mjzee

Release date February 1:

Bob Dylan to star in Chrysler Super Bowl ad, according to report

Release date February 3:

Ah, Nameless Sound...good to know. Thanks.

Where in Houston is the Bradford show?

I heard the LPs when they came out, but didn't buy them. The original LPs barely gave recording dates, so I never knew what to make of them; I also didn't understand the Pablo/Norman Granz connection until the box set. Count me as someone distinctly underwhelmed by the Live Trane box. Besides the mediocre, remote sound quality, these performances do not strike me as adding to our knowledge about Trane. You can hear the same sorts of performances, much better performances, elsewhere.

We finished watching Good Ol' Freda tonight. It's a sweet story, well worth watching. Freda Kelly was a relatively minor player in the Beatles story, but she's the real deal, was there with them from the beginning, was friends with them, worked for Brian Epstein, was friends with Ringo's parents (who told Brian Epstein to give Freda a raise!), was one of the bus passengers in Magical Mystery Tour, and was there at the dissolution. It's really a story about loyalty and friendship, and about being a fan.

We watched the first 20 minutes before getting interrupted. Yes, so far, very good. It's a very sweet story, very real. Visuals, editing are all very well done.

Watching "Good Ol' Freda" now.

Marc Myers has been contributing a terrific series for the Wall Street Journal, where he interviews various stars as to how a particular song came about. No doubt these will eventually be collected in a book. His latest piece is a conversation with Merle Haggard regarding the tune "Big City." WSJ (If the link doesn't return the full article, google the headline "The Fit That Led to a Country Hit for Merle Haggard")

Would you consider downloads? That would be a really inexpensive way to go.

You're welcome.

A friend in college had the first UK release of Sgt. Pepper. There's a weird lead-out groove on, IIRC, side 2; sounds like something being played backwards. Sure enough, when we did play it backwards (at the radio station, put the turntable in neutral and turn the disc back with your finger) we distinctly heard "We're going to fuck you like supermen" over and over...

I actually have that Lou Christie MGM single, and I hear what you're saying about Charlie Calello, but I could never relate to the falsetto voice. There are very few falsettos I like (Little Anthony is one, but even there, it just sounds so strange). The 4 Seasons songs are successful in spite of Frankie Valli's falsetto, not because of it (IMHO).

I'd like to also propose something else. I call it the "Gary Puckett & The Union Gap dictum." To wit: Pop music should have an expiration date, beyond which it's rarely heard. I remember hearing Woman, Woman when I was a child, thinking it was a godawful song but that's OK, because 3 months from now the song will drop off the radio and I'd rarely have to hear it again. Then came the advent of FM Oldies stations and, low and behold, I could never stop hearing Woman, Woman. Good lord! Not only was it a shitty song, it was the shitty song that kept on giving. There oughta be a law, and that's what I'm proposing. Mind you, it would be hard to codify what's awful (Puckett) and what's not (Beatles), but it can be done. This would leave room for new awful pop music, where we'd have the same blessed reaction: only 3 months for this, hopefully.

PM sent on Miles & Gil Evans: The Complete Columbia Recording Sessions (6 CDs) Long Box $20 Bob Dylan: The Original Mono Recordings - Includes the Brandies University CD (10 CDs) $55 Led Zeppelin: The Complete Studio Recordings (10 CDs) $55

When I got the US box, it was such a rush because I didn't own the albums when they came out, just heard them when I went to friends' houses (usually their older brothers owned the LPs) so hearing them now brought me back to when I was 9. Cool! In college, some friends had a few of the UK albums, and that was interesting, but they weren't our albums, y'know? And the US albums definitely sound different than the UK albums - more energy, they sound more alive. People bought those US albums until the CD era, so it wasn't just a kids thing.

Go to Amazon and read the customer reviews of this new release. They're uniformly negative. It looks like the earlier 2 4-disc boxes were truer to the original U.S. LPs. I have the first of those boxes and think it's great.

Are these tapes from Columbia's vaults, or true "bootlegs" (other sources)?

Where do they get that Trane "led" this band? I don't recall ever hearing that before. I don't recall hearing that either. Smells funny to me. The liner notes to John Coltrane - The Bethlehem Years just calls it an all-star jam session.

Release date January 21:

Release date March 4:

If anyone's interested, there's a "used-like new" Japanese copy of the Plugged Nickel box on Amazon right now for $89.95. You'd better move fast. Amazon

Vivaldi is my favorite. I've been luxuriating in this box for awhile now: And these two downloads, taken from the Vanguard archives, are excellent values. Volume II is currently 99 cents on Amazon, and Volume I is $2.99 (not sure how much they are by you, though).

The mid 60's were a treasure trove of sitcom idiocies. My Mother The Car? Mr. Ed? The Beverly Hillbillies? I loved Green Acres, which sped past idiocy into pure dada genius. But really, TV today is so much better.