Name some Blue Note cds you find overrated

[Scott Dolan]

I need to grab that one. I have 0 Moncur in my collection, and have been meaning to remedy that for years.

*edit*

Downloading now!

Edited September 4, 2014 by Scott Dolan

[colinmce]

I'd to turn this into an Underrated BN thread but one record which never fails to blow my mind is Anthony Williams - Life Time. To me, this date is equal to any of the vaunted avant albums of the day, and maybe even more accomplished. I sometimes wonder if I'm just untrained or easily impressed or what, but for my money it's one of the most brilliant, ahead-of-its-time records ever made. I don't get why it doesn't have a status equal to anything else-- I find it beyond category. Maybe this is a post for the new Motian thread...

[Scott Dolan]

If we're talking underrated, I'd nominate The Illinois Concert from Dolphy. Herbie was going off that night!

[clifford_thornton]

To get back to BN, my take during the mid-sixties was that Blue Note got their toes wet with the new music when they recorded McLean, Hutcherson, Hill, Moncur, etc., and they signed Ornette, Cherry, and Cecil because they didn't want to get left out. (And don't get me wrong, I'm very happy that those records were recorded.) Perhaps that's not the whole story. Just my take at the time and still my take.

That makes a lot of sense.

I'd be interested to know whether Brilliant Circles was intended for another label than Polydor/Spiegelei when it was recorded in 1969. It is an excellent album.

Strata-East had a very diffuse catalogue, from fusion and proto-smooth jazz funk to avant-garde heavies, and it's hard to think of them in the BN bag (even though the Tollivers are decent post-bop). For my money the best things they released are the Pharoah and the Mtume Umoja records. Then again, I suppose BN in their later UA years were pretty all over the map. Those Corea records for example - pretty out, though not often rated very highly by people who either dive into free music or who are BN dedicatees.

I really have to go back to those Hutcherson albums - I always thought the more interesting ones were NOT Dialogue and Components, rather Stick-Up, Total Eclipse, San Francisco and the Harold Land years. The first two BNs are a bit "dry" for my taste, though the Webern/Stravinsky thought is interesting - something I certainly think of with respect to SME, Cecil or Bill Dixon, less so with the avant-garde Blue Note crew, though I'm sure those guys were listening to the same composers.

Moncur's BART set with Hutcherson, McBee and Harris is wonderful. That 24-minute piece is just sublime. Of course, Hutch and Chambers were playing with Shepp at the time in a very interesting group - not necessarily the most successful, but one I'm glad exists.

[JSngry]

Wait - Lion when on a Free Jazz Spree because AG records were selling like hotcakes, better than Three Sounds & such? Hardly!

Look at what BN became after Liberty took over - that was staying a relevant player in the market.

Signing Cecil Taylor, Ornette Coleman, & Don Cherry when they did wasn't some random attempt to grab market share - none of those guys had any then, really. Cecil wasn't working at all, Ornette hardly any, and Cherry was already beginning to live the life of a gypsy. Sure, they all had "names", but they did not sell records in any remarkable quantity. Does anybody really think that Lion was in the storeroom packing copies of Unit Structures thinking "yah baby, here comes the money NOW!!!"

What it was, I think, was Lion recognizing that these were proven artists with something significant to say within the jazz tradition, and he wanted them documented on his label. Call it an ego move or a vanity move if you want, that's not necessarily wrong (either factually or "morally") best as I can tell, but Lion approached his label the same way Goddard Lieberson did at Columbia - one eye on moving the product, one eye on builing a meaningful cultural legacy, and quite often/generally using different artists for each end. Good thing he had two eyes!

[JSngry]

I'd to turn this into an Underrated BN thread but one record which never fails to blow my mind is Anthony Williams - Life Time. To me, this date is equal to any of the vaunted avant albums of the day, and maybe even more accomplished. I sometimes wonder if I'm just untrained or easily impressed or what, but for my money it's one of the most brilliant, ahead-of-its-time records ever made. I don't get why it doesn't have a status equal to anything else-- I find it beyond category. Maybe this is a post for the new Motian thread...

That is a great record, and to think of it as Improvisation-Rooted 20th Century Classical Percussion Music is...if you need a label for it, that one's is as good as anything else, and better than most.

