Kevin Bresnahan

I must be missing something... I don't read that review of Sanders' performance as positive. Sitting out most of the 2nd set is not a good thing. To be honest, he's scheduled to play in Boston Oct. 6th and I'm skipping it. I have many fond memories of Pharoah at the Regattabar. They'll have to suffice.

Kenny Dorham - Una Mas (Blue Note). Blue label Liberty Van Gelder pressing. It's pressings like this where I realize that those bright RVG CDs aren't so far off from the original LPs as I originally thought. Rudy liked his midrange.

I am still waiting for a Horace Parlan vinyl set to show up at a decent price. Not all sets have dropped in value.

I'd love to find a nice copy of this. Not an easy one to find.

I do like Bunky's Delos CD, "Healing The Pain" a lot. Maybe a bit more than this one. Regarding the bass sound, I'm just glad that the recording engineers stopped recording bass directly into the soundboard and started mic'ing them again. It sounds so unnatural. Eddie is a great bassist but that twang twang twung stuff makes him sound like every other 70's era recorded bass.

Bunky Green - Places We've Never Been (Vanguard). I'm having some bad luck with twangy basses today! Terrible bass sound aside, Bunky's playing here is very good. Really interesting compositions (all by Bunky except one by Bunky with guest pianist Ronald Kubelik). Randy Brecker plays great. I wonder if there's a dry version of this master tape? The reverb can get a bit distracting. Reading Bunky's Wiki page, I was pleasantly surprised to see that he's still alive at 82. I wonder if he still plays?

Gonz - Uranian Undertow (Plug). Gonz is Jerry Bergonzi (ts), Bruce Gertz (b) & Bob Gullotti (d). This 1984 recording is pretty interesting with some in & out travels. How can you not like an album with a tune called "Hank", written for Hank Mobley? Plus, it's not often that a record is titled for Uranus or anyone's anus for that matter. I think that Bruce Gertz still has copies of his Plug records stashed at his house. I was able to buy a whole slew of these LPs from him a few years ago.

Coleman Hawkins - The High And Mighty Hawk (Affinity). Great music in iffy sound. It sounds like the music is being played through a veil - very attenuated high end. I do dig "Bird Of Prey Blues", no matter the sound quality. I should pull out the London CD version I have to see if it's just this LP. Didn't Affinity simply grab the audio from wherever they could? Who owns those old Felsted masters these days?

Red Garland - Strike Up The Band (Galaxy). Promo copy. George Coleman (ts), Julian Priester (tb), Red, Ron Carter (b) & Ben Riley (d). I'm laughing as George Coleman is doing some of that circular breathing stuff for effect. Seeing it live was interesting (the first time) but it got old pretty quick. Julian Preister seems to play in higher registers than most trombonists. 1979 bass sound - doesn't really even sound like Carter.

Teddy Edwards with Les McCann LTD. - It's About Time (Pacific Jazz PJ-6 mono). Nice deep groove pressing that seems to have weathered the passage of time in decent shape. Bass is a little shy though. Am I the only one who thinks Teddy's nasally tone makes him sound a bit like Charlie Rouse?

Just finished: Clark Terry - Everything's Mellow (Prestige/Moodsville/Status) Now playing: Paul Desmond - Pure Desmond (CTI). As is typical of most original CTI pressings - it looks brand new yet plays like a bowl of Rice Krispies. They're almost always on the lead in too. Beautiful album though. Worth getting past those crackles. I probably should pick up a CD copy of this someday.

Joe Temperley & Jimmy Knepper - Just Friends (Hep 2003). I just found this in the LP rack still sealed. Derek Smith (p), Michael Moore (b) & Billy Hart (d) form the rhythm section. I didn't know that Michael Moore started out as bassist. This session comes across as rather tame. The liner notes, by Alun Morgan, go on about how this is a record of old standards, which I guess was important to note back in 1979. The bass (as expected) sounds terrible, with that 70's twang.

What you're asking for is a fuse. And sure, some speakers are fused. But of course, even fuses have their limitations due to the dynamic nature of audio signals. Remember, most tweeters blow because the tweeter draws more current than the thin voice coil wires can handle. So if you fuse the speaker at a current level that protects those thin tweeter wires, that current limit will probably be too low for the woofer to reproduce a loud passage filled with low bass. The best fused speakers have separate fuses for each speaker element. Then there's the resistive nature of the fuse. It's not a simple wire. It has resistive properties that many claim hurts the sound. Protecting speakers is not as easy as it sounds (pun intended).

It's very hard to put current protection in a signal path that doesn't change the signal going through it. The B&W APOC circuit had several diodes that shunt excess current to ground until they shut off the speaker completely. As these circuit elements started to turn on, they most likely changed the sound. There are forums around the 'net telling people how to bypass or remove the APOC circuitry in these older B&W speakers and the dramatic improvement in sound after it's done.

B&W speakers back then had a protection circuit built into them. Here's the owner's manual for the CM-1/CM-2 Matrix speakers that dicky is talking about: http://bwgroupsupport.com/downloads/manuals/bw/CM1-CM2-OM.pdf On Page 5, they mention the APOC circuit.

Arthur Taylor - Hard Cookin' (Prestige). A twofer from 1965 combining "Taylor's Wailers" and "Taylor's Tenors". Blue label RVG pressings for both records doesn't save these records from being an iffy-sounding LPs. Crackles galore and not the fullest sound. Presitge LPs quality really did vary all over the place back then. The labels are messed up too. The label for the 1st record, which is listed as Side A & Side B, are labeled Side C & Side D. The other record is similarly mis-marked. The music is awesome though.

I assume it's this one, but I still don't think their sketch looks like Getz:

I wonder what picture was used for this sketch?

Speaking of the Mingus Big Band, I wonder if Rooster_Ties can extend his visit by a day and catch their weekly gig at the Standard? Well worth it.

When B&W switched over their entire Nautilus line to diamond tweeters in 2010, the list prices were nearly tripled. As a result, the used market for the older Nautilus speakers without the diamond tweeter has spiked recently. If yours need work, I would definitely get it done. They are nice sounding speakers.

Really? That's not good. I used to really like that place when I lived closer. I haven't been in many years now.

The speaker wires are worth a shot (you could've used some cheap lamp cord as a quick check). I'll be pleasantly surprised if that's it. I still agree with most of the other posters that both speakers being affected sounds like an amp/preamp problem. Crappy luck if you just happened to blow both speakers together. I have heard stories of it happening from a lightning strike. I've blown a few tweeters in my day but never both at once.

"Break up" sounds like it could be a tweeter. But again, it's usually a higher-frequency buzz like a loud mosquito. Did you ever get a chance to try different speaker wires?

I'd pick the Vanguard myself. I'm a sucker for Renee's playing and she has Chris Potter playing up front. The Blue Note has the vocal band Take 6, Birdland has Ron Carter's "Great Big Band" and Smoke Jazz has vocalist Joanna Pascale doing a Monk tribute. Pascale's got a killer backing band so if a vocal tribute to Monk is for you, that might be a good one.