chuckyd4

Okay... it looks like a lot of other people got this one. But FWIW: D1, T10 Tom, I liked your comments about the mix of traditional bass drum beat and accents that "modernize" it - that's what I was driving at in my piece.

Okay, I finally got around to listening to Disc 2 to make some (mildly) educated guesses... have been struggling not to peek, but I've been good. Here goes: Disc 2: 1 - Really dislike the electronic effects on the tenor. Is this "Nature Boy"? Is that what the infamous varitone sounds like? Surprising misfire on a solid two discs of music. I might be embarrassing myself, but don't think I care what else these players did (at least in this style). Reminds me of a mediocre Elvin Jones disc with Jan Hammer and Gene Perla. 2 - Much better... I dig the melody and the sonority of the tenor and bone. To throw out an idea - seems like something Roswell Rudd might have come up with. George Lewis? Definitely gonna guess some avant cats - bone effects are too blustery. Tenor is great - the way he works the melody - but I have no idea. 3 - Okay, it's easy to embarrass myself here. Sounds like Marvin Gaye doing a Stevie Wonder tune. High notes have to be Marvin. This track makes me very happy - reminds me of the first time I fell in love. 4 - This one stumped me for a while, but I recently reviewed Steve Swallow's Damaged in Transit... seems like that bass sound is uniquely his. Lots of LPs to choose from - suffice it to say I'm more interested in his more recent work: this is much too stagnant for my tastes. 5 - I love this track... the way the New Orleans ensemble is updated with modern solos. I will look for more by this group. This has a smooth, four-beat rhythmic phrasing foreign to some N.O. stuff I've heard. The bone player has clearly listened to J.J. Johnson. Feel like I should know the tenor. But I also like the way they retain older voicings throughout. This is a standout track to these ears. 6 - My first thought was the Lee Konitz Nonet. There is a great, Tristano-esque melody, and the alto solo could be Konitz, IMHO. Also, this group retains the feel of an overgrown mid-size band, which reminds me a lot of the Nonet stuff I've heard. Very smooth, but it swings nicely - I dug this one. 7 - Had no idea at first - again the complexity of a Tristano line - until I heard that staccato, angular phrasing on the alto solo: has to be Braxton. That would also make sense with the Tristano textures. I've needed to pick up more of his Arista stuff... maybe this is hidden in there. I personally love his more traditional jazz ensembles - I find it a great mix of tense styles, much like the "avant Blue Note" stuff. 8 - If that piano intro isn't Basie, with Freddie Green on guitar, then my ears are busted. Maybe an aircheck? The drums are miked surprisingly loudly. This is classic stuff, though (ashamed to admit it) I often get Lester confused with his other major tenor of the time - which could explain the extra hard-driving phrases that hit about halfway through. My guess is Basie wiht a different tenor than Lester. I know Jacquet was in the band in the fifties, but this sounds too old. Great stuff, regardless of my confusion. 9 - Oooohhhh... a Bird tune - solo sounds a lot like Sonny Rollins - I'm convinced; the long tones, repetition of a melodic fragment, the Parker tune; it's all straight from his arsenal. But who's the bassist? I wish to God he'd find a bassist with that much fire again. This is a period I haven't explored, but need to. If this is Sonny, he is taking all kinds of chances a bit unusual for him - crazy trills and slashing phrases. Fascinating. 10 - This one I really don't know. Wasn't digging on this too hard. Doesn't really pique my curiosity. 11 - My first thought was how I never noticed how much Blythe and Threadgill's tones sound so similar. I'm gonna vote for the latter, though... the ensemble seems like a dead giveaway. Seems like the man is incredibly consistent - he always pulls out a new wrinkle, and I always love the outcome. The honks are pure Threadgill, and the smaller influence of Bird distinguishes him from Blythe. I'll have to find this disc. Okay... that about does it. I'm just glad that I can finally read the whole thread, and find out how badly I've been off on some of these things. BTW... thanks again to Jim for putting this together... I think I discovered some new stuff worth exploring, and liked the thought that went into its progression. You've set the bar high on my first Blindfold Test.

