So, What Are You Listening To NOW?

[BillF]

Time for a second listen. So lovely!

Record of the year so far, or is it this?

[JSngry]

Mixed emotions about these for me (as with Grossman in general, not just these records, he was apparently a "complicated guy") but of two things I am certain - It's hard not to like this record if you don't think about it past the immediate moment; and - for all those whiners who would love nothing more than to have Sonny Rollins playing in 1984 like he did in 1957, here's your records, thank you, now stop bitching about it.

[Peter Friedman]

Leonard Feather Presents BOP - Phil Woods, Idrees Sulieman, Thad Jones, George Wallington, Curley Russell, Denzil Best, Art Taylor

Edited January 28, 2022 by Peter Friedman

[HutchFan]

5 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Mixed emotions about these for me (as with Grossman in general, not just these records, he was apparently a "complicated guy") but of two things I am certain - It's hard not to like this record if you don't think about it past the immediate moment; and - for all those whiners who would love nothing more than to have Sonny Rollins playing in 1984 like he did in 1957, here's your records, thank you, now stop bitching about it.

In his autobiography, Dave Liebman talks about how surprised he was when he heard Steve Grossman in the 1980s after not having seen him for a long time.  Lieb was totally surprised by Grossman's sound, how Rollins-esque it was. ... Of course, it was very different than the sound Grossman had when he and Liebman were in Elvin's band.  So it was a shock.  I didn't sense that Lieb was judging Grossman exactly.  But it threw him for a loop. 

 

[jlhoots]

Andrea Motis: Emotional Dance

[HutchFan]

Two different John Abercrombie quartets from the 1980s.

Earlier:

 

Now:

 

[jazzbo]

Albare "A Long Way"

[JSngry]

22 minutes ago, HutchFan said:

In his autobiography, Dave Liebman talks about how surprised he was when he heard Steve Grossman in the 1980s after not having seen him for a long time.  Lieb was totally surprised by Grossman's sound, how Rollins-esque it was. ... Of course, it was very different than the sound Grossman had when he and Liebman were in Elvin's band.  So it was a shock.  I didn't sense that Lieb was judging Grossman exactly.  But it threw him for a loop. 

 

What Liebman told about Grossman was that Grossman had mastered Bird by the time he was, like 15 or 16, and then got busy doing the same thing with Trane and had that down by the time he was 18. Grossman got the Miles gig first, remember, so he must have had some kind of buzz about his very early on.

Somewhere Grossman was asked about his influence on all the young tenor players (or a certain ilk) and he replied that all he was doing was playing Trane slowed down into 8th notes instead of 16th notes. I took him at his word and respect his honesty.

A really complicated person with demons of the All Time type, if even half the stories are true. That kind of a tortured soul background adds a bit of poignancy that many of the other CloneTranes don't have for me.

Have you heard the Live at Brown's private tapes? He's in a zone there, and a zone is a zone, even if it's a little "derivative". You can't fake a zone, and he was in one there, and almost here as well.

 

[HutchFan]

9 minutes ago, JSngry said:

Have you heard the Live at Brown's private tapes? He's in a zone there, and a zone is a zone, even if it's a little "derivative". You can't fake a zone, and he was in one there, and almost here as well.

I haven't.  When were those recordings made?

 

Edited January 28, 2022 by HutchFan

[JSngry]

mid-late 70s.

find your local  Tenor Geek Of A Certain Age, they should have old cassettes of it, that's how they circulated.

 

[soulpope]

2 hours ago, HutchFan said:

Andrew Cyrille - Special People (Soul Note, 1980)

Outstanding ....

[Peter Friedman]

Kind of a strange coincidence. Jim comments about those (whiners) who want to hear Sonny Rollins of 1957.

Just before reading that from Jim, I played this one that has 3 tracks of Rollins in 1957. And yes, I much prefer Rollins from that period.

[HutchFan]

Just stumbled across this interview with Liebman (on Lieb's website) that focuses on Steve Grossman.  It reiterates much of what we were saying. 

One particularly interesting passage:

JB: I was wondering if there is anything specific you can say about perhaps what Grossman could have done to enhance his reputation? I mean, he obviously kind of went over the edge with self-indulgent behavior.

DL: Well, that’s it! That is what happened. I don’t know musically if he made a conscious decision to go back into the bebop thing, particularly Sonny Rollins’ playing of the ‘50s or if it just happened. Questions of lifestyle and living in Europe for decades factor in also. It’s complicated so it seems. You’d have to ask him. He definitely had a way of playing that was unique. He was the best of all of us. We, the tenor players of that time from our generation all acknowledged that. Those of us still alive from then would still say that Steve was the one that had the most going on. It’s like if you came up in the ‘90s you had Chris Potter to contend with, super whiz kid stuff. Steve was the most innovative at the time and the most accomplished. How it ended up, or how it is now what he’s been playing the last decades has baffled almost everybody who would be part of my observation. Why and how, and what happened we don’t know. There was a feeling he went backward or stopped. On the other hand, he’s such a great player that it doesn’t matter what he plays. I mean he could play a nail and it would be great. What a guy chooses to play is his decision and it’s his prerogative to do what he wants. It’s not a judgment call to me, it’s just mystifying and baffling that he did not go further on. I don’t know what direction that could’ve been but some kind of more individual direction than what it appears he ended up playing like. I can’t tell you how he’s playing today, so who knows. Again I’m not judging him, it’s just that he was the one we were looking at and then he kind of, well not dropped the ball, but just went in what seems to have been a radical direction.

