ejp626

Domino's pizza Mostly because it is bad, but also because of it's past owner Tom Monaghan. Stupid I know, but you get stuck in a rut. And it's just not good enough to break a long habit.

Futurama - all 4 seasons (looks like a very good chance they will be making some direct to DVD Futurama movies -- that would be so awesome) Simpsons s 1/2 Firefly The Tick Married with Children s 1 Northern Exposure s 1/2/3 Twilight Zone s 1/2/3 Star Trek Original Series s 1 Seinfeld s 1/2 Red Dwarf s 1-6 Invader Zim (all) Are You Being Served (all) Monty Python (all) As Time Goes By s 1-6 Father Ted (all) Some of these are my wife's! But there is a real split between British comedy and science fiction

I doubt many people saw it, but here in the UK, some BBC talk show had Serena Williams on. A lot of the talk was on the salicious side and showing photos of her in tight, tight outfits, but she kept saying she was too young to talk about relationships, etc. It was entertaining and she came across pretty well -- not as a complete airhead.

I missed out on the great Beethoven deal over at BBC Radio 3 by a couple of days. They were offering Symphonies 1-5 as downloadable mp3s. Beethoven downloads So my question is whether anyone here snagged them (or has a friend of a friend ...) and might be persuaded to share. (It seems hundreds of people had trouble on the last day, so maybe the BBC will relent and repost them, but I am not counting on it. Alternatively, they might be on one of those BitTorrent sites, but I haven't seen them so far.) The second purpose of the post is to notify people that next week they will be making Symphonies 6-9 available. I will definitely grab them when they go on-line. It has been a very popular experiment at any rate. Eric

I was reading some interview about Ackroyd, and how he practically had to drag the director through the paces, saying he knew exactly how inane the plot was but that it was worth it to get the music on film. I suppose there is some merit to that, but it is so far beneath the first one plotwise ...

A couple of posts on the board have talked about this upcoming album, but I can't believe there isn't a post in the new releases section, unless I completely missed it. Anyway, a very good album -- often sonically dense but with a nice flow. I particularly like track 3, which was even a bit better live -- simply because they were really on when I saw them at the Green Mill. Vijay Iyer is paired again with Rudresh Mahanthappa. Bassist Stephan Crumb and drummer Marcus Gilmore round out the ensemble. I'll add more later, but this is a CD worth checking out. It's probably Iyer's best (so far) and he himself said that he and his band weren't quite ready to record some of the material (such as Cardio) until now, indicating that he felt they had really grown as a unit in the last year. Tracks 1. Revolutions 2. Inertia 3. Song for Midwood 4. Infogee's Cakewalk 5. The Big Almost 6. Cardio 7. Experience 8. Composites 9. Phalanx 10. Imagine (John Lennon)

OK, here is a little bit more information I found elsewhere. It does seem likely that the US version will be in 4:3 not 16:9 format, since the UK version was in the fake widescreen but the German and other European versions were not. So that's a good sign, but too bad for the Brits. I'd still like more confirmation before I pre-order, however. It looks like disc 5 has a lot of documentary material, which is usually watched precisely once.

Heads up. The Pink Panther cartoons are coming to the US at the end of July. This will be a 5 DVD box set of 124 cartoons -- much better than the short compilation DVD called Jet Pink or something like that. I just saw a 4 DVD set here in the UK, which has been out for months, and apparently has the same basic content. There is a lot of moaning about the quality, since the UK cartoons have fake 1:69 format rather than the original 1:33 format. Apparently, they added black bands to top and bottom -- over the original content -- so sometimes the Panther's head is clipped, etc. I'm thinking/hoping that the forthcoming region 1 set will correct this, but I think I will wait to read reviews.

I think Paris will get it, but I voted for Madrid since it is much further away from where I am now (the UK!!!). I hadn't heard that Silver vetoed the stadium plan. Really glad to hear that, since NY needs the Olympics (or the stadium) like a hole in the head. On a semi-political level, I've been traveling a lot and noticed that the US has added even more barriers to foreigners traveling to the US (most of them are stupid and only serve to humiliate travelers). Why anyone in the US honestly thinks they have a snowball's chance of getting the Olympics is beyond me. It's not just that the world hates us, though that is certainly enough, but that US officials seem determined to make life miserable for people trying to travel (to say nothing of study or work) in the US.

I am feeling more and more torn over this series. I should be pulling for the Pistons, but I just can't stand Sheed and his antics. I didn't like it when he was in Portland, and I thought he had calmed down and matured a bit last year, but clearly I was wrong. I so dislike these spoiled bballers who throw tantrums. Maybe it gets to the heart of everything I dislike about sports in general and how ridiculously overblown and overprioritized it is in society, but at least play with dignity and not act like a child. Blah. I'm actually pretty glad I won't be able to watch game 7 and will just catch the score after it's over.

Pretty soon they will be releasing another 3 CD set from this year's concerts, which were a mix of Coltrane compositions and original tunes. Sal, sheldonm and I caught them in Chicago, and they were great, so I will be pre-ordering this. It partly made up for missing Bobby at the Jazz Showcase due to my extensive traveling.

I didn't watch all of game 4 or 5, but caught bits and pieces of both. One thing I did notice was that in game 4 Detroit was making all kinds of freak outside shots where the ball would bounce high above the rim before going in. I was thinking that if they had missed 5 or 6 of them, and the Heat had rebounded (the second being a strong assumption) then the game would have been completely different. Lo and behold, they didn't make those shots in game 5 (shooting percentage under 40% vs. 52% in game 4) and that was the difference. Game 6 should be intense. One thing that bodes well for the Heat is that the role players are playing with a lot more confidence. Also, Sheed looks like he is heading for a meltdown, rolling around on the court when the call doesn't go his way. The next set of refs may not be afraid to T him up.