So I got mine in the mail yesterday, thanks to big help from Jim Dye! Gonna go ahead and put down my thoughts wrt to Disc 1... overall I thought this was a really nice set of music, Jim. Very few low points in my book. Also, I should mention that I am writing this without reading past the first page of responses, which I read before I ever got the disc. Haven't reread anything. Disc 1: 1. There are a lot of tunes implied in that piano intro - I hear definite shades of Monk, and I think I caught a snippet of "Prelude to a Kiss". When the band comes in, though - WHoa! Totally different tune, seems to me. On a limb, I would say the piano player was somebody like Sir Roland Hanna - someone with the clusters of Monk, but a smoother delivery. As for the rest of the band, don't know, but I liked the nice, easily relaxed swing. The trumpet player said Woody Shaw to me. Don't know if Shaw and Hanna were ever in a band together, but its something from their circles and era. 2. No idea here - not something I'd put on over and over again, but I like the mix of R & B and what sounded like a light Caribbean feel to me. Makes me wonder - there's got to be some connection between this and the two that come on either side, but I have no idea what it is. 3. First thought was Thad Jones-Mel Lewis on some kind of edgy speed - I like the drive of it, maybe Akiyoshi-Tabackin from one of those RCA lps I've never heard? Piano sounded too edgy for that to me though... Clarke-Boland? Now I'm just throwing out names. Then when the tenor sax came in, though - that has to be Booker Ervin, which could mean that this is a group of Mingus-related people, but I definitely don't think it's Mingus. Especially that section where the horns solo simultaneously, though, some of those ensemble passages sound like him. I like this one. 4. Now we get to Clarke-Boland in my mind... the tempo in three, the latin percussion, the driving funk bass - reminds me of some of the C-BBB dates from the 70's. But the guitar solo throws me completely out of place... still these are solid jazz solos on either side of it. 5. Don't recognize the vocalist. How could anyone not dig this? Makes me want to find my lady friend and get down. 6. Don't tend to listen to a lot of vocalists with this approach... makes me feel kind of icky, like I need a long hot shower. Arrangements are much too thick, the vocalist doesn't takke enough chances for my tastes. Low point of the disc for me. 7. Man, this one sent me back to my collection trying to find the name of that Monk tune! I can think of a lot that it isn't... this was either an alto/clarinet/piano trio or a duet with a guy who doubles. I like the way that they prolong getting around to the melody until the end; Michael Moore does this a lot with the Clusone 3. Could it be some duet with him and Mengelberg? Don't know, but I'd like to hear the rest of this album. 8. The first two notes out of the gate reminded me exactly of Dex, but the solo just doesn't bear that out... AT ALL. Whoever this group is, I'm going to find more - sounds like none of the tenors in my collection, exactly, so it's probably someone I've been meaning to investigate more. 9. Reminds me of some scary, stripped-down Beefheart. Good track to annoy the girlfriend - I dig it, but probably couldn't do a whole album, what else is on the original? this is either some early drummer doing a traditional tune or a more experimental 60's cat making up his own. 10. Just wrote a review of this reissue for my website - no fair! But God he's brilliant... listen to the way he takes that bass drum beat and subdues it into a smoother rhythmic flow, with all his accents and rolls over the top. This is brilliant stuff - my highest rating. You can read the review here. 11. No idea, but I'm judging from the last track that this is from around World War I, considering the military mood and the hilarious German episode (ha! crazy...) Who was that guy in the army in WWI with the band? Europe or something? Had a feeling this track was mostly there to set up the next one. 12. Man, I would stop now if I wasn't able to ID this group. And I do like the placement after the last one, Jim... I know I have this disc in my collection - is it one of the recent reissues? 13. This has gotta be Stan Getz on tenor, or else somebody with a heavy Lester influence. And when the clarinet solo comes in, I know Art Pepper could play some mean clarinet... is this some type of reunion of the old Herman herd? I thought this track was so so... not my favorite, but it swung nice and hard. 14. Sounds like Gerry Mulligan on bari to me; one of his quartets? I'm horrible at ID'ing bari players, though... obviously someone with a light tone, though. I dig the floating quality he has; don't think he digs hard enough into certain phrases to be Mulligan. I like the laid-back, on the beat guitar solo, too. Piano player is very economical but exciting. Jimmy Rowles? Whoever he is, he clearly listened to a lot of Basie. I love this track in its ability to move and stand still at the same time. 15. My first thought was the Hamp and Oscar Peterson recordings - I've been meaning to pick that up for a long time. Vibes and piano are both virtuosi, clearly (must be Hamp! caught a couple of grunts). Could have done without the Latin percussion, though. Gonna go get that box set when I get some dough. I found a lot of the tracks had familiar melodies that I just couldn't name. Anyway, liked the disc, Jim, and I'll try to get on to disc 2 in the next day or so.

