johnagrandy

Where did you get that impression? Wilen came from a well-to-do family but I don't think it can be said that he squandered his inheritance. He was earning his own money when he became one of the most visible musician on the French and European jazz scene while still a teenager! Unfortunately I didn't take notes while I was reading. First I read that the huge lengthy Africa trip was financed by money he inherited, and from a purely financial standpoint that trip strikes me as insanely foolish. Then I read that in later years lenders were after him for various failed productions, which indicates to me that maybe he blew the entire inheritance in Africa. Then I read that towards the end of his life he was broke. I never heard of Wilen until this thread, and so of course I could be completely wrong. Well, who cares. He had a brilliant life.

Reading this thread (3 times !) and learning about Wilen other places on the web has been absolutely fascinating for me. But it seems there was a bit of the typical rich kid in him. Squandered his inheritance, then squandered other people's money. It's actually easy for me to forgive someone who came up in the ghetto for this type of behavior ... but I wonder about Wilen.

Ok, they did try other drugs: “He had a lot of setbacks,” Hermine says. “He’d come back from M’Boom and then they would wait for him to get better again before going back out. He’d try a medication and it would make him so sick. He’d say, ‘I can’t play, I can’t hear the music.’ It took many, many years before he found something he could work with. It turns out lithium was the only thing that worked. I kept thinking, ‘Maybe this will save his life." But that interview was 2001 and not clear over what time period Roy was treated with medication. I disagree that it was the right move to sentence Roy to years in prison. In poor neighborhoods, neighbors threatening each other with various weapons is rather common. Judges should closely look at the context and the life-history. Prison is full of the proven violent mentally ill who need to be dumbed down by lithium so that they don't kill someone. I don't believe Roy was like that.

Medication can and does work for many of those with bipolar disorder. However, from what I've learned from recent research, lithium is out of favor in the MD/PhD community. Side effects are extreme. Still commonly used in psych wards in jails, but rare to be prescribed for those with good medical insurance and a good psychiatrist. There are many other options, and usually 2-3 or more drugs are tried out before the appropriate long-term drug is found and adhered to. Not sure it's true that if Roy had consistently taken a medication that fit his biochemistry that his playing would have lost its fire. His style might have changed somewhat ... but the creativity most probably would have remained. Truly sad story. Especially for Detroit where, from what I've read, the struggle to survive is among the most difficult in America. Is it Detroit or South Philly where something like 60% are addicts ?

I have all the big band vinyls somewhere. "Road Time" I remember was my favorite. Looks like BMG is re-issuing it on CD , available Mar 2 from Amazon ........ unfortunately it's $47 for the pair of CDs ... ouch.

He was messing with me. A sly cat that Jazz Kat.

Just got it. What a vibe. The man had soul. The Soulful Mr. Timmons. Singlehandedly eliminates society's need for shrinks, couch docs, therapists, SSRIs, and benzos.

"If everything is rhythm, then you just have these rhythms on top of each other. But they're not polyrhythms or pyramids of rhythm: they're crossing rhythms." Can someone explain this ?

what? I gave him some of what I'm on.

Just 'cause I post some theory from Amazon here doesn't mean I agree with it. My knowledge of HH post-Miles 2nd 5tet begins with Head Hunters. I've heard Mwandishi but I don't own any. Anyway, the bit you posted from the Miles AB does imply that Miles saw where the music was going to have to go to a reach a mass audience but didn't hit the target and that angered him. Question is was he mad only at himself, or at others.

You're probably right. Anyway it doesn't really matter 'cause I went to those WR shows and had a great time. But I don't like to listen to WR anymore. I guess what finally did it for me on the fusion side was all that thumb-popping bass. That's when I went pure acoustic for years and years. BTW, I'm not talking about anything approx up to date of Miles' retirement.

