Kevin Bresnahan

Those states that ended their mask mandates earlier than others got the benefit of having a vaccination program rapidly ramping while they did this. There is also the simple fact that vaccinated people who get COVID might not even know they got it and would certainly not get tested. And let me ask a simple question: Isn't it a good thing that the Biden administration was wrong about this? This situation is like two guys driving a car toward a wall. One person says to slow down and turn and the other says screw it and drives right up to the wall and locks up the brakes at the last second. Both avoided hitting the wall, but there is a safe way and a less-safe way to do it. Thank god for them that the brakes worked as designed.

I'll never order from udiscovermusic.com again. In late 2019 (pre-pandemic), I ordered several Blue Note LPs. After several weeks, they e-mailed that one title was out of stock, so my order would be delayed. I E-mailed them to ask if they would send the other LPs in the order. They never responded. I kept contacting them and only got automated responses. Finally after 5 months, I cancelled the order.

The 1989 US pressing may say "Digital Transfers: Ron McMaster", but that's just copied over from the CD artwork from the CD that was released concurrently with this LP. This is an analog cut. Ron told me that he always cut Blue Note LPs from the analog masters back then and to ignore that digital typo.

This sorta bugged me at first, but then I realized that those liars are only putting themselves at risk so it's their own damn fault if they get COVID. It's not on me.

I thought this quote was even more eye opening: "We sell a lot of vinyl, but it’s all one of this and one of that. It’s 1,000s of things, but one of this and one of that. A really big vinyl seller for Wayside Music is three or four copies. That’s great. And since I am buying them one at a time, that’s fine. But if they cost me a fortune, and my minimum quantity is 250, selling four copies kind of sucks."

Great music, but for some reason, I've never liked this cover. It looks like something I would've done and I suck at that stuff.

Let's not get started on Jerry Lee. He married his 13 year old cousin when he was 22.

I hope you are not a big fan of the Seinfeld show then.

Do you really think this is true at Blue Note today? After they released that Jazz Messengers date that no one would release for decades, it would seem that they are no longer honoring those old rules. I expect the Tyrone Washington "Train Wreck" to get released any day now. "Discovered in the vaults - a long lost session!"

Edit to say: I called Mosaic back to find out if they lost my order and found out that anyone that gets a shipping notice now is simply getting an automated E-mail and that your box has not really shipped. They have hundreds of backorders due to this SNAFU with the company supplying the outer boxes.

Mosaic is preparing an E-mail to explain the delays that are happening right now. Apparently, they have the CDs, including the artwork, for their current orders, but the outside box order got delayed so they can't ship yet. I was told that they are expecting them within the next two weeks. Scott also assured me that this is not sold out and that he expects that Jazz Messengers will be getting more.

I don't like that this story has gotten so much traction with #MeToo headlines. To my eyes, it's really not. #MeToo is really for all the women who have been forced to remain silent in the face of sexual harassment and even rape. To be clear, if Grand had come out and said that Steve Coleman asked her for sex as payment for sax lessons and she had to walk away without getting those sax lessons, she could post away with that #MeToo hashtag and we'd likely all be behind her. I know I would be. But that's not what happened here. The jerk inappropriately propositioned her and she said, "Sure," and then kept at it for 6 years. 6 years. That sounds more like #WeToo.

WTF are "social justice warrior circles"? First "cancel culture wokies" and now this? Stop making up stupid terms to try and generalize things you don't like. Not only are you painting with a broad brush, you're showing yourself to be pretty damn heartless. FYI, a lot of us really appreciate the #MeToo movement, myself included. Just because we think it's something whose time is long overdue, doesn't mean that we are suddenly some type of social justice warrior or we just "woke up". We've been aware of this for a long time. My awareness and desire for change was heightened when I had two daughters more than 30 years ago. Shit has happened to women for a long time and it should not have required anyone to "wake up" to realize it was wrong and needed to be stopped. #MeToo should never have had to be a movement. It should have always existed. But here we are. I guess more than anything, we can thank Bill Cosby.

Sorry, but in my eyes, the only "whore" in this situation is Steve Coleman. The dude saw a cute young girl (alright - legally a woman) and all he could think about was getting in her pants, not her potential as a saxophone player. Having said that, I do have a problem with her purposefully trying to ruin his life by exposing their relationship - a relationship that she willfully entered into and kept going for a long time (almost 6 years) by threatening to go public if he broke it off. She followed through on that threat and got away with it due to a law that was created to help protect women from unwanted sexual contact or caught in abusive relationships. This was neither. Her ability to use this law to punish Steve Coleman has exposed a problem with that law. When several women were able to finally speak out about sexual predators like Bill Cosby & Harvey Weinstein and get their day in court, I cheered them on. I don't feel like cheering this woman on.