I thought the last few minutes of the Suns-Spurs game got awfully physical, largely to the benefit of the Suns. Well, the Suns didn't get swept, but I don't see them taking game 5. Let's see if the Pistons can snap out of their funk and win tomorrow.

One time was sort of inadvertent, since my date and I didn't get coordinated, so I paid to go into Blues Brothers 2000, and left when I didn't see her (it was her idea -- really -- but I suppose I was saved). That's really the only time I can remember. I don't go to the movies that often, and only go see things that need to be seen on the big screen (sf mostly). I do recall one experimental movie I really wanted to leave, but the director and all the actors were in the audience, and I felt trapped.

I am aware of one sealed box set in a Chicago Borders, but I think they jacked up the price higher than $400, so you would need a mighty coupon for it.

Subject: Enrique is it over yet? depress brigade strirrup enigmatic unheaval endogamy hubbub spiny semitic alexander seaport doorbell lateral demented metabolism sketchy inner maledict bistate amoeba aaron vicky explain wash . crocodilian been colloidal simulcast incommutable mica backyard >> Maybe not so different from the Vogon poetry heard in Hitchhiker's Guide...

My sets showed up today, so not on Friday after all. Anyway, the booklets are beautiful; I particularly like the full color reproductions of many of the original album covers making up the JiP sets. As much as I love the photos of Paris from the JiP set, it would have been nice to have the original covers reproduced inside somewhere, and now we do get a few of them. Anyway, I will start listening soon to see what I think of the new organization of material.

It seems the interference was worst when I changed from a set of computer speakers to a set of headphones coming out of the computer sound card. It appears there really is no significant problem with the stereo system, but rather the turntable and computer interface. Of course, that doesn't help me too much, since the whole point of the set up is to convert LPs over. What I am trying right now is to record without the headphones plugged in, then do the editing later with the headphones. If that is ok, I'll stick with it for now.

Just out of curiosity, if the material was already on a JiP title, is that clearly indicated (by title or number), or do you have to go to through your CDs and pull out the CDs by that particular artist? I am looking forward to getting mine, which will hopefully be here before Friday (ideally today).

So I did make it up to the Green Mill to catch Iyer and Mahanthappa. It was great. I was especially happy I got there in time to get a seat in front, rather than sitting at the bar, which is what I usually do. There wasn't nearly as much smoke as usual. Early on, there were still seats, but by mid-set, the place was as full as, say, the Greg Osby sets I have seen there. I wonder if people were thrown by the reasonably early start time (8). A few general comments now. They played songs from the upcoming release, and I'll be getting that late next week, so I'll be better able to judge the difference between live and studio. But this is dense, intricate music and being able to play it live at all is astounding. There is only one song (Cardio) that is so tricky (tempo changes and sudden shifts from the piano) that it calls attention to itself and doesn't function as well as music. A few people here and there make some comparisons to the classic Coltrane quartet, and there is something to that, though really both Iyer and Mahanthappa are making "sheets of sound" and the music is more tightly composed (Mahanthappa at least is playing off sheet music for several songs). One thing that I felt is that there is more repetition of the composed phases (maybe cyclical music sounds less derogatory) taking it to higher levels and a kind of climax. In a Song for Midwood, you can definitely hear quotes from Indian music in the cycles. The drummer is good. He is really really young though, maybe not even 20. And I liked the fact the bass player cut through the mix with simple patterns and chords. He did get to walk a bit, but I'll have to see which song that was on. I don't have my notes in front of me, but they played Revolutions, Inertia, Song for Midwood, Infogee's Cakewalk and Cardio. They played one or two songs after that, which were not announced. The final piece was really great, so I will see if I can recognize it from the CD when it shows up. So if you can catch these guys, I would recommend it. Of course, I don't think they will change music as much as Coltrane and Tyner, but even getting a small hint of what it would have been like listening to them starting out is amazing. Again, these guys do have their own thing, but the energy and sheer amount of music coming out of them is comparable to the Coltrane Quartet. It was a good set to be my last set, since I don't anticipate going back to the Green Mill for a long, long time. By the way, Vijay seems like a really nice guy. I brought him the liner from In What Language to sign, and he was surprised to see I had brought that in (don't think it was a huge seller or anything). So we talked for a minute or two about the album.

Just today I noticed that when I turn on my turntable, I am getting a low hum that seems to be transmitting through to the output jacks. I am transferring most of my LPs to computer, so the computer is too close to the turntable, but I can't really change that. I've had this set up for months now, and I think it just started today. Any suggestions, other than unplug wires and straighten them out and start over? Is there a piece of hardware that cuts down on this kind of interference? Thanks. Eric

I picked up a used copy of Charlie Rouse's Epistrophy and a promo copy of One More: The Music of Thad Jones. Talk about an all star cast on the second disk: James Moody, Benny Golson, Frank Wess, Bob Brookmeyer Mickey Roekr and Hank Jones!

Sal: Give me a call if you can still make it on Sat. Should be a great show. Eric

I think having Paypal, and accepting checks as a possible back-up, should be satisfactory to your customers.

Well, it looks like I will have to pass on Bobby at the Showcase (two years straight I've missed him -- damn -- though I did see him with the SF Jazz Collective, and they were definitely on that evening). But I think Sal and I are going to make it to the Green Mill on Sat. the 14th to see Vijay Iyer Quartet with Rudresh Mahanthappa. Should be a great show. According to the on-line Reader, Friday's show is 9 PM and Sat. is 8 PM. I'll correct this if different. Let us know if you think you'll be dropping in.