king ubu

There's plenty to enjoy, both old and new (maybe less new, that may be true, I don't know enough of ECMs catalogue to really tell). Anyway, with all the BN fetishism going on, there's plenty of boring BN stuff, too, and many might feel the older the label got, the lesser the quality/freshness of their releases... look at all the mediocre stuff from the late 60s...

Amusing little discussion here... I agree about the sentiment of ECM "getting old" and one being able to generally notice that, but I also am in that camp who thinks there's enough good new stuff coming out on ECM - Rava, Balke, Tord Gustavsen, Trygve Seim. DeJohnette and the AEC made several albums for ECM, I don't think this has to turn into yet another one of those dreadful skin colour-specific threads.

Hm, for some reason I always preferred that one... can't say why - maybe just becasue I got it first? And that short bass solo on "Knock on Wood" is killer stuff!

yup, me too... but what do we know, we're all innocent faggotts, I guess... Interesting Brownie, how although we are from vastly different parts of the world, I too had (have) a serious "thing" for Susan Harrison. When this movie was released in Cape Town in 1957, after a great deal of anticipatory publicity in Metronome and Downbeat regarding the Chico Hamilton Quintet contribution, I saw it three times that first week. I now teach this movie every year as a personal indulgence in my "Social Aspects Of Film" class, and I always confess to the class about my fixation on her. (Most of the males in the class just don't get it ... the females recognize her vulnerability, though). It is a real mystery what happened to her ... she just disappeared from the Hollywood scene after doing some television roles. She probably married an insurance salesman, and moved to the Valley, where she is now a grandmother and the general secretary of the local John Birch Society. This is a very rich film for social and cultural analysis of the period ... from prevailing sexual mores to the blacklist and communism (remember J.J. asks the Marty Milner character if he is a "red'?) ... and we must not forget that director Barry Levinson (who is our age) offers a wonderful homage to the film in his great film DINER ... where one character repeats large sections of dialog from TSSOS. The fiilm captures a lost world of American fifties culture (perhaps peculiar to Boadway/New York), and requires a great deal of background explanation for today's students. Also, it is very interesting that it was made by a Scotsman, Alexander McKendrick ... perhaps it required someone from outside of the culture to capture it so precisely, much like John Schlesinger did later with MIDNIGHT COWBOY. That post makes me want to see the film again soon! It's really a great one!

MG, check out Maceo's "*Soundtrack" (it looks untitled on the cover) - I always preferred that one over the Planet Groove one. They do some old favourites (Knock on Wood, and the usual J.B. stuff - of course Wesley and Pee Wee Ellis are there, Larry Goldings is on organ).

The two Cobblestone dates were reissued on Muse and 32 Jazz. These are definitely worth looking for! (The 32 Jazz release paired them on one disc!)

Elton Dean and rostasi, or what's this thread about again?

Oh, and the West Coast 3CD set (now singly available as VMEs, I think, but I'm not sure if all of it is out in that form) is much better than the reviews I remember reading back when it came out! Lou Levy!

Quite a few of these have been published... I used them to practice earlier... was quite interesting to find out more about his pet licks and all... he's not the most inventive soloist to troll on earth, it's his sound and soul that makes him special, his phrasing and bending etc. - you don't get that on transcriptions, of course!

I'm not leaning that much towards acid jazz today... I used to like it much more, but that's where I got into jazz, starting out with funk, both old-school and new stuff (Crusaders, Larry Graham, Sly Stone, Prince, Maceo etc.). Will play "Swing Low Sweet Cadillac" again to see how I like it nowadays!

Too right, how often have I tried listening to a new album in "the wrong mood" and got too little out of it. Revisiting reveals a much better session than first spin. ... Now that's a different story altogether, reaching out for the right thing at the wrong time or vice-versa! Happens quite often of late, but that's likely because too much new stuff has piled up over the last 2 years or so...

don't know it long enough to really say something but at the moment i really really like that 1968 Reunion Big Band MPS album not to forget the subject of the thread: Dizzy Gillespie - Digital in Montreux I got the Berlin one on your recommendation, it's good, but it's too short... and there are too many fine musicians that don't get heard in solo! I generally like the live material more than the studio stuff with Diz, that applies to his group with James Moody, the Gillespiana stuff with Leo Wright, as well as to the 1957 big band. Again, let me point out that I have all this stuff on CD and like it - it just to me never really lives up to my expectations, it's like it all should have been a notch better...

derailing the thread for a second... I tend to think of Cadena as a Savoy producer, mainly (and a helluva fine composer, ha ha ha)... and your Prestige list misses Don Schlitten who did the books of Booger and other fine things (he too worked for other labels, and I think he took some photos as well).

I'm sure timing is crucial, but I wanted to point out that the moment I got into jazz didn't keep me from enjoying Granz' 50s retro stuff... I still don't get these, really: - Diz & Getz - Getz & J.J. at the Opera House - the one with Dizzy, Getz & Stitt But I quite enjoy the Dizzy/Rollins/Stitt one, which happens to be the last one of those that I got... (a case where preferences did change after I came to know another similarly conceived album) Also I feel like most of the Dizzy albums now in the Mosaic don't live up to my expectations (Something Old, Something New, Electrifying Evening, also the Impulse Swing Low one), which is why I've not yet been trying to find a reasonably prized Euro/Universal edition of that Mosaic... (but I know I'll get it, eventually). I think Dizzy may be a case in point... is there any album of his that really lives up to the expectations, aside from his sides with Bird, and say the Massey Hall and Town Hall discs, and his own early big band dates for Savoy/RCA/etc? I really don't know... I mean I can hear why he's so great and I enjoy his playing, but there's no album I've heard yet that I really think is great. My favourite (as an album) might be, hold tight, the stoopid latin jazz album, "Jambo Caribe" - it's just great stoopid fun from beginning to end!

