Steve Reynolds

I’ve always thought/felt that it seemed so few are even interested in these musicians around these parts for unknown reasons. I’d love to discuss my relatively limited experience regarding the full DKV catalogue and then my deep interest in Vandermark’s music - specifically his many large ensemble projects that he’s recorded & toured with over the past 20 or so years but I think I’d bore people. I’m sad I’ve not been able to travel to see some of these groups like the Territory Band or Resonance Ensemble but I love the recordings - especially the Territory Band with some added electronics and the last 3 Resonance Ensemble recordings on Not Two records. A great combination of guys like Dave Rempis, Steve Swell and some great young European musicians playing Ken’s creative charts. I think most know my history and thoughts regarding Hamid Drake. I’m just glad I’ll have another opportunity to see him live again this year at least once or twice more this year. First shows for me back in 1998 or 99, I think. My favorite is still the quartet with Fred Anderson, Kidd Jordan & William Parker back in 1999 of 2000 at Vision Fest. People were dancing in the aisles. Stunning experience. These last 2 DKV boxes are all fully improvised groove based jazz save for the 2008 show on the previous box “Past & Present” where they improvise off of Don Cherry compositions. Maybe the best disc of the 12 discs that the 2 box sets contain.

DKV Trio: Sound in Motion Hamid Drake, Kent Kessler & Ken Vandermark 5 discs from 5 nights between 2012 & 2014. Amazing sound quality & production on Not Two Records

Delivered but not to be opened until my birthday (4/25)

A fantastic box set. The Fernandez large ensemble suite is incredible.

After listening through 5 or 6 of the 8 CD’s within the Joelle Leandre “A Woman’s Work” Box I give this release my highest recommendation on many levels. First level is that Lady Joelle might be the strongest bassist with a bow I’ve ever heard. then her occasional ‘singing’ then her choice of dance/playing partners and then disc 8 which is the full quartet with Evan Parker, Agusti Fernandez & Zlatko Kaucic. on Not Two Records

Led Zeppelin: Presence

Dark Star>Me and My Uncle>Dark Star>Wharf Rat Grateful Dead 4/24/72 from Rockin’ the Rhein mind-boggling stuff from the great E72 tour

Phil Lesh & Friends @ Capital Theatre

Same vendor:)

Here in the U.S. there is a vendor directly related to the label where we get ONE shipping charge for as many CD’s as we want from Not Two. I made an order (that I documented on another thread) that was over 8-9 releases with a total shipping cost of $7.43 U.S. dollars. Same for these 2 boxes - I think $122 cost & 7.43 shipping:) for the two boxes. Great price in my view for these very high quality recordings.

No report until some time after 4/25!! My experience with the 2 previous DKV box sets is that the sound quality is very very good. If one compares it to the William Parker Wood Flute Songs Box on AUM, the Not Two DKV boxes sound better. I use that as a comparison as Hamid Drake is on both and the sound of his drums is very important to me. Not Two records to this avid non-audiophile provides the best sound quality as compared to any current label I know of. The “Sound in Motion” box maybe sounds even better than the previous “Past & Present” box but both are spectacular sounding documents. I hope you are also considering the Barry Guy box as the previous Tensegrity 4 CD set is among my favorite collection of current day freely improvised music. It’s exciting to these ears to hear the playing from a number of younger players I was previously unfamiliar with (Per Texas Johansson, Julius Gabriel, Fanny Paccoud, Ben Dwyer, etc.) similar excitement in hearing the 3 CD set from Per-Ake Holmlander with a number of younger woman players I’d never heard of including a bassist Elsa Bergman who is amazing and some horn players who are also very very good and all seem to have fresh approaches to this music. Plus this set has Steve Swell & Tim Daisy as “veteran leadership” so there is a wonderful young & older or ying & yang feel to this release. This one might end up being an all-time favorite as my second or third time through in listening to the composed & improvised suite on disc 3 (with the full large ensemble) reveals a mature accomplished composer in Holmlander.

Gong: Angel’s Egg

Grateful Dead: Dick's Picks 19 from 10/19/73 Sonic Youth: NYC Ghosts & Flowers

Adding Brotzmann’s “For Adolphe Sax” stunning true debut LP from 1967 with Peter Kowald & Sven-Ake Johansson imagine oneself hearing this knowing what other jazz/improvised music existed at this point in time

Repeating from New Releases thread Journey to Parazzar Joe McPhee: alto saxophone & pocket trumpet, voice John Edwards: bass Klaus Kugel: drums stunning

Hopefully they get Ches Smith recorded as he sounds in real life. If that’s the case it should be played very loud.

