Kevin Bresnahan

Kenny Werner - Church On Mars (Newvelle Records). I got in my first of two individual LPs ordered from Newvelle Records. Expensive as hell ($65 each) but very nice pressings of music that isn't available elsewhere (yet).

The Tone Poet series is being curated by Don Was and Joe Harley and they have not limited it to the Blue Note catalog. There have been Solid State ("Now He Sings, Now He Sobs"), Pacific Jazz ("Katanga", "Chet Baker Sings" & "New Bottle, Old Wine") and United Artists ("Money Jungle") releases sprinkled in there.

Not that it means that they are right about this, but the denizens of the Hoffman forums are saying that the new Tone Poet reissue of this sounds very good. Several of them are claiming that it's the best-sounding Tone Poet yet. I would take that with a grain of salt because they always seem to elevate each new release above the previous one and because I don't see how the sound could top that Kenny Burrell Tone Poet, which sounds pretty damn good.

Jack Wilson - Merge (Chiaroscuro Records). This is a really good record that was recommended to me many years ago by Sonnymax. I was lucky to have caught Wilkins on one of his rare visits to the Boston area.

Was it set to Automatic? If that's the case, it must've switched to the Speaker setting when you were playing back your music. Good catch. You'll just have to remember this if you ever want to listen via the phone's speakers.

I think if Cuscuna knew that answer, we'd have alternate takes now.

Cuscuna once told me that he searched the tape archive and never found the session tapes for the "Leeway" recording date. He said that all that's in the vault is the LP-sequenced master tape. He even said something along the lines that it was one of the biggest disappointments after he got access to the tape vaults.

10 Lee Morgan dates to be reissued on SHM-CD in August: https://www.cdjapan.co.jp/products?term.prodkey=UCCQ-9573,UCCQ-9574,UCCQ-9575,UCCQ-9576,UCCQ-9577,UCCQ-9578,UCCQ-9579,UCCQ-9580,UCCQ-9581,UCCQ-9582 Do any of these have extra never-before-released tracks?

If you lower the volume on the iPhone, does the sound still break up but at a lower volume or does it stop? Sometimes, media players on phones default to a "line out" level, which is typically full volume. Full volume could be distorting the playback via your earbuds.

I wonder if the autograph is genuine? Plus it's mono and there are a lot of mono fetishists out there. The mono aspect of this one doesn't make much sense as it's just a fold down of the stereo recording. I suppose if money were no object this would seem like a cool purchase if only for that autograph. Too bad my name isn't Bill.

I still think it's absolute garbage that they now know that the initial release was messed up but rather than send us this new cut free or offer some sort of discount for those of us who spent the money up front, they come out with the corrected version, give it a new subtitle and stand there with their hands out. Screw them. I don't care if this sounds like Monk is in the room with me, I ain't buying this.

No turntable can "handle" marauding toddlers. A toddler grabs your TT arm with a record on there and your options are: stylus is toast, record is toast or both are toast. FWiW, I just bought a turntable for my secondary listening space where I needed it to be able to on a shelf - so no traditional cover. I bought a Denon DP-400 (~$500): I swapped out the stock cartridge for an Ortofon 3M Black (~$750) and I have a very nice sounding turntable. With this funky cover in place, it's safe from my dog's tail, but a toddler could still reach into that opening where the stylus resides. BTW - that cover doubles as a cover stand, It actually works well:

Inexpensive decent direct drive turntables are a bit of a rare breed these days. Depending on your budget, there are a couple of Technics direct drive TTs and Cambridge Audio's Alva TT is a nice-looking option... except that it has a non-defeatable phono preamp. There is an inexpensive Pioneer direct drive built for DJs, but I don't have any idea about its quality. Other than these few options, the major players have mostly gone belt drive. No Pro-Ject or Rega direct drive TTs. VPI makes a direct drive TT but it's $15,000. Have fun with that. You'll have one poster will post something as an absolute and then the rest of the posters will take sides and gang up on anyone who doesn't agree with them. Belt drive vs direct drive is like "Tastes great/Less Filling" for those people. And don't even get me started about some of their recommended accessories. There are a lot of snake oil advocates over there.

It might take that long to get them to cut this material onto Edison cylinders.

You made it to 66. Why not try retirement? If you have ever given any thoughts at enjoying your retirement, now is your chance. You're still young. You're healthy and financially OK. At least try taking a nice long vacation. Start a hobby? Volunteer? My dad died at 70 of a sudden heart attack, so I saw someone make all the best retirement plans and "poof", it was all gone in an instant. Even though I am not even 60, I have already had one health scare. On top of that, I have had quite a few high school classmates die of various causes so I've really started to think about this. You only get one shot at the rest of your life. You don't know when your number is up.

I did order the Kenny Werner & Frank Kimbrough LPs but at $65, I didn't take a chance on that Pablo Ablanedo date and the Andy Zimmerman was sold out before I got a chance to visit their store. BTW - there are still copies available for those looking to splurge to treat themselves.

Newvelle Records is supposed to be offering individual LPs for sale tomorrow for Record Store Day. This is the first time I've been able to look at this catalog with the thought that I could buy a record or two that piqued my interest. I have one of their LPs, Noah Preminger's "Some Other Time" & I have the CD version of Ben Allison's "Quiet Revolution". Has anyone been able to hear more of their catalog and offer recommendations? I am thinking about Frank Kimbrough's "Meantime", Andy Zimmerman's "Half Light" & Kenny Werner's "Church On Mars". I am also curious about Pablo Ablanedo's "Octet" which has a pretty good lineup: Anat Cohen, Jenny Scheinman, Chris Cheek, Jerome Sabbagh, Diego Urcola, Ben Monder, Fernando Huergo, Franco Pinna and Daniel Ian Smith. Thanks, Kevin

Immanuel Wilkins - Omega (Blue Note)

Kisor is great but again, I think Weiss' piano is a big plus.

Great record. Several tracks showcase Ronnie's affection for the Latin side. Michael Weiss' piano playing stands out to me. The closer, "Better Git It In Your Soul" is great, with Ronnie going to town in his short solo. Weiss' bouncy piano sets a mood that just makes you want to get up and dance. Worth the price for that track alone. Another great track is Cuber's "Humacao". Weiss' solo here has a little of that locked-hands style that reminds me of Garland. I wonder if that was what he was going for there?

Abercrombie's recording debut... I don't think I've ever heard that one.

That is correct. Even in the EU, post-1962 recordings are under copyright protection. However, I was once told that Andorra, where some of the Fresh Sound family of labels reside, are not part of the EU, so they are supposedly still using a 50 year copyright. I have no idea if that is true. I think it's sad that the US will eventually have an infinite copyright due to Mickey Mouse whereas the EU will have one due to The Beatles. Public Domain is going away.

BTW - I did give Udiscovermusic.com a second chance and it was even worse than the first. I never received any records from that order after about 4 months so I had to cancel that one too. If this box is at all limited (I don't think it is but you should verify), don't order from them because you might not recieive it and it might go oop waiting for them to ship. They have one of the worst customer service groups I've ever dealt with.

Don't you have a stereo/mono button on your amp/preamp? If not, you could buy a couple of Y adapters and get mono, no problem. One of these: Connected to one of these: And then run the "regular RCA stereo cables into both sides of this combined adapter thing, running one side to the preamp input and the other side to your source source. You got mono. https://www.showmecables.com/rca-female-to-dual-rca-female-adapter https://www.showmecables.com/by-category/adapters/audio-video-adapters/rca/rca-male-to-dual-rca-female-adapter