Bill Frisell

[AllenLowe]

Larry, are you saying I'm predictable? Well, my wife feels the same way...

Paul, please don't act so superior, if I told you you were a douche and a phony and associated with people who only associated with you for the money, attacked you professionally as well, etc etc, well, than, I think you might respond, unless you were completely comatose or catatonic. It's natural, there's nothing wrong with it, and it's appropriate.

Edited November 21, 2005 by AllenLowe

[Christiern]

Where does that leave me?

In Chicago, seeing things more clearly than most here.

[Nate Dorward]

Allen--wow, you liked the Frisell/Holland/Jones album? I heard a few tracks off that one ("Moon River" & an original) & hated them so much I've avoided it ever since. It struck me as about as irksome a mismatch as the duo album with Fred Hersch, another one I didn't get at all.

Frisell I run hot & cold on, but he was doing pretty interesting stuff up to about the mid-1990s when things went wrong circa Nashville. I liked East/West, mostly (the last few tracks on the Vanguard session are disappointing--Frisell's probably got a great "Crazy" in him but not this time). Virtually everything he did with Zorn is worth checking out, & with Paul Motian. I like "After the Requiem" with Gavin Bryars, too, though it's not jazz. Of the albums of his I've heard, Have a Little Faith & This Land have been the best, though I haven't heard the ECMs. Live with the trio is musically excellent, though the sound is poor (but the version of "Strange Meeting", an original from his Power Tools days, is one of the most moving things I've heard him do). -- He's always worth seeing live.

Re: Nels Cline, I don't know his work enough to wade into this particular spat--I saw him once with the Red Headed Stranger group & with the Singers, it was OK, but I actually enjoyed Carla B's rundown of a tune of her own far more than the Willie Nelson covers--but will just say that the Clineophiles will probably enjoy his work on ROVA's Electric Ascension, their recent update of the Coltrane classic. It's a tremendous record.

[AllenLowe]

hey Nate, don't be so surprised - yeah, I do like that CD, I think it's easy to mistake Frisell's great musical patience and almost slow-motion Americana for dullness - he does walk that line sometimes, but I find it works for me, though I do agree with you about the earlier stuff and wonder if they were trying to push him a little bit into the middle-of-the-road for a time. His approach is much different than mine; I tend to like my guitarists (and my own guitar) to sound less digital, more connected to strings and tubes, but he is one of the few that I like who have managed to digitize the guitar's sound and touch.

[AllenLowe]

and by the way - and here it is just possible that I agree with Clem - Ribot is probably my favorite contemporary guitarist. Saw him solo about 2 years ago and it was brilliant-

[neveronfriday]

Fun thread.

Thanks for bringing some life to the party again.

[Guy Berger]

Where does that leave me?

In Chicago, seeing things more clearly than most here.

←

I'm digging the EYE, Chris.

Guy

[AllenLowe]

Clem, I would respond but I've been instructed by everyone here to use my ignore function - I've got it set so it filters out every other word in your posts - funny thing is, you make more sense that way -

[AllenLowe]

just re-did the ignore - here's how Clem's post reads to me now:

"jesus... Lowe's untypically asinine post from this ex-musician; (I'm a) half student of character & rhetoric, I really have no clear ideas I (need) therapy, however-- got SERIOUS issues & a bitter streak T-H-I-S wide. i've said dopey stuff in life like "douche" (I can't) write or read

yes, i fake it all. i'm a fuck

Lowe's career as musician & writer, rises on its own accord. it's amazing (and) real"

you guys were right - I feel MUCH better -

Edited November 21, 2005 by AllenLowe

[AllenLowe]

"welcome to the party, bro'-- pls share with us your considered opinion more often.

i (have) cooties

you (are) actually great repeatedly,

explain to us oh great musician, all yr musical arguments

(your organ is) illustrious & quite long, MUSICAL genius"

[Jim Alfredson]

Look, if this is going to turn into some little bitchfest between you two, I'm going to close this thread. Or better yet, just erase both your posts from this thread and ban you both to the thread on Supertramp.

[AllenLowe]

I'm through, Jim -

[Aggie87]

Sooooooo....

Has anybody else picked up "Richter 858" yet? For those who didn't care for Frisell's Americana turn, this is quite different. I don't think there's been anything else quite like it in his catalog, either. Originally a limited (and expensive - $250) edition only available with a book of Gerhard Richter's paintings, it is now available as a normal standalone disc.

...and I need to check out that Power Tools thing. Sounds interesting!

[7/4]

Sooooooo....

Has anybody else picked up "Richter 858" yet?  For those who didn't care for Frisell's Americana turn, this is quite different.  I don't think there's been anything else quite like it in his catalog, either.  Originally a limited (and expensive - $250) edition only available with a book of Gerhard Richter's paintings, it is now available as a normal standalone disc. 