I thought this was an absolutely brilliant book - I didn't always find myself agreeing with his conclusions, but his prose is really excellent. I found it one of the best jazz reads I can remember.

I agree RDK... I remember one time I bought a NHOP disc that turned out to be Danish folk songs, and was a little non-plussed, but I think that's the only time I returned something cause it wasn't what I expected. I usually like it if it's at least a little different than what I would have thought before hearing it. It's hard for me to imagine anyone digging jazz (with all of its freedom and variety) and getting upset when something steps over the magic line. I know there are people out there who feel this way, it just makes me wonder what it was they liked about jazz in the first place.

didn't get my disc yet... but I hope people will come up with something more creative to my test than whether or not the tracks are "jazz"... shades of bnbb Hardbop posts. If you don't like it, that's cool, but try to give a little more explanation of why... that's how these things work best.

I'm totally in agreement with #2, Dan. On the #1, though, I think it's gonna get a bit tricky when we start trying to draw hard and fast rules on whether or not something's "jazz." Sure, I agree that the BF tests should have a jazz emphasis, but who's to say where that line begins and ends? Not to get philosophical about it, or pose a pretentious rhetorical question here - I honestly wonder about some of my considerations in thinking about the test I have coming up. For instance, not to give things away, but what happens when I think about someone like a Fela Kuti? His stuff has a lot of jazz influences, and I'm almost certain it would open at least a couple of ears around here, and possibly generate some absolute fanatics, but I definitely wouldn't classify it as jazz. I mean, I'm not suggesting making up a test of Pixies and Fugazi and Public Enemy, just to stump people, but why make such a rule in the first place? I have a feeling that anybody who visits here enough to volunteer to compile one of these will have enough jazz-based material to satisfy the faithful. Just a thought....

I always heard that you could use this to find your soap opera name, not your porn star name. And the way I heard it was to use your middle name followed by the name of the street you grew up on. Following my own rules (for soap opera star), I am: Denison Lockton Otherwise, if I follow the porn star thing, I become: Toko Lockton. I'm thinking the first one has a nicer ring.

Just wanted to throw out another rec for this set... glad to see it being reissued once again, so that more people can get their hands on it. It is one where I can throw on any one of the four discs, any time day or night, and be a very happy camper. There aren't too many sets you can say that about.

My picks (and slim they are!) as follows, since we're in the spirit (and only in the categories where I've heard any of the albums): Vocal Jazz: Luciana Souza - North and South Instrumental solo: Keith Jarrett - "Butch and Butch" (Up For It Jazz Instrumental Album: Wayne Shorter - Alegria (I would have gone with the Holland disc, but I didn't think it was as ambitious as Alegria, though when you're the Holland Quintet, there's no sense in messing with the old formula! This was a tough call for me...) Jazz Large Ensemble Album: Gerald Wilson - New York, New Sound Latin Jazz Ensemble: Chucho Valdes - New Conceptions That said, why any serious jazz fan would take the Grammys seriously (which we here obviously don't) is far beyond me.

