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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 1, 2015 14:02:47 GMT
hmmm... yes doom metal is an acquired taste, i admit. here's what i ended up listening to yesterday after that 7":
it takes awhile to get going, as the whole point of the genre is long-form builds using layering, but man i love it.
i rather enjoy ted curson, but i know very little about him. i like him a lot on "charles mingus presents charles mingus". is "tears for dolphy" a good start?
blue haze is great, and i highly, highly suggest interstellar space. you might be surprised how much you like it. i know i was.
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Post by mrfancy on Mar 1, 2015 18:25:11 GMT
My week listening has been running closer to GTF's weekend playlist than Alun's, and my fortunes picking at local record shops for this week have been aping GTF's as well.
First up is the earliest Jimmy Smith recording i know of, BN1512, first pressing, frame cover, flat edge, etc. This is a particularly significant one for me because it is the first 12" LP of newly recorded studio material in the Blue Note catalog (the prior LPs consisted of combined 10" and 78s or the two Jazz Messengers live titles), as well as Smith's first recording with the label. The wax looked rough but after cleaning the playback was shockingly good. Smith's sound alternates from calliope, to churchy, to raw and rocking. Thornel Schwartz on guitar is quite a revelation. I have heard Schwartz before on other records, but he really stands out on this one--rocking comping, and some pretty bold soloing. For now it has surpassed Back At The Chicken Shack as my favorite Jimmy Smith.
Next are a trio of Duke Pearson records--two stereo pressings on Atlantic, and a King Blue Note. Prairie Dog and Honeybuns, both on Atlantic are superb music, and beautifully recorded--these have quickly have become my new favorite Duke Pearson records. The third is Tender Feelins, pristine Japanese vinyl from King. I have not played this one as much because the others are so complex, varied and engaging.
Then there is a first pressing on Savoy: The Jazz Message of Hank Mobley. The record has a weird inward warp which makes the first half of the first songs unplayable on my Thorens TD150, (but my trusty AR manages to play the bit where the Thorens cannot). Really great record. Mobley's early velvety soulful playing sublime on that first side, and British Lenny Tristano protege Ronny Ball really tears it up . I was initially disappointed to to discover no Hank on side 2, but John LaPorta's alto is excellent, and plays beautifully with Horace Silver, who also only appears on the B side. Aside from the split cover and odd warp, the vinyl very clean--plays and sounds fabulous (even though I have to play the first songs of each side on the AR then move the wax to the Thorens).
Two from Lem Winchester--Lem's Beat on New Jazz and With Feeling on Moodsville. You all probably know Lem was a policeman turned vibes player (and seems most of his record titles pun to this fact). Lem's short career came to an abrupt end when he shot himself while goofing around with an unfamiliar handgun. The one on Moodsville is very very mellow, despite the presence of Roy Haynes--in fact he is so low key, I I could barely tell it was him, despite the liner notes. The one on New Jazz has Oliver Nelson, who also did the charts, and it is a madly swinging record, and Nelson sounds great. Both deep groove first pressing, and play perfectly despite one suspect scuff one each.
Then I found a first Riverside Stereo pressing of Chet Baker plays Lerner & Loewe--stone cold mint wax, jacket with a bit of rubbing, in-tact wax paper innards. This recording is great but has loads of reverb, and mellow, but Chet Baker's playing is fabulous. Great additions to the band are Bill Evans and Pepper Adams who get some good solos (though I craved more more more from them). This one is an excellent end of the evening listen.
Finally two by Horace Parlan. We Three on Blue Note --a King pressing, and Frankly Speaking on Steeplechase, so named for the presence of Franks Strozier and Foster. The first is a trio setting, groovy and earthy/funky, and the second a quintet in a hard bop, or post bop thing. Frank Storzier is very familiar to me, though I think this is the latest I have heard him play, recored in 1977. His work on Veejay and Jazzland was my intro to Strozier, His work on this record is every bit as good as that earlier stuff. And it seems to be really hard to go wrong with Horace Parlan.
If prowling the local shops consistently yielded treasures like these, I turn my back on ebay. (I am so weary of returning overgraded vinyl, or renegotiating with lazy or deceptive ebay vinyl peddlers. And store finds are much more thrilling and economical.)
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Post by dottorjazz on Mar 1, 2015 20:53:07 GMT
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Post by mrfancy on Mar 1, 2015 21:20:42 GMT
today no time for listening but another great satisfaction from my kid Leo, winner again in a regional tournament. Fine looking boy--congratulations dottorjazz. Is Leo a jazz fan?
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 1, 2015 22:01:52 GMT
i rather enjoy ted curson, but i know very little about him. i like him a lot on "charles mingus presents charles mingus". is "tears for dolphy" a good start? blue haze is great, and i highly, highly suggest interstellar space. you might be surprised how much you like it. i know i was. ---------------------------------------------------------------- I think TEARS may well be the record Curson is known most for. There Re good enough and cheap enough 80s pressings around, so it needn't break the bank. I think you would like it. Finally tonight, SUNRISE by the Masabumi Kikuchi Trio on ECM. Now this is the third time I have tried to listen to this CD and the first time I have managed to play it all the way through -- this time with great enjoyment. The problem is Kikuchi's 'vocalising'. Now I am no fan of Jarrett's vocalising, and Kikuchi's is if anything worse, the only difference being that KJ's is a falsetto screech and Kikuchi's a sort of low pitched growl. On the positive side, SUNRISE also features Paul Motion in excellent form -- but it one of the last things, perhaps the last, that PM recorded. Indeed, he didn't live to see its release.