Does anyone have this one : Bobby Hutcherson "Cirrus" Woody Shaw, Harold Land, Emanuel Boyd, Bill Henderson, Ray Drummond, Larry Hancock and Kenneth Nash, Studio in Los Angeles 4/17/1974 -- 4/18/1974 This would hopefully be Wood on the top of his game.

akanalog, right here right now vs nostalgia definitely plays a role ... but maybe it's more complex. Somebody earlier up said it all ended up getting bogged down in chops. That's part of what I think. Late 60s early 70s ... plugging-in had a compelling, no, more than a compelling, an irresistable motivation. 'Cause maybe you could say something that you hadn't been able to say before. The attraction of the unknown. A new world. Today, so much time has passed. Almost 4 decades. The younger musicians I like seem to have come up not feeling compelled to amass enormous chops. Some of them have got them anyway. But primarily what they've done is absorb and internalize a vast amount of music from many genres and eras and world regions and are adding interesting angles and dimensions to the best of what's come before. It's this melding that's producing the innovation today. That's today's new world. Another little piece: almost everyone looks to have discarded the lame synth sounds. Anyone with any talent on the electic side has raw sound as a central focus.

"This thread" misunderstands Miles' approach to music ? Meaning everyone on this thread ? You might want to re-read the 1st post (mine). It's a quote verbatim from an Amazon.com review (I left out the reviewer's name, but obviously it can be searched for). I thought what he had to say was thought-provoking ...

I still end up buying and listening to a lot of 70s 80s fusion. But I realized it's a relative waste of my time and money. The ratio of crappy "feel good" music in that period is extreme. Yeah , the early days were great: Head Hunters, Mahavishnu, Lifetime, every legit and bootleg electric session Miles ever put together ... Miles in that timeframe was scary. Seriously, that music scares the shit out of me. And that's a good thing. Today, there is so much fascinating plugged-in improv (the best tends towards a mix of electric & acoustic instruments) that it almost demotes Weather Report, Corea, Brecker Brothers, Ponty, whomever, to the minor leagues. A lot of what WR did was pretentious. I was at so many of those shows, but you have to come to terms with not letting nostalgia guide your tastes. It's a relative waste of time & money chasing down those old fusion albums when you have this astounding modern alternative electric scene ... like Scott Amendola's "Believe". You can actually hear almost 1/2 of that one for free: http://jazztimes.com/columns_and_features/..._mp3s/index.cfm "Oladipo" 's mind blowing guitar improvs courtesy of Nels Cline & Jeff Parker : http://jazztimes.com/columns_and_features/...ew.cfm?track=37 Other trax: http://jazztimes.com/columns_and_features/...ew.cfm?track=36 http://jazztimes.com/columns_and_features/...ew.cfm?track=38 http://jazztimes.com/columns_and_features/...ew.cfm?track=39

http://www.stonesthrow.com/news/shadesofblue/tracks.html I own next to none of this stuff, but I've been to some ropeadope events. Maybe they're thinking like this : "I love jazz, I love certain artists, certain albums, and I want to deliver some of that history to an audience who probably isn't going to listen to it otherwise ... but I've got something topical to say, something political, I want to use rap to deliver the message, and I want it to be danceable." Apparently Madlib does play all the instruments on YNQ : http://www.stonesthrow.com/madlib/ No question it's a trend. The next ropeadope travelling event includes Christian McBride and dj logic ... don't know if they will play together or not. WHAT IS JAZZ? it's on - the 2006 what is jazz? tour featuring the christian mcbride band, charlie hunter trio, dj logic and bobby previte launching in april and coming to a town near you this april.

I have lots of Larry Young , that counts ... right ? ... and how 'bout Robert Walter ? You guys should check this cat out ! BTW, anyone know what Anthony Coleman is up to these days ?

Ok, I just got the RTE Olympia May 13 1961 2 CD set ( the Laserlight version looked incomplete ) , and it does indeed have a Tunisia on it. CD1 1. The Summit 2. Yama 3. Close Your Eyes 4. Dat Dere 5. Round About Midnight 6. So Tired 7. My Funny Valentine CD2 1. It's Only A Paper Moon 2. Noise In The Attic 3. Moanin' 4. I Didn't Know What Time It Was 5. Blues March 6. Night In Tunisia So, there are at least two live Lee recordings of Tunisia relatively easily available. And two in the studio. I haven't gotten any further into the discography than that .. ... but master trumpet transcriber Jeff Helgesen says he might find time to transcribe all the versions that I'm send them to him as I get ahold of them. That would be a trip.

