Matthew

Really, the divorce case produced more that enough evidence of financial mismanagement, yet Bud did nothing. Color me completely pissed-off at Bud and his turning a blind eye. Steroids, crappy umpiring, baseball strikes, and now this. :angry: A day late, a dollar short. He got his wish when he got the McCourt's to buy the Dodgers, all because he did not want an owner who could produce a high payroll, but he wanted someone with no money, who would be unable to do a thing to improve the Dodgers, and that way, kiss up to the small-market teams. Retire already, you cheap, old man. :tdown

I refuse to give any kudos to Bud, because he is the one who forced the sale to the McCourts in the first place. The perfect couple: Bud & Frank McCourt :tdown A dark day in Dodger history.

Nice win by Oakland over the Red Sox tonight, 5-0. It was a 1-0 for the A's until the bottom of the 8th, when there was a meltdown by the Boston bullpen, with Okajima being the star of that show. I've seen a lot of the Red Sox games so far, and something look off about them, and their offense is weak. Carl "4-3" Crawford looks clueless at the plate, with Youk not that far behind. On the plus side, Lackey pitched his best game so far, really looking good, with his fastball in the low 90s the whole game. I know you East Coast guys are in slumber-ville when the A's play, but they have a pretty good team this year, with very strong pitching -- no offense though. Looks like they're trying to be the 2011 AL version of the Giants... we'll see.

Beltre huh? I'll hold my tounge on that one

Carl Crawford is really good at the 4-3 ground out, I think he is in the .120s now.

The Oakland series will be tough, the A's are a good team with very strong pitching. What I hate about Red Sox games in Oakland is all the wanna-be, bandwagon, Red Sox fans in the stands, the pink BoSox caps actually make me physically sick, I hate them so much.

I would have a major freak-out if I ever saw one of those things within a mile of me, probably worse than an eleven year old at that. That thing is majorly creepy.

HAPPY BIRTHDAY

Creed Taylor WSJ Interview

Cliff Lee was once sent down after being a starter for 3 full seasons and at an older age than Hughes. And when he came back he was CLIFF LEE. While there's no guarantee he'll have that kind of a dramatic improvement it's obviously a necessary move, and who knows, maybe it'll straighten him out. But there was a huge difference in the reasons why each were sent down. Lee was sent down because of location issues. He never had a problem w/ his velocity. Good point. It's just our Yankee fans here fret so much I was just trying to make them feel optimistic for a change. Whew, the Red Sox are playing mighty earlier this morning if you live on the west coast. I feel like such a slacker. The Yankee fans need to become Mariner fans -- we don't fret about anything, in fact, we're years away from a good fret...

Listening now. The splices are pretty apparent to me. I think you meant that the overall composition doesn't have that "put together feel"? Yeah, that's what I meant. It's interesting to read the critical reaction to this song and album (it's the only excuse I have for this post): Jack Chamber writes of He Loved Him Madly: There can be no doubt that this music is deeply felt. Whether it succeeds in matching the feelings to the man whose death evoked them is a separate question, and one that would be debated hotly. It is a dirge, carried by long, motionless organ chords, with occasional drum rolls as punctuation and long, spacey interludes by guitar, flute, and trumpet that add color to the organ drone without distracting the listener from it. The organ dominates, although it seems more appropriate as a background for a spoken elegy or perhaps for a musical allusion to Ellington's style. The anticipation that something will arise to fill the empty foreground is the listener's main response on the first listening, but the foreknowledge that it never comes affects further listenings. He Loved Him Madly thus reduces to a passionately understated individula response to Ellington's death, but as a composition it is too monochromatic to justify its half-hour length. (Milestones 2: The Music and Times of Miles Davis Since 1960 pg. 269) In the same book, Chambers quotes Barry Tepperman: Barry Tepperman, reviewing the LP for Coda, labeled it "indentifiably personal, rhythmically involved background music, compressing the limitations of his [Davis's] horn to their ultimate closure, with absolutely nothing to project it into consciousness." As for He Loved Him Madly, Tepperman states: "The only vague interest in this bonsai album comes in an artistically absurd dedication "For Duke." (pg. 270) Again, why there was an expectation that somehow, Miles would work a dedication to Ellington in the "Ellington Style" is interesting, it seems to me that people still had not come to grips with the musical direction of Miles, and were disappointed that Davis did not "come back to the mainstream fold" on this occasion.

Where's there a will, there's a way...

All hail King Ubu on his birthday!

I Noticed that those evil people at Dusty Groove have this on sale: The CTI Jazz All-Star Band: Montreux Jazz Festival 2009 Is this any good? Worth the $34.00? I think I read a review that panned this one, in fact it might have been Doug Payne.