[Scott Dolan]

What it was, I think, was Lion recognizing that these were proven artists with something significant to say within the jazz tradition, and he wanted them documented on his label. Call it an ego move or a vanity move if you want, that's not necessarily wrong (either factually or "morally") best as I can tell, but Lion approached his label the same way Goddard Lieberson did at Columbia - one eye on moving the product, one eye on builing a meaningful cultural legacy, and quite often/generally using different artists for each end. Good thing he had two eyes!

Sorry, but I can't buy that even a little. There has never been a record executive in history that ran a multi-million dollar company that said "fuck money, I've got a legacy to build!"

Alfred was no fool, and by the mid 60's it was pretty clear the direction Jazz had moved in. The Three Sounds comparison is trite at best. There were outliers, but AG was the main attraction.

You might as well have refused to sign a Hair Metal band in the 80's while continuing to look for the next Jim Croce.

Edited September 4, 2014 by Scott Dolan

[clifford_thornton]

I don't think BN's avant-garde LPs were as easily relegated to the cut-out bins as Savoys or ESPs. They were definitely in a better position to market and sell the stuff.

[JSngry]

What it was, I think, was Lion recognizing that these were proven artists with something significant to say within the jazz tradition, and he wanted them documented on his label. Call it an ego move or a vanity move if you want, that's not necessarily wrong (either factually or "morally") best as I can tell, but Lion approached his label the same way Goddard Lieberson did at Columbia - one eye on moving the product, one eye on builing a meaningful cultural legacy, and quite often/generally using different artists for each end. Good thing he had two eyes!

Sorry, but I can't buy that even a little. There has never been a record executive in history that ran a multi-million dollar company that said "fuck money, I've got a legacy to build!"

Alfred was no fool, and by the mid 60's it was pretty clear the direction Jazz had moved in. The Three Sounds comparison is trite at best. There were outliers, but AG was the main attraction.

You might as well have refused to sign a Hair Metal band in the 80's while continuing to look for the next Jim Croce.

Sorry, but that is all kinds of wrong.

First - nobody's saying that anybody was saying "fuck money".

Second - The Three Sounds kept Blue Note solvent, so they were anything but outliers.

Third - no, the "main attraction", as you put it, was in "soul jazz" in general. That was what was selling records in real quantity. Coltrane was the outlier in terms of jazz sales, not The Three Sounds, or Ramsey Lewis. Even columbia's go-to guy Miles was losing sales with all those now-classic Second Quintet records.

Fourth - both Lieberson & Lion were both open about selling records and building a legacy with stuff that doesn't sell well right away, if at all. This is no secret. It's the foundation of the conept of "deep catalog", of having your hits and having your items that might sell a relatively few copies a year, but keep selling those few copies for years on end.

Finally (and again) - look at the direction of Blue Note catalog after Lion sold to Liberty.

[clifford_thornton]

speaking of which, Savoy is a really interesting comparison - they released a handful of scarce avant-garde LPs in the mid- to late 1960s. Surely they weren't thinking of these as a cash cow, as many of them went straight to the cut-out bins. Nobody (or almost nobody) bought that Marzette Watts record when it came out, but nevertheless with Bill Dixon's role as a producer/sorta A&R person, that sub-sector of the artistic market got coverage.

Edited September 4, 2014 by clifford_thornton

[mjzee]

I'd only add Lion's desire to document music he liked. Witness the Herbie Nichols records - they didn't sell then (I'll bet they still don't sell much), but Lion thought he was an important voice. This approach goes all the way back to Monk - at the time BN recorded him, I wonder whether they ever expected him to sell.

[JSngry]

I don't think BN's avant-garde LPs were as easily relegated to the cut-out bins as Savoys or ESPs. They were definitely in a better position to market and sell the stuff.

I bought this stuff in the 70s, and the BN stuff was spotty. The Ornette Golden Circles were always there. The others, not there. Unit Structures, readily available. Conquistador, not so much. Complete Communion, always there. The other two, no way.

Find the Schwann catalog where Liberty did a huge, ginormous, mass deleion of the new labels they had acuired over the last year or so. It's in 1967, I think. Chuck would know better than me. It will make you cry, although it explained the contents of the cutout bins for the next 5-6 years, which did not make me cry. UA culled even further in the 70s, but that Liberty purge....ouch.

ESP kep[t showing up, though, somewhere. Bootlegs or not, I don't know. I've read the book aboutht he label, and still am not convinced one way or the other about Stollman. But I had no trouble buying the stuff in 1976 or so. It was there, most of it.