...and I need to check out that Power Tools thing.  Sounds interesting!

←

I have it. Frisell with a string trio. Good shit.

[John L]

I don't have too much Frisell, but I really enjoy what he does on those trio dates with Joey Baron and Arthur Blythe.

[RDK]

I once picked up a David Frizzell album by mistake. Didn't care for it...

[medjuck]

I like some Bil Frisell a lot and don't like some at all. But it's obvious he likes whatever he's doing. He doesn't care if it's jazz or if we like it. That's not selling out. It's just a guy with eclectic tastes having a good time.

[marcello]

I once picked up a David Frizzell album by mistake.  Didn't care for it...

←

Some of this guy's playing I like; some I don't:

[danasgoodstuff]

Love Lefty, nice pic, presumably from after his career went sour... but to get this thread more or less back on track have any of you downloaded the Further East/Further West linked earlier? I've never done anything like that and I'm a little fuzzy on how it works. Do I need any special software installed and is Flac worth the extra $? A little hand holding here would be much appreciated.

[7/4]

Love Lefty, nice pic, presumably from after his career went sour... but to get this thread more or less back on track have any of you downloaded the Further East/Further West linked earlier? I've never done anything like that and I'm a little fuzzy on how it works. Do I need any special software installed and is Flac worth the extra $? A little hand holding here would be much appreciated.

Flac decodes to a wav file, so it's CD quality, unlike a MP3 file. There's software out there to do the translation.

[danasgoodstuff]

So I'm going to have to get some of this software to go from flac to wave, or might it already be in one of the three CD burning programs on computer already? Sorry to be dense but you'd think they'd put info like this on a site that sells downloads...

[7/4]

So I'm going to have to get some of this software to go from flac to wave, or might it already be in one of the three CD burning programs on computer already? Sorry to be dense but you'd think they'd put info like this on a site that sells downloads...

I use MKW Audio Compression Tool Kit.

[RDK]

You can find FLAC decoders for free on the web. Just google it. Piece of cake to use.

[BFrank]

Would it make you happy if you knew that disk 1 is West and disk 2 is East?

Yeah....what's up with that? I just got the album and it took me a while to figure out what was going on.

[nathan]

Interesting thread -- glad the internet is always here to provide a consequence-free environment in which to rant, insult and threaten...maybe it helps keep folks out of gun shops and belltowers!

Anyway, for those of you in the Bay Area in January, I would recommend coming out to Yoshi's in Oakland (www.yoshis.com) to hear Nels Cline playing a program of Andrew Hill music with some of the best musicians around (all amazing players, all frequent collaborators with and admirers of Cline, and yet -- judging from what I'm learning in this thread -- none of whom appear to be sophisticated enough to realize that Cline has been bullshitting...gosh):

January 30th @ Yoshi's (Oakland, CA)

Bobby Bradford - cornet

Ben Goldberg - clarinets

Andrea Parkins - accordion

Devin Hoff - bass

Scott Amendola - drums

Nels Cline - guitar

Might open some eyes. At the very least, it should be a great night of music with some amazing players and, of course, some of the finest compositions ever written. For the past few years, Nels has been playing around the Bay Area a lot in a variety of contexts (also saw him a bunch when I was living in NYC), and I don't think he's left many musicians with the feeling that he's bullshitting.

As for recorded Cline, there are a lot of great records, but for someone looking to dip their toe in, I'd recommend "The Inkling", an amazing quartet recording. I'd also give a huge second to the Bendian "...Jack Kirby" album Impossible mentioned above (if memory serves, it was my 2nd favorite record of the year when it came out, right behind Marc Ribot's impossibly brilliant "Saints").

As for the Frisell topic ostensibly at hand, I'm a huge Frisell fan, and I would highly recommend, anong others, his Quartet date "Lookout for Hope". I'm also a big fan of the early "In Line", which is mostly solo guitar. Not for all tastes, and definitely recorded in Full-On-ECM style, but great to me. I am enjoying "East/West" a lot, particularly the East disc. Kenny Wollesen, as always, is incredible (his many recordings with the above-mentioned Ben Goldberg should be more widely heard). I've been lukewarm on some of Frisell's recent stuff (not that it's ever less than listenable), but this is a very good one. Another one that's not new, but relatively new to me, is Paul Motian's "On Broadway, vol. 2". Some really beautiful Frisell on there, playing standards w/ Motian, Lovano and Haden. OH! And he's got some great solo tracks on John Zorn's "Masada Guitars". I could go on...

Oh, and I'm a performing guitarist, so I must know what I'm talking about, right ;-)

nathan

Edited December 14, 2005 by nathan