guitars in stock. That new Kenny Burrell Groove Master looks pretty sweet! Incidentally, J. Hale is also a jazz guitarist, and here's some pictures of him from a visit to the Heritage Factory B)

Yes, Heritage guitars are made in the former Gibson plant in Kalamazoo, Michigan: How It All Began... I've been extremely happy with my H-575.

That's next on my list!

Just picked up today: Incredible! Dang, I *love* this stuff! I already have Miles Smiles and E.S.P, so I kind of knew what to expect, but there are a lot of surprises on this one. I keep thinking I should have just bought the box set instead of slowing aquiring the individual CDs, but it is kind of fun picking up a new one every few weeks.

Mine also has a very small bubble at the outer edge. It looks like it is on the outside of clear part of the outer edge (not on the inside silver part).

My copy skips at 2:28. Most often, it "jumps" back a few seconds, but sometimes it will go all the way back to 1:24. Incidentally, I also had excessive "jitter" errors on that track when I tried to MP3 encode this disc for my portable player. On the MP3-encoded track, the problems also start at 2:28.

MD6-174 Tristano, Konitz and Marsh MD6-181 The Complete Hank Mobley Blue Note Fifties Sessions MS-002 Carmell Jones My moratorium began after I placed this order, almost a month ago*. Now I'm hearing a J.J. Johnson set quietly calling my name, all the way from Stamford. I'm just hoping that one doesn't show up on the running low list any time soon. *except for "All Music", and some new RVG's. those don't count, right???

Happy (belated) Birthday, Lazaro! Thanks for all that you do to keep jazz alive and well in West Michigan!

KISS, with special guests Cheap Trick. Cobo Hall, Detroit, 1976*. (*disclaimer: I was only 10 years old at the time)

Be careful what you wish for! I suppose I'd be in *real* trouble if I found a masturbating certified public accountant! I was wondering why my tax returns were kind of sticky this year...

Here's one of my personal favorites: Topic: Lee Morgan -- "Charisma", ...just how charismatic? ... To this day, whenever I'm browsing the Lee Morgan section in a music store, I'm always hoping to find "The Certified Public Accountant" and "The Masturbator". B)

Saturday - wait by the mailbox to see if my order from Jazzmatazz arrives (some Art Farmer and Tina Brooks "True Blue" on the way...) Sunday - go see Organissimo LIVE! (they are playing at a restaurant that's only about 5 miles from my house).

I've had good luck with ICDSoft. I think they are primary a web hosting company, but they can also handle domain name registration. It's $60/year for hosting, plus $5 for the domain name.

I've been using CDEx for a long time, and it has always worked well: CDEx It's free, and it uses the LAME encoder. Lately, I've been encoding everything with VBR (variable bit rate) instead of 128k or 160k bps. Slightly larger file sizes, but noticeably better sound quality.

Welcome to the board, zizala! Happy to have another guitar player on board. Slightly off-topic, but I'm intrigued by a former sax player that is now a guitarist. Quite a bit of the jazz that I listen to doesn't include guitar, and I find myself really listening to and enjoying the saxes, trumpets, and comping on the piano. At times I get frustrated by the guitar, as it seems to be quite easy to fall into "guitarisms" (for lack of a better term). One of my long term goals is to try to avoid those cliches, and approach the instrument from a (hopefully) more well-rounded perspective. Any advice? Has your background as a sax player affected the way you approach the guitar?

Thanks for the correction, Pete. In addition to being a great bass player, John seems to be an all-around genuinely nice guy. Upright Bill got to “talk shop” with John after the show in Grand Rapids. I'll always remember Tom Rainey for his “bag of sticks” thing. Very interesting and effective percussive technique.

Incidentally, Tom Rainey was the drummer at the Brad Shepik Trio show that Joe G, Upright Bill, and I caught in Grand Rapids at the UICA. The bass player was Tom Hebert, who I believe is now off playing with Andrew Hill somewhere in Europe. Phil Woods was recently in Grand Rapids, and James Moody/Cedar Walton and the Newport All-Stars came to little ole Muskegon. Also caught Marcus Belgrave at GVSU in Allendale a few months ago. Bill and I saw Rudy Linka and Miles Evans, in Fremont(!), Michigan. Chuck's home town is a bustling metropolis in comparison. While we certainly don't have jazz every night (or even every weekend) around here, there have been some great shows recently. It's nice having Lazaro on board here to alert us in case we miss anything!