Savoy - keep in mind that Savoy was in the process of becoming a pretty successful Gospel label and was still owned by Herman Lubinsky. "Tax write-off" explains many things...but he got the right guy to do it in Bill Dixon, that's for sure.

[Scott Dolan]

Well, I'm glad you cats have found the angels amongst us who just want to "document" the music they find "important".

Back here in Realityville it was clear that Rock was eating into Jazz sales in the 60's in a big way. Record executives for Jazz labels were trying to hit home runs, not score bloop singles.

Fusion didn't happen by accident.

[Big Beat Steve]

Most avantgarde listeners would not accept any oldtime/classic jazz "must hears" either. Jazz is and remains a wide field and one man's meat is and remains another man's poison. Which does not prevent anybody from exploring other fields of jazz if he himself feels like it - but "must" expore? Nonsense.

While I agree with you generally, you're way wrong about this. If you look at the stuff Chuck Nessa (and if he can't be described accurately as an 'avant garde listener', I don't know who can be) likes and thinks important, you find ALL sorts of stuff. And he's not the only one here; Larry Kart, Jim Sangrey, John Littweiler have all got very broad taste and can point out important stuff from beyond the avant garde. Hot Ptah, too, now I come to think of it. And Ubu. And Moms Mobley. Oh, Alan Lowe, too. Oh hell, I bet all of the avant fans here are WELL aware of the history of jazz and can identify important prior stuff they love to bits. (And some of them can even identify important soul jazz recordings they love to bits )

MG

Wow .. this thread moves way too fast for me ... there you are off the web for an hour or two to take care of other matters, and pow ... 2 more pages of posts ...

Anyway, MG; I really did not want to refer AG-inclined forumists here but to the avantgarde audience "at large". My general impressions there (you get into contact with all fields of jazz fans over the years) are summed up in what I wrote above ... So maybe this explains that.

As for avantgarde and BN and why BN may have signed up artists from that field:

Couldn't it have been a case of just staying in the limelight there after all? Avantgarde may never have sold much in objective quantites but this segment of jazz made the headlines. Collecting jazz for me has always included jazz magazines and I find it very instructive to read up on specifc matters in CONTEMPORARY sources and not just through historians' writings. And from what I have seen in various European jazz mags (of which i have fairly comprehensive runs up to the mid-60s) is that as the 50s turned into the 60s, the jazz fields that got coverage increasingly focused on three areas only: Soul jazz, avantgarde and rediscovered old blues heroes (field recordings etc.) from way back ... This was what many headlines and an increasingly large share of the record reviews were made up of. All other fields of jazz were increasingly limited to reissues and the timeless heroes like Ellington etc. Cannot say to what extent this was profoundly different in the US media, but maybe this may explain after all why you probably just had to get on the avantgarde bandwagon too if you wanted to be covered comprehensively in the jazz press and therefore remain in the headlines of the jazz public? Just wondering ....

[JSngry]

While we're at it...let's look at Contemporary. They did Cecil, the debuted Ornette, and they had a good set of Sonny Simmons with and without Prince Lasha. Was any of that simply driven by the hopes for a big payday?

I'm cynical about a lot of things, but hell - Les Koenig recorded two albums of Vernon Duke's classical compositions (they are nothing like his pop sonmgs, btw) and released all those Andre Previn records.

I'd never discount the advantages/motivations of tax-writeoffs, but when somebody loses money on something they believe in that they pretty much know is going to be a no-go sales-wise, hey. More power to them, for all of it.

[Scott Dolan]

As for avantgarde and BN and why BN may have signed up artists from that field:

Couldn't it have been a case of just staying in the limelight there after all? Avantgarde may never have sold much in objective quantites but this segment of jazz made the headlines. Collecting jazz for me has always included jazz magazines and I find it very instructive to read up on specifc matters in CONTEMPORARY sources and not just through historians' writings. And from what I have seen in various European jazz mags (of which i have fairly comprehensive runs up to the mid-60s) is that as the 50s turned into the 60s, the jazz fields that got coverage increasingly focused on three areas only: Soul jazz, avantgarde and rediscovered old blues heroes (field recordings etc.) from way back ... This was what many headlines and an increasingly large share of the record reviews were made up of. All other fields of jazz were increasingly limited to reissues and the timeless heroes like Ellington etc. Cannot say to what extent this was profoundly different in the US media, but maybe this may explain after all why you probably just had to get on the avantgarde bandwagon too if you wanted to be covered comprehensively in the jazz press and therefore remain in the headlines of the jazz public? Just wondering ....