Which JS recording should I buy first ? ( Assuming I have none, which is a true assumption. )

Anybody have Head Hunters "Evolution Revolution" from 2003 ? No Herbie, but many of the original Head Hunters members ... which is kindof interesting because "Survival of the Fittest" 30 years before was also Herbie-less (although he produced it). I'm trying to figure if these are worth buying.

On the strength of Randy's very fine straightahead session "In The Idiom", I'm thinking of picking up "Live at Sweet Basil" ? Anyone have this one ... ?

From an Amazon review ........ thought provoking: "Herbie Hancock owes much of this album's success to Miles Davis, because he took Miles' vision of a polyrhythmic union of jazz, funk and rock and created an extremely accessible, million-selling record. Was that a good thing? Did the student become the master, or did he in fact soil the master? Depends on how you like your rock/jazz/funk. Back in 1968 and 1969, Miles saw where music was heading, and as usual he was at the forefront of it all. He was hanging out with Jimi Hendrix, while at the same time soaking in the music of James Brown and Sly and the Family Stone. Sly in particular intrigued both Miles and Hancock, who had been a part of Miles' classic sixties quintet along with Ron Carter, Wayne Shorter, and the great Tony Williams. One of the great jazz pianists of all time, Hancock watched as Miles gradually stretched the quintet as far as it could go musically, then began to add electric instruments in an attempt to add a heavier, more rock/funk element to his music. Miles gradually changed his lineup to fulfill this vision, adding musicians like Chick Corea and John McLaughlin who played electric piano and guitar, respectively. He plugged in Herbie's piano and his own trumpet, just to see what kind of sounds he could make: The results were stunning: In a few short years, he churned out masterpieces such as Miles In The Sky, Filles de Kilimanjaro, In A Silent Way, Bitches Brew, and Jack Johnson -- and he was just getting warmed up. He was planning his crowning glory, the one album that would get his music across to a younger group of fans currently grooving to people like Sly, James Brown, George Clinton, and Curtis Mayfield, and place himself (and therefore much of jazz) firmly in that camp. That album was On The Corner. I am not here to say that On The Corner is better than Headhunters. In fact, I would call On The Corner a noble failure. Released in 1972, On The Corner was a dense, swirling mudslide of grooves that was roundly rejected by all audiences. Not only was it a commercial flop, On The Corner was savaged by jazz purists and rock critics alike. The great Lester Bangs called On The Corner "a form of suicide, or at least an artistically perverse act of the highest order." But one man was watching, and his name was Herbie Hancock. Released one year later, in 1973, Headhunters should be called "On The Corner Lite", or "On The Corner And Accessible". Headhunters also became the best-selling jazz LP of all time during that year. Think Miles was upset about that? Well, he was -- so much so that he put down his trumpet not long after -- and didn't pick it up again for years and years. Again, this is not to bash Headhunters. Hancock saw what Miles wanted to do, and quite frankly did it correctly. "

I'd rather check it out at one of those travelling ropeadope events where you hear a pocketful of artists all at once. But isn't Yesterday's New Quintet really Madlib, Madlib, Madlib, Madlib, and Madlib ? ... so I guess I gotta buy the product to check it out.

Dated 1/11/2006 , but I'm pretty sure this just recently showed up on Mike's website ('cause I check it often) : January 11, 2006 - Michael was the recipient of an experimental "haplo" (half matching) blood stem cell transplant in Minneapolis. His daughter was the donor. While Michael is seriously ill, every day out of the hospital is encouraging. We are hopeful, but there is a long and difficult road ahead. There will be various future donor drive-type activities in which we could use your assistance and support. If you're interested, just send an e-mail to info@michaelbrecker.com and in the subject line write "I want to help".