 

[HutchFan]

Now spinning:

Steve Turre - S/T (Verve, 1997)

 

[JSngry]

16 minutes ago, HutchFan said:

Just stumbled across this interview with Liebman (on Lieb's website) that focuses on Steve Grossman.  It reiterates much of what we were saying. 

One particularly interesting passage:

JB: I was wondering if there is anything specific you can say about perhaps what Grossman could have done to enhance his reputation? I mean, he obviously kind of went over the edge with self-indulgent behavior.

DL: Well, that’s it! That is what happened. I don’t know musically if he made a conscious decision to go back into the bebop thing, particularly Sonny Rollins’ playing of the ‘50s or if it just happened. Questions of lifestyle and living in Europe for decades factor in also. It’s complicated so it seems. You’d have to ask him. He definitely had a way of playing that was unique. He was the best of all of us. We, the tenor players of that time from our generation all acknowledged that. Those of us still alive from then would still say that Steve was the one that had the most going on. It’s like if you came up in the ‘90s you had Chris Potter to contend with, super whiz kid stuff. Steve was the most innovative at the time and the most accomplished. How it ended up, or how it is now what he’s been playing the last decades has baffled almost everybody who would be part of my observation. Why and how, and what happened we don’t know. There was a feeling he went backward or stopped. On the other hand, he’s such a great player that it doesn’t matter what he plays. I mean he could play a nail and it would be great. What a guy chooses to play is his decision and it’s his prerogative to do what he wants. It’s not a judgment call to me, it’s just mystifying and baffling that he did not go further on. I don’t know what direction that could’ve been but some kind of more individual direction than what it appears he ended up playing like. I can’t tell you how he’s playing today, so who knows. Again I’m not judging him, it’s just that he was the one we were looking at and then he kind of, well not dropped the ball, but just went in what seems to have been a radical direction.

 

Ok, armchair psychologist here - "it" came so easy to him - it being the "mastery" of existing styles - that coupled with the addiction issues...at some point he started asking himself the same questions that Liebman asked (and probably before anybody else started asking them) that a certain style of self-loathing set in. I mean, he probably knew that he could/should be doing more to move forward, but...why? And you know, I really can't, I'm a fraud (Coltrane at half-speed, remember), so fuck it, let me play like Sonny (and really if you can do that THAT well and inside it's what you love, hey...) and self-destruct, let nature take its course.

Totally speculative, and Liebman would rightfully call BS on it (he does that, you know). But really...what else makes sense? The wildcard being that things don't always make sense...they just don't.

All I know is that I have a soft spot for Steve Grossman that I don't have for any of those other guys, Liebman included. In my heart, not in my head. Some of those Stone Alliance albums are just SO full of pure, raw, feeling, not unlike a punk aesthetic as practiced by a certain time/place/people of a jazz bent. Infinitely more musical content, but still, just raw feeling.

[HutchFan]

You're speculation makes sense.  It's plausible.  But, like you said, at the end of the day... Who knows?   

Grossman may not have even fully understood his own motivations.

Every one of us has done stuff in our own lives without fully understanding why.  We just do it.  ... A lot of life is like that.

 

[JSngry]

2 minutes ago, HutchFan said:

Every one of us has done stuff in our own lives without fully understanding why.  We just do it.  ... A lot of life is like that.

Oh hell yeah.

From my experience (and only mine), the best path forward is to understand yourself, painful as that process can become (and remain), and then deal with that. No illusions, no lies.

And I do get the impression that that's where Grossman was at, he knew himself, and he accepted himself.

I say that because of all the horror stories you hear about the guy, you never hear the stories ending with him "apologizing", making excuses, promising to do better, or anything else to get you to think that he wanted to be anything other than he was. It seems like that was his version of Sonny's "This is what I do".

[HutchFan]

Mads Vinding Trio - The Kingdom (Where Nobody Dies) (Stunt, 1997)

 

[mikeweil]

[Peter Friedman]

[HutchFan]

2 minutes ago, Peter Friedman said:

Sublime.

 

[ghost of miles]

Ryo Fukui:

[HutchFan]

Wes Montgomery - Boss Guitar (Riverside, 1963)
with Mel Rhyne and Jimmy Cobb

 

[BillF]

5 hours ago, HutchFan said:

Wes Montgomery - Boss Guitar (Riverside, 1963)
with Mel Rhyne and Jimmy Cobb

 

 

 Wonderful!

Now playing:

 

 

 

[Referentzhunter]