Just some of the reasons why I love this album: 1. He Loved Him Madly. Davis' tribute to Duke Ellington. This song evokes many responses by critics, with the words "strange" and "unusual" being the most often used by the reviews I have read. It is different piece of work, according to the Miles Ahead website, there are at least nineteen splices contained in it, but it does not have that "put together feel." Sometimes I get the feeling that people expected this tribute to the passing of Duke Ellington to be more in a traditional mode, something in the style of I Remember Clifford, instead of what Miles did here. It really is a different kind of song to honor Ellington, but to my mind, it is one of the best Miles Davis songs there is, I even like the sudden ending to it, which always catches me by surprise. I find the song, exciting, lovely, melancholic, and boring, all at the same time, and also depending on my mood. 2. The way Miles plays the organ. I've never read an in-depth appreciation of the organ playing of Miles, but I love it, and I find it totally unique. So often, from what I've read in different places, I get the impression that people feel that Davis is noodling on the organ, passing the time, not too involved. I don't find that at all. For me, his organ playing is at the heart of the songs here (as well as in other albums), and he also plays the organ with a sly sense of humor, of which, his playing on Calypso Frelimo is a good example. 3. Maiysha. I have a DID burn of my favorite Miles, and this one is on it, great playing by all involved, and it is a fun song. 4. It is a fun record. I know it is heresy, but the music of Miles Davis has a ton of fun and laughter in it, and those qualities are here in abundance. 5. You have to play it loud. The best way to appreciate the music here is to say: "To heck with the neighbors" and crank it up. As I said before: Buy it. Listen to it. Love it.

That's Giants Torture. And they're very good at it. Hey, they still won; fourth in a row, too Zito getting hurt helped a lot with the win, he looked terrible... again.

Watch out Yankees, the Giants now hit into five double plays in six innings...

Da Bulls™ escaped by the skin of their teeth today, not even having the lead until less than a minute left in the game. Rose looked great, and Noah is flat-out crazy. Maybe the Pacers will put up a fight in this series after all.

You know you're in trouble when Bartolo Colon is one of the better pitchers on the staff. In other news: It was a nice, workman life win for the Giants last night against the DBacks. Cain, as usual, was very good, relief pitching was okay, it was too bad that Wilson had to come in and get the last out, I would like to see the Giants try not to pitch Wilson as much, but a win is a win. These are the kind of games the Giants need to win because the Rockies are looking very good right now, and these early April victories add up at the end of the season.

What!!! The 2011 Cy Young Award winner?? f PA's bad... turns out he's been put on the 15-day DL for dead arm. Ivan Nova is a pretty fine pitcher for the first three innings or so... ay yi yi. Texas may be owning us now the way we owned them for so long. This just in: Phil Hughes' arm is still dead.

"You can't go up in that plane Pappy! IT'S SUICIDE!!!" Has to be a line from every episode of that series.

'...Horizon' is Benson "put in the right environment". It's his masterpiece, and quite atypical for CTI (no sweetener), and my favorite jazz guitar album. The title track from the Hubbard is gorgeous in a prototypical CTI manner. Also, 'White Rabbit' is one of the best "typical" CTI's (sweetener galore, but it all works). Agree w/Felser--BEYOND is a really solid Benson outing, Matthew. I have the Mosaic Contemporary edition (whatever happened to that series, eh?) and probably won't be too inclined to go for the new one, but you ought to snag it if you're into GB at all. I emailed Mosaic about a month ago asking if they would ever do the Contemporary Series again: Alas, "No" was the answer, which is too bad, it seems as if Mosaic was ahead of the curve on this one, there is some wonderful, under appreciated jazz from the 1970s, especially in the CTI catalog. On another topic: I have the Japanese edition of The Big Box, which was a 24bit remaster -- is there a noticeable sonic improvement with the 40th edition, (I don't want to spend money if both are equal)?

What!!! The 2011 Cy Young Award winner??

I'm the same way. Though I've never liked the Dodgers I have always liked Vin Scully's voice....and I can't believe Chick Hearn is gone either. The Lakers are the only LA team I root for since way back in the 60s. So...is Scully retiring? With Scully, it's year to year, he says he needs to see how he feels at the end of each season. How he has put up with the McCourt's is beyond me. I was wondering last night if Scully has been muzzled, because the Dodgers were getting booed loudly, and not a discouraging word was heard from Vinny's mouth. And not a word on the ridiculous security at Dodger Stadium -- two armed police at each section? What The Heck???? Dodger Stadium was empty, I doubt there were over 20,000 thousand in the stands. Sad times in Dodgerland.

I was able to watch the Cardinals / Dodgers game last night, and I'm afraid the Dodgers have a terrible team right now, nothing looks too good, just a couple of good players, but not the kind that can carry a team. On another note: I can't believe that I have been listening to Vin Scully all my life. I remember that Scully was the first announcer I ever listened to, and that was when I was seven years old, forty-five years ago. It won't be the same when he retires -- I'm still not use to no Chick Hearn for the Lakers' games.