Among others but the 2 drummerless trios on ECM with Joe Maneri, Mat Maneri & Barre Phillips are amazing (note that Joe plays a bit of piano on a few tracks in place of his alto & tenor saxophone or his amazing clarinet). Tales of Rohnlief Angles of Repose After all these ears I’ve become way more open to these sessions without my guy Randy Peterson on drums. I still believe the recordings with Peterson are even more incredible / especially the Hat ARTs & the above 2 CD trio set on Leo. That trio set also has quite a bit of Papa Joe on piano fwiw. As time has moved on from his passing and it will be ten years in August and well over that amount of time since he played or recorded - the last concerts were in 2005 (farewell shows that I was not able to attend - where are the release of these recordings?!?!?) and the last released recordings are from 2002 - his music is gaining even more depth & uniqueness, in my view. still his muse was an off beat or even an eccentric one but his originality and singular voice can never be questioned. still...... Coming Down the Mountain

Waiting to get this when I see them in Newburgh NY on 4/20

Excellent album

The 2008 disc from the DKV Trio Past & Present 7 CD box is spectacular as good as Vandermark has sounded with the trio - they play a suite of music based on Don Cherry compositions. Even better than the great Trigonometry 2 CD set from 2001. Plus Hamid explodes out of the speakers and Cherry’s tunes are right in his swinging/grooving wheelhouse.

I’m happy Jim wrote/posted above what he did. I loved the liners from the old jazz classics from the 50’s & early 60’s when I was getting and buying all those great classic recordings via CD back in the early 90’s. When I evolved in my jazz listening I ran into his “critical” comments regarding much of the newer or more abstract or challenging music I was discovering and those “critical” comments came across to me as ignorant and close-minded more than anything else. He didn’t like it so therefore he made silly value judgements against all of it. He (and many others) were so SURE that they were correct as they had SEEN and heard the guys who really “swung” and none of these guys blah fucking blah....

David S Ware: New York Live at The Blue Note 2010 / 2 CD set on AUM

Fred Anderson with William Parker & Hamid Drake: Blue Winter Peter Brotzmann with the above bass/drums: Never too Late But Alway too Early Both double CD’s on eremite Rodrigo Amado Motion Trio - any of them but the latest is Desire and Freedom - on Not Two records Paul Dunmall with John Adams & Mark Sanders: Ghostly Thoughts - on hatology Joe Maneri: Trio Concerts with Mat Maneri & Randy Peterson / 2 CD set on Leo Parker Guy Lytton: At the Vortex - on Emanem Records Mats Gustafsson with Barry Guy & Raymond Strid: Tarfala / on Intakt records Tony Malaby with William Parker & Nasheet Waits: Tamarindo / on Clean feed many many others from these and other great players but the above in my view are top of top great trio recordings

Tickets ordered for me and my pal who is experiencing a bunch of these musicians for the first time. He is also coming with me to see Schlippenbach Trio & then Peter Brotzmann with Andrew Cyrille @ Vision Fest in June. so we will hear Gustafsson, Parker & Brotzmann back to back to back and for my young friend - first time for him to each of them and maybe last shot on the two older legends - who knows how many more opportunities any of us will get to hear the first generation European improvising grand masters. I’m very grateful for these concerts being scheduled for this spring. I never really expected any of the three to be so close by this year.

Ordering both the DKV Trio plus Joe McPhee 6 CD set & the Barry Guy Blue Shroud Band 5 CD set with a promise from me to my wife that they don’t get opened until my birthday in April time to remind those here who have been unmoved about previous reminders about these Barry Guy Small Formation box sets that these releases are some of the finest played/improvised live music of the past few decades and are all presented in sound quality that is second to none. The first box is now hard to find and quite expensive (Mad Dogs with the New Orchestra members) but Mad Dogs on the Loose with almost the same personell (including Evan Parker, Mats Gustafsson, etc.) is almost as great and is available for a fair cost while Tensegrity is small formations improvisation from the Blue Shroud Band and it is arguably a more exciting collectionby mostly lesser known players (save for Guy, Peter Evans & Agusti Fernandez) is even less expensive.