Nice guys!- I really appreciate the support!!! B) Please keep checking back, as we are going to be updating stuff constantly. Right now, we have just added a feature where you can comment on reviews - go ahead, I hope it will encourage discussion about both the albums themselves and the reviews of them! That will also enable you to receive our newsletter, which will keep you up to date with new Sudden Thoughts stuff. This weekend, I'll be adding quite a few more reviews, and we already have a new Label Watch lined up. Look out for streaming radio and some other stuff like that too. peace, charles

Also a first time participant, and I can't wait. Duly noted points, Jim... I think that's a great idea as compared to some of these tests to say more than "This sucked, don't know"... explain what you think sucked about it. sounded like you put a lot of thought and effort into it, and there's a good amount of variety... I'll look forward to hearing it.

Hey everybody... I just launched my new website, which is mostly devoted to jazz and improvised music, but which dabbles in hip hop, reggae, and other interesting music. You can find it here, at http://www.sudden-thoughts.com. Right now, we have CD reviews, both of new and older stuff, a unique section where artists are invited to contribute articles (Steve Coleman did the first one on boxing and improvising) and other features, like one on up and coming labels right now. Also, soon we'll be adding streaming radio, sampler CDs, and a whole lot more reviews. I'd appreciate any feedback the fans here have too, as you folks are my people! Enjoy...

I still listen to all different kinds of music even after slipping down the "jazz hole" quite a few years ago. Lately I've been deep into a lot of the more interesting hip hop out there, but my tastes have always gone towards reggae, afro beat, blues, other stuff like that. There was a time when I listened to some indie rock, but i can only stand whiney white boys for so long . I guess there was a period for the first two years or so when I got deep into jazz where I listened to nothing else, but same thing as some others: when I started going back to some other cds I remembered there was other good stuff out there too. Also working in a variety of CD stores over the years has helped.

Just to add to what I said, I recently wrote a feature article about Pi recordings which can be found here.

Hey folks- Thought some of you might be interested in checking out this article Steve wrote for my website. You can find it here. He talks about the similarities between boxing and improvising music, and makes a real interesting point. Anyway, enjoy.

Tommy Flanagan had the same birthday as me - March 16 - so I used to go see his birthday shows at the Village Vanguard to celebrate during his last few years. He also recorded one of those shows that was released on Blue Note. Of course we weren't born in the same year, nor did I attend that show the day I was born, so I don't know if this stuff counts. Anybody find anything for 3/16/80?

Funny- you beat me to the punch... so far, they are 9 for 9 in my mind... and have compiled an amazing roster of artists. I am eagerly looking forward to what's coming next. Also, I would second the nomination for Palmetto, as well as the obvious choices Soul Note/Black Saint, Hat, and ECM, who would go into that category for Dave Holland's work alone, if nothing else. I also have my eyes on a couple of labels that look promising and are starting to live up to it: 441 Records, which has recently put out two stellar sessions by Pianist Don Friedman and Joe Chambers. Also, the Spanish label Satchmo Jazz Records, whose website is unfortunately mostly in Spanish...but I have been impressed by a disc from Ugonna Okegwo (with Sam Newsome on soprano and Xavier Davis on piano) as well as one from trumpeter Chris Kase, with the awesome rhythmic duo of Johannes Weidenmuller and Ari Hoenig. Which reminds me of a couple of other impressive labels over the last couple of decades: Dreyfus Jazz and Arabesque... not 100% of the time, but a much larger percentage than most.

So I will go ahead and claim #7, then, unless Man wants it, cause he actually posted first. If nothing is said, though, I will plan on doing #7... just to clarify.

Yeah... we got this in at the Borders I was working at a couple of months ago... I haven't had enough bread to snatch it up, but it looked very promising. Reminds me I should check it out though.

Hey everyone- I am new to Organissimo, but maybe some of you remember my sporadic posting from the old BN board and Jazz Corner. In any case, I just found this board recently, and am signed up to go with Jim's CD... I will be participating a lot more. As I have quite a bit of time on my hands these days, I'll go ahead and take whatever the next slot would be... I promise all kinds of goodies.

Hey Michael... I'm listening to it right now... and am loving the variety of stuff presented. I only own a couple of his Jazz Lab dates and a couple of sideman appearances, so I'm getting to hear all kinds of new stuff. But I haven't heard you guys talking yet! Help me out! Let me know where I can find all this good stuff!