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 2, 2015 15:35:51 GMT
alun, i will check it out! thanks!
dott: it is always enjoyable to see younger folks than i excelling at/enjoying a hobby. i hope he enjoys ping-pong the way we enjoy jazz! i find ping-pong to be impossibly frustrating. the light touch required is one i do not possess. so props to leo!
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Post by dottorjazz on Mar 3, 2015 17:27:25 GMT
back to Jazz (next Table Tennis important tournament in only 4 days! and very far from home). I don't know why but Jazz after 1969-70 barely moves me. maybe because I've not listened to ALL recorded from 50's and 60's yet? those two decades are gold for me, let's say gold and all. or because I can't find TIME to? when 70's and later music comes to my ear I can't be satisfied. already heard? me too old? I give up. alun: my kids don't look interested in Jazz, until now: they're listening to shit, but they are 12 and 13. I do hope they'll change up their minds, musically speaking. if not my collection will be spread to interested people. decades to collect and then gone I won't even know where. sad. GTF: I've got all your 5 last friday records: our interests look the same. NOT interested in the sixth. mrfancy: do dig Lem Winchester, interesting proposal for those who don't know him. I do not have any of the vinyl you talk about, all in CD, alas. for those interested in Ted Curson, his rarest record comes on the obscure label Old Town. first pressing should be on blue vinyl but there's a black vinyl edition too. Eric Dolphy plays on two tracks.
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Post by mrfancy on Mar 3, 2015 18:30:16 GMT
back to Jazz (next Table Tennis important tournament in only 4 days! and very far from home). I don't know why but Jazz after 1969-70 barely moves me. maybe because I've not listened to ALL recorded from 50's and 60's yet? those two decades are gold for me, let's say gold and all. or because I can't find TIME to? when 70's and later music comes to my ear I can't be satisfied. already heard? me too old? I give up. alun: my kids don't look interested in Jazz, until now: they're listening to shit, but they are 12 and 13. I do hope they'll change up their minds, musically speaking. if not my collection will be spread to interested people. decades to collect and then gone I won't even know where. sad. GTF: I've got all your 5 last friday records: our interests look the same. NOT interested in the sixth. mrfancy: do dig Lem Winchester, interesting proposal for those who don't know him. I do not have any of the vinyl you talk about, all in CD, alas. for those interested in Ted Curson, his rarest record comes on the obscure label Old Town. first pressing should be on blue vinyl but there's a black vinyl edition too. Eric Dolphy plays on two tracks. I only know Curson's work with Mingus and the one with Shepp--never seen nor heard his own bands. I would dearly love to blunder onto that Old Town labeled one. And I would happily settle for black vinyl. Super-curious about the two tracks with Dolphy.
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Post by dottorjazz on Mar 3, 2015 18:34:55 GMT
dottor: i have the first non-private press of mingus at monterey, and have often considered buying the white cover version you display which was mingus' original private press. how is the sound quality? re Music written for Monterey, the sound is pretty good, much better then Mingus at Monterey. there's a reissue of this rare record, on East Coasting, that has an unedited EP from the Monterey concert: They trespass the land of the sacred Sioux, part 1 and 2 this track was performed also at UCLA concert (music written for).
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 4, 2015 15:39:32 GMT
haha, yes dott, or tastes seem to be very similar within JAZZ. but i grew up during the second golden age of hardcore and punk, and the influence was impossible to avoid. but i'd say only 1/5 of my vinyl collection is non-jazz. i don't really feel the need to listen to much non-jazz on vinyl.
as for your youngsters' listening: there isn't a single thing from when i was 12 or 13 that I still care to listen to EVER. so who knows. but it takes all kinds. i do not worry about my future kids' musical tastes. they will be their own people.
oh, that EP looks neat! I must check it out!
listening today on vinyl:
1) Herbie Harper Sextet on Mode (#100) 2) Bud Shank and Three Trombones EP on Pacific Jazz 3) Charlie Parker EP on Clef (the number escapes me at the moment) 4) Archie Shepp - "On This Night" again (I couldn't resist) 5) Oliver Nelson - "The Kennedy Dream" this is an often maligned record but I must admit I rather enjoy it, and the use of voice samples in the music anticipates the post-rock and punk movements of the early 2000's, which is cool to see in retrospect.
And now I fear I must go pick up the Chinese food I have ordered for lunch, eat it, and go teach some math. I am supposed to hear if I got into grad school today, so there will definitely be a listening party of "The Immortal Charlie Parker" with various fine spirits later if that happens.
