clifford_thornton

My high school English teacher always called me "Maynard," having something to do with scrubby facial hair and being stoned I think.

Yeah, I'm very curious about this stuff and about him. I'll be getting in touch with you, berendes, and with Norman shortly. Thanks!!!

Were the Beacon Hill dates live or studio? I can't remember.

I'll probably get this soon. Haden was great to speak with in interview (a couple of years ago), and he is not afraid to let his notions of art and politics become intertwined. A beautiful cat, indeed, though some of his playing situations over the past some-odd years haven't been my favorite, his personality and contributions to the music are both hugely important. And he and Carla are like peanut butter and jelly.

Unless you find, as I do, graphic notation as comparable to visual art and thus creating an all-over, visual canvas of sound that approximates what Pollock et al. have done with their painting. THAT is what I was saying.

In a way, that's true - ESP might have fared better if they hadn't gained notoriety from the Fugs and Pearls Before Swine, with bootlegs and constant difficulty meeting demand at the time. Of course, some of that was due to mismanagement. I wonder what the biggest-selling BYG record was? I'm guessing the Don Cherrys or Blase, but not sure about that.

I think the main reason why I rarely buy any Herbie Hancock or Tyner albums is because they are both often so cloying, as well as copied by other stylists of the era. Now, Hancock's bag circa 1965 is fine by me - Some Other Stuff, Spring, Extensions, etc. - but there is so much of it that just seems like I should be listening to something, I don't know, else... Tyner with Trane, yes, Tyner without Trane, no.

I used the word 'great' three times in that last post. It's late, otherwise I woulda thought of better verbiage.

Funny, right now I'm listening to a new Pandelis Karayorgis disc on which he plays Fender Rhodes (trio w/ Nate McBride and Curt Newton on Clean Feed) and it's absolutely great. I've become more and more accepting of the el-p in the past few years, and this particular album is great. Rather free interpretations of Monk, Dolphy and Hasaan. In response to an ancient mention of Burton Greene's electric piano, he does play it on Celesphere, a duo with Maarten Altena on Futura Records from '71 or so. It's a great record, and I like Burton's approach to the instrument.

Spoke with James and he's feeling fine - but getting ripped off by the Yoshi's gig, so he bowed out. Unfortunately, one would think that at this point he'd be making more dough than enough to cover meals, but that's not always the case.

Yeah, profiteering is a big part of this. I used to live near KC and in the 90s, gas was about $1.10 a gallon. I'm now thinking of selling my car for the price of a tank...

I can't even imagine what it must be like down there. Fuck. RIP.

If you're talking LPs, you can send them to this address...

It is great, and yeah, I'd rather look at Landslide's mug than that mudpie on the original. I don't think the HiFi pressing is that expensive either - probably because it's so gawd-awful...

I assume you've seen the jacket of his first 'breakout' solo LP (yes, vinyl), where he looks like a cross between members of Wham! and a young Steve Guttenberg. Red sweatsuit and all!

Pentatonic Fairy-Fucker, indeed. I'll just say none, it's better that way.

...it's Jerry Gonzales! (Trumpet/Congas) ← Wait, isn't everybody with the last name Gonzalez related?

Kind of like I'm doing with Mauricio Kagel's Exotica, which I'm spinning right now. Michel Portal, Vinko Globokar Siegfried Palm and several other weirdos creating one hell of a racket. Beautiful!

Though as we've said before, it's pretty dubious what DMG are doing.

I'd love to hear that shit with Pharaoh and Black Harold, actually. Better than shelling out $500 for the LP!

I always knew there was something "different" about him. ← Ouch! Seriously, a lot of the early sides are those I have yet to hear that I actually give a shit about. I can live without the Duke Pearson big band stuff, and the later Tyner albums, things like that. Got a sizeable chunk of the 4000s but little to show for the 1500 series. And the Three Sounds can keep hanging out at Brandon's.

I always thought the UK Creation pressing of Loveless was fine, though anything before that might be dubious in its original form.

Spaulding is a wonderful human being. Unfortunately, he hasn't been gigging as much as he should be. I sure wish he was going to be at Yoshi's - he's been practicing a lot and his last few records have been awesome.

Both of these were on CD, but are now OOP. They're certainly due for a reissue, though! As for Intents and Purposes, amazingly Dixon and RCA are on the same page about this not making it to CD - he's moved on to probably stronger work, and RCA is probably on the "Bill who?" by now.

I thought Dennis Gonzalez was the trumpeter of the three Gonzalez brothers... Yeah, Milford was with Montego Joe, though I've never bought those records. From Montego to ESP in what, a year?