Just found this list over here: http://www.docdosco.com/edwards.html Pretty impressive!

Sad news! Many fine photos of his are in the booklet of the Dolphy Complete Prestige box, too... I think that's where I first noted he did some photos, too - before I only was aware of him as a producer/session supervisor. The cover of Coltrane's debut album is terrific!

Yes, a short but very fine one!

"Soulville." And I agree, was disappointed when I got it at the time it came out. Just compare it to the way Webster sounds on Harry Edison's "Sweets," from about the same time. Uh oh... I am planning to order Soulville and Meets Oscar Peterson from yourmusic -- should I avoid? Guy Meets OP is the better date and I wouldn't avoid either. I am with Chuck on this I guess, I like them both very much and don't prefer either one - but I guess I just like Ben Webster. Get both of them, both are fine, in fact "Meets OP" is more than fine, one of my favourite Webster albums! Remember, it's just the disappointed expectations this thread is about, not about an album actually being bad (at least I didn't want to say any of the ones I listed were bad, they merely did not meet my personnal expectations). You know, Coleman Hawkins Encounters Ben Webster was the first of these Granz retro thingies I heard, probably among my first 25 or so jazz CDs (and I knew it from the library before). I still love that one very, very much "La Rosita", "Prisoner of Love"... what they do there is likely a lost art by now and I feel it has to be treasured! So "Soulville" not meeting my expectations has nothing to do with when I came to jazz (early to mid 90s, I was born at the very end of the 70s), but rather that - similar to "Side by Side" vs. "Back to Back" - the "place" for such an album as "Soulville" had already been occupied for a long time by "Encounters" (I also prefer that one over "Genius of Coleman Hawkins" and "Webster Meets O.P.", btw), and I didn't feel like having to change my perception in this case...

Sorry, I won't be on this gig. I'm not part of Aynur's touring band right now, maybe later again. These people are more and more thinking project-like - same with Mikail Aslan's band who has some real nice Benelux gigs coming up in June but is somewhat losing the patience to go through the sometimes difficult and time-consuming process of working with non-kurdish musicians. There goes the world music fusion .... pretty frustrating: he has things im his head, but not the will to explain them or write them down. I have to see what the future brings. p.s. got your SMS but was busy at that time. As soon as I'm back online at home I will write more. Oh, sorry to hear these bad news! What would you think, is the Aynur concert worth going still? What kind of music does she play? The info in the Moods programme is pretty successful in not telling anything particular - probably they don't know, either... No problem about the SMS, I just saw the new programme right then and thought I'd write...

I only have two of those Monks so far, still missing one... I think the main problem is not that it's all bad - rather the inconsistency is a bit bothersome.

I love "Back to back", too. But I always thought that "Side by side" wouldn't be nearly as good, so I never bothered with it. Looks like I may have been right. MG Well, it's not bad - how could it be, with that fantastic line-up?! But my expectations where set-up by my love for "Back to Back": first I had a tape copy of hte CD from the school library, after noticing that the transcribed Hodges Basin Street solo in my first jazz saxophone book was from that album... then I got an LP - not original, I guess - and then finally the VME release, and I always loved it, from beginning to end. So it was virtually impossible for "Side by Side" to compete with "Back to Back"... Oh - sacrilege - another group of albums that never hold up for me (adding them to Young's "Into Somethin'"): Grant Green's "Talkin' About", "Idle Moments" and the third one... I got them after having bought probably 8-10 other Green discs, and I never could understand all the fuss about those... I still enjoy the one with Quebec, the Clark Quartets, the Lateef one, Idle Moments, Solid, and the gospel album, to the Green-Young-Elvin ones (although I *love* Elvin!)

Oh, and am I going to hear mikeweil with Aynur in Zurich on February 20?

Chuck has stated somewhere that Black Lion in its LP days was a fine label, but any CD reissue series have been crappy. I can't confirm the former, but the later seems to be true, generally... but then you can find some very fine music on those discs and it might be the only option to get it without having to look up and down for used vinyl.

haven't gone through the whole thread, but here are some ok or even good ones that didn't live up the expectations: - Jimmy Smith "Cool Blues" - probably each Freddie Hubbard I heard (Hub-Tones, Breaking Point, Goin' Up, Open Sesame - well that one's a bit better, and Ready for Freddie fine, I think) - the Scofield albums with Lovano on Blue Note - Larry Young "Into Something" - Jason Moran - the one with Sam Rivers, well, actually maybe all four of his first BNs - Dave Holland - the big band album (and likely almost any other, except for the one with Rivers and Braxton which I still enjoy) - Hodges/Ellington "Side by Side" (yeah, I love "Back to Back" that much and knew it long before, it was quite a safe let-down, sorry) - Ben Webster - the famous one with OP trio/Ellis, what's it called again? - Hank Mobley - the pink one everyone goes apeshit (I'm still trying on that one, though, but I enjoy "Soul Station", "No Room for Squares", "The Turnaround" and most of the 50s Mosaic much more, sorry) - Cannonball Adderley "Jazz Workshop Revisited", "In New York" (I love the sextet, but these just don't do it for me so far - also still trying with these two)

I heard a needle drop "review copy" of "Other Afternoons" on the way to work - first time I heard this album, and WOW it rocks! Lyons is one of the true masters, his command of the alto is totally stunning, I'm more and more impressed by his playing! Will have to look for his albums eventually (I have "Jump Up" and the box so far, plus lots of stuff with Cecil, of course).