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Post by dottorjazz on Mar 5, 2015 15:58:12 GMT
Super-curious about the two tracks with Dolphy. Dolphy plays flute on both tracks, no solo. on The Things We Did Last Summer and Bali-H'ai he plays counterpoint to Curson's lead. when I got this record I was disappointed by the absence of Dolphy's solos but the recording is worth for Curson's playing, really good. anyway it's not Eric's date... if your interest is for the reedman only, don't look after it but if you would like to know a good music from a seldom recorded trumpeter, go man!
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Post by dottorjazz on Mar 5, 2015 16:08:10 GMT
haha, yes dott, or tastes seem to be very similar within JAZZ. once again! I've got four out of five. ok, I admit: I've never been tickled by that Impulse and never heard the music on. actually, reading your brief comment, my interest remains sleepy. far from me to force my kids to listen to my music, they only are exposed when at home. I do hope that, growing up, they will be caught up as I've been in my teens.
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 5, 2015 18:40:50 GMT
haha, yes dott, or tastes seem to be very similar within JAZZ. once again! I've got four out of five. ok, I admit: I've never been tickled by that Impulse and never heard the music on. actually, reading your brief comment, my interest remains sleepy. far from me to force my kids to listen to my music, they only are exposed when at home. I do hope that, growing up, they will be caught up as I've been in my teens. yes, i have noticed in my short time in this online community that a lot of big jazz fans are very resistant to relating jazz to other genres. but we are kindred spirits, you and i. the album is extremely cheap as an original. mine was 8$ in NM condition, so it isn't a huge risk. but the music is really typical oliver nelson, but with snippets of kennedy's speeches thrown in. i'll admit, it is one of the more mocked impulse offerings.
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Post by alunsevern on Mar 7, 2015 10:29:09 GMT
Saturday 7th March. Today (and yesterday evening) is a red letter day. I am listening as I type to the new Music Matters 33 pressing of. Dolphy's OUT TO LUNCH! and last night to the new MAIDEN VOYAGE, Herbie Hancock. My usual supplier had these for GBP32.00 each -- expensive, at least to me, and the upper end of what I would consider paying for a record, but as an occasional treat, unbeatable.
The Dolphy. Well, I have never heard nor am likely to hear an original, but let me say that hearing this -- after my late-90s EMI French reissue -- is like having the veils removed from one's ears. It sounds superb. I'm not qualified to try and offer a comprehensive analysis of the sound, but here's some of t he things I notice as I listen on Beyerdynamic headphones. Extraordinary clarity and presence. Williams' percussion, for example -- where a sound or a percussive strike is made up of more than one element, you can hear the layers of sound. This is especially evident in the measured intro to Hat and Beard, where very quietly he strikes the high hat almost simultaneously with something else: both sounds are evident. The woody, textured human sound of Dolphy on bass clarinet -- thrilling under any circumstances -- seems revealed in a way I have never quite heard before.
Maiden Voyage -- first and foremost on this I hear what others have commented on: a blanket has been removed from Hancock's piano, restoring it to its rightful central role in the recording. It's quite glorious.
Pressing, production,packaging are all as one would hope and expect.
Here are two high points in the Blue Note catalogue -- and to my mind LUNCH reached heights that virtually no other BN recording did -- and it is difficult to imagine that one will ever hear them any better than this on vinyl.
Then a side of Blue Saxophones, AKA Coleman Hawkins Meets Ben Webster, my copy on the World Record Club series, from, I imagine, the late-60s. To my mind there are records that offer better -- whether of Hawk or Ben. Besides, my wife was humming along -- always a sign that the music is too immediately tuneful. I was able to put paid to that by switching to Anthony Braxton's Four Compositions (Quartet) 1983 on Black Saint -- his great 80s quartet with George Lewis on trombone.
And then on to Herbie Hancock's THE PRISONER. This is a record that I previously only had a ripped CD of and had never really taken to, but since finding a Blue Note/Liberty/UA -- which I think is its original pressing: others can probably advise more accurately -- it is an LP that has really grown on me. A sort of pre-fusion fusion record. Cook and Morton always describe the playing of Hancock's line-ups at this time as 'slithery', and that is exactly the right word.
I've recently been listening to tenor Mark Turner (with the Billy Hart Quartet on ONE IS THE OTHER) and finding him enigmatic and searching, a little Wayne Shorterish in the enigmatic logic of his playing, and I forgot that I have him paired with Enrico Rava on the terrific NEW YORK DAYS from 2009, playing now in the double vinyl ECM package, and extremely enjoyable it is too. But Turner also reminds me of someone else too, and I wish I could put my finger on who it is. Is it Iain Ballamy?
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Post by gregorythefish on Mar 7, 2015 15:59:59 GMT
I love out to lunch, and am also unlikely to ever score an original. that record was probably one of the first jazz albums i ever heard, on CD of course, when i was just starting college. i decided to try to enjoy some of the music and spontaneously grabbed that and a few others at a local shop for dirt cheap, and have been hooked ever since.
no vinyl escapades for me this weekend as i've been out being courted by a math department i would very much like to join. exciting, but alas no time for jazz. time for record shopping, though!
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