This law was changed to allow for "opinions" to be protected speech in cases where it involves a "non-public" figure. Don't you think it's wrong that Steve Coleman has been denied that classification? I think the protections for a public figure should apply here. Clearly, he is a public figure and it is likely that his career and ability to work will be affected by what she wrote. The term "public figure" should not be reserved for politicians.

https://www.bakerlaw.com/news/victory-for-speaking-out?utm_campaign=march_2021&utm_medium=social&utm_source=facebook&utm_content=pro-bono' It looks like Coleman lost because New York just passed a new #MeToo law, not because of anything in this he said/she said case. To wit: "The decision is one of the first to apply New York’s recently expanded anti-SLAPP statute (“strategic lawsuit against public participation”), in a defamation case involving a non-public figure. It upholds essential First Amendment rights, particularly for people who speak up about abuse and harassment." So basically, in New York, you can legally accuse someone (who isn't famous i.e "rich") of sexual harassment, whether it's real or made up. It's now protected speech. I think it's pretty sad that Steve Coleman's fame as a Jazz artist is so low that he has been classified as a non-public figure. I mean hell, just the fact that we are talking about it here would seem to indicate that he is, in fact, a public figure. He's just not rich enough, I guess. This whole thing is truly messed up. From a 52 year-old man thinking it's a good idea to have a sexual relationship with a 17 year old (student no less), to said student threatening to expose this inappropriate relationship so that he would continue it. Dude should've kept it in his pants, no matter what she was doing.

The bandcamp site for Space Walk has some of the music up for streaming. It sounds the band was recorded in a Tube tunnel.

My wife works in a school system and she said that there is a science class at the high school where 8 out of the 20 students in that class are sick with COVID. This is the same school system where a group of unmasked parents protested at the school committee meeting last week to demand that the schools drop their mask mandates. It got so bad that one of the protesters got arrested. Let me repeat - 8 out of 20 kids got COVID. Whatever happened to parents wanting to protect their children?

I am of two opinions here. One side of me says that these anti-vaxxers are getting to drop their masks because people like me went and got vaccinated, so that part of it bugs me. The other side of me says that masks are now for their protection, not mine, so if they want to continue to risk getting COVID by not getting a vaccine and not masking up, then they're only putting themselves at risk, so why should I care? More than anything, I'm interested in seeing how my company handles this whole thing. I work with a few people with extreme opinions about this (the political nature of these opinions precludes me from going into details), so there will likely be some push back on the mandatory reporting of your vaccination status.

The company where I work just announced that starting next Tuesday, June 1st, anyone who has been vaccinated can shed their mask and no more 6 foot keep-out circles. So how will they know who is vaccinated and who is not? They are requiring everyone to register their status (with HR - no one else will know). I am still wondering how they are going to enforce this. I can almost guarantee that the ones who have refused to get a vaccine will be the same ones who will refuse to admit it or they will lie about it. I also know for certain that they will also refuse to wear a mask because they try to do it all the time already. I wonder if my company has the cahones to stand up to them? We shall see.

I finally broke down and ordered the Joe Henderson Mosaic box. Too many reviewers are going on & on about the great audio and I had some PayPal credit so it's on the way.

Did you not like the Connoisseur CD of this material?

Reservoir Records is one of my favorite record labels. I really like their Nick Brignola catalog. Thank you Mr. Feldman for the great music.

Good? Depressing maybe. It certainly rings true that old adage, "How do you make a million bucks selling Jazz? Start with two million."

The rumor mill (actually, the Steve Hoffman forum ) says that cartridges with a higher tracking force seem to fare better. Well, I just happened to pick up a Denon 110th Anniversary DL-103R cartridge last month and that cartridge tracks at 2.5 grams, 2/3rds higher than my Ortofon 2M Black cart, so I stuck that on there (hooray for turntables with swappable headshells) and it plays straight through without any problem... except it really doesn't sound as good to my ears. Bummer. I was hoping to have this cart as a backup (always a good idea with vinyl playback systems) but now I may just buy a back-up 2M Black stylus.