Jim says no.

I say yes.

And thanks for the info you gained from reading the contemporary publications of the time which seem to confirm "yes". At least to some degree. If you want to stay relevant in the market, you are going to have to sign artists that the publications feeding your market are abuzz over.

While we're at it...let's look at Contemporary. They did Cecil, the debuted Ornette, and they had a good set of Sonny Simmons with and without Prince Lasha. Was any of that simply driven by the hopes for a big payday?

A fallacy you seem hell bent on featuring as your main argument.

There were no "big paydays" left in Jazz in the mid to late 60's. If there were, we'd probably never have had Fusion.

[clifford_thornton]

Interesting about the Schwann / Liberty deletion. I did read somewhere that you could still buy some Lex and West 63rd Blue Notes in the late '60s for pretty cheap, even some of the 10"s.

Yes, I'm of the understanding that Koenig had open ears and liked the music of Ornette, Cecil, Lasha and Simmons, although all of them mentioned that they didn't see much financial benefit from being on Contemporary.

[JSngry]

No, Jim does't say no, Jim says know. I've read the old magazines, checked the old album sleeves, read the old Schwans, and most entertainingly, lived in the old cuttout bins to see how it all played out.

Let's not confuse "relevant in the press" with "relevant at the cash register". Ask the AG jazz musicians of the time - any of them, of any ilk - how many records they were selling and how many gigs they were getting. And then ask Ramsey Lewis or Gene Harris or Lou Donaldson the same question. Coltrane, outlier, and for pretty obvious reasons. Shepp, probably the same, but for different reasons. Anybody else, hey, remember that 3rd pressing of Three For Shepp? No?

And let's not confuse Albert Lion recording Cecil Taylor with John Hammond recording Prince Lasha, Burton Greene, Sonny Murray, etc.

For that matter, let's not confuse Albert Lion recording Cecil Taylor twice with Albert Lion recording The Three Sounds eighty bajillion times.

And for sure, let's not confuse Compulsion with Grass Roots.

[Scott Dolan]

Right.

Because nobody goes out an buys an album after reading a review about it in their publication of choice.

Edited September 4, 2014 by Scott Dolan

[JSngry]

Right.

Because nobody goes out an buys an album after reading a review about it in their publication of choice.

Geez, you're right Scott. That's just how it works, exactly. A straight linear process, read the review, buy the record. Works evertime, simple as that.

My bad, sorry. I always try to complicate things.

[Scott Dolan]

If you don't think albums that are advertised or reviewed in respected publications have an advantage over those that aren't, then you're truly off your rocker.

[JSngry]

Again, sir, you are correct.

I can only hope to someday have your keen, concisive grasp of the obvious. My mind gets too cluttered with all the follow-up scenarios & corollaries to be of much use to anybody, especially myself.

Mentor me, Scott. Please mentor me. Show me how you do it.

[clifford_thornton]

There are several pressings of Marion Brown's Three for Shepp - orange/black (stereo/mono), black/red, green, and purple/yellow, not to mention Japanese and French issues.

[JSngry]

There are several pressings of Marion Brown's Three for Shepp - orange/black (stereo/mono), black/red, green, and purple/yellow, not to mention Japanese and French issues.

Never saw a purple/yellow. Interesting.

Would like to know the numbers of each pressing, and whether any edition got more than one run. That's one that, if I saw it retail at all, it was one copy, and when it was gone, it was not restocked.

What about Everywhere? Not sure, but I think I've only seen that one in black.red.

Did either of these get the MCA gold-stamped on the cover treatment? I often wonder if they did the whole catlaog like that, kinda like one last fling/dump/whatever.

[clifford_thornton]

Everywhere came in orange/black (both stereo and mono), black/red, and green. I assume there is a Japanese pressing but I haven't seen one (or a Euro). Can't remember gold stamp specifics but for green or purple/yellow pressings, those did appear, probably sometimes using leftovers from earlier runs. Only reason I know this shit is because I've bought these albums multiple times/seen them when working in or frequenting stores, etc.

As for Three for Shepp, I think the black/red did get more than one run because a whole bunch of them got assembled with the inner gatefold slick (liners) upside down!

Oh, there are also Canadian and record club editions of Everywhere. Hah.