What records disappointed your expectations?

[Guy Berger]

I should give Turn It Over another spin -- I've never given it the attention it deserved and last time I was somewhat disappointed. Hell, it took a few years for me to "get" Emergency.

There are circulating live tapes of the original Lifetime trio, from the Village Gate I think. Supposed to be phenomenal.

mommy -- I think you are on the wrong side here. Strongly critical comments about a record you haven't heard just don't stand up to much scrutiny. At least give it a spin before passing judgment. Also, will you do my laundry?

Guy

Edited January 25, 2007 by Guy

[ep1str0phy]

What is "wildlife"?

Well, "Wildlife" was a tune from Believe It that Bruce often played... (was he present at those sessions?)

Edited January 25, 2007 by ep1str0phy

[Guest the mommy]

the wildlife sessions was an unreleased tony williams session recorded after "ego". from 1975. with bruce, holdsworth, webster lewis and tequila. good stuff. not completed for whatever reason, i guess.

oh i totally forgot holdsworth is then on the next two albums as well.

[Guest the mommy]

i said the trio beyond thing sounded like a commercial idea and i have no intention of hearing it. i made no comment to the quality.

[ep1str0phy]

I had no idea that Bruce stuck around after the Young/Williams partnership had dissolved.

[Aggie87]

i said the trio beyond thing sounded like a commercial idea and i have no intention of hearing it. i made no comment to the quality.

You used words like commercial, palatable, and boring. I don't agree with commercial or boring, but am undecided on more palatable, since I don't have all of Lifetime's recordings to compare against.

ECM is hardly a more commercial label than Verve, which is what the Lifetime Emergency release was on.

[Jim Alfredson]

i said the trio beyond thing sounded like a commercial idea and i have no intention of hearing it. i made no comment to the quality.

I can just imagine the conversation:

DeJohnette: Hey Sco, you know how we can go totally commercial and make crazy bread? A Tony Williams Lifetime Tribute band!!

Sco: Yeah, we could sell, like, 500 CDs!

DeJohnette: Yeah!!! Totally awesome!

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

"Diminuendo and Crescendo in Blue" from "Ellington at Newport." I love Paul Gonsalves in other settings, and I admire the piece itself, but IMO those fabled 27 (or whatever) choruses are mostly a lot of huffing and puffing. Maybe if the album came with an inflatable version of the blonde who got up and started dancing.

I think the concert as a whole was disappointing (should have added it to my list), but I really like D&CiB.

Guy

An interesting opinion, Guy. And one that I agree with, BTW.

I still find it odd how many folks point out that that performance at Newport somewhat reinvigorated Ellingtons career.

Aside from that one tune and legendary solo, the rest of the set seemed rather uninspired.

"Ellington at Newport" was Duke's first album to hit the pop LP charts. At that time, he hadn't had a hit single for several years.

"Reinvigorate" doesn't necessarily mean artistically. With a business such as Duke's band, getting paid is tremendously important in what else it permits you to do.

MG

[king ubu]

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)

[michel1969]

What is the most disppointing to me is reading, mainly in those french Jazz magazines, about many french jazzmen described at "pure genius", "extraordinary talented" "he has to much to say", "50 minutes of pure beauty and gravitation", " radically new sound" "one new idea each 50 seconds" and to hear actually only good but not unfogettable music (whatever kind of). French journalist are always a little excessive in compliments, especially when writing about the newcomers. I think they are afraid to miss the new Barney Wilen or Django Reinhardt.

[Niko]

What is the most disppointing to me is reading, mainly in those french Jazz magazines, about many french jazzmen described at "pure genius", "extraordinary talented" "he has to much to say", "50 minutes of pure beauty and gravitation", " radically new sound" "one new idea each 50 seconds" and to hear actually only good but not unfogettable music (whatever kind of). French journalist are always a little excessive in compliments, especially when writing about the newcomers. I think they are afraid to miss the new Barney Wilen or Django Reinhardt.

don't know if that makes you feel better, but it's not entirely a French phenomenon...

[The Magnificent Goldberg]

- 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)

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

[king ubu]

- 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)

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!)

[Guest the mommy]

so you guys don't like the original lifetime. i don't like the new one. it is not a big deal.

i don't know why i need to hear it to say that i have no interest in hearing scofield and goldings play music "inspired by and going beyond" tony williams lifetime, which i am pretty sure they don't. and isn't extending songs from "turn it over" for many minutes missing the point, anyway? i made no comment on the quality of the music. just said it sounded like a commercial venture. i have no interest in hearing it. if i saw it in a store i would not look at it twice. i will never have any interest in anything scofield or goldings do. i think they stink. scofield used to be pretty fine. with cobham and cobham/duke and miles...through the gramavision years i got no beef. but in 2006 i don't need to hear this junk. sorry.

[Hot Ptah]

I was disappointed by John McLaughlin's "Electric Dreams" in 1978. The last Mahavishnu Orchestra albums had been disappointing, culminating in "Inner Worlds", and McLaughlin seemed most interested in the acoustic Shakti group.

Then the news came that John had put together a new electric band, called the One Truth Band.

Would the group and album be great? Would it be a return to the quality of "Inner Mounting Flame" and "Birds of Fire"? Would John cut loose and really play the electric guitar at the peak of his powers?

No.

[Hot Ptah]

I was also disappointed in Wynton Marsalis' "Standard Time, Volume 1". Up to that point I was still hoping that Wynton would be a consistently interesting player. I had liked his work in Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers when I saw them live, and thought that his 1982 gigs with his own first quintet were promising. I listened to the first several solo albums, giving him the benefit of the doubt, finding virtues in some cuts off "Black Codes" and the others. But then "Standard Time, Volume 1" came out in 1986 and it was so dull. I remember that my wife and I both felt that it was a real dud upon the first listen.

Edited January 25, 2007 by Hot Ptah

[Scott Dolan]

I was also disappointed in Wynton Marsalis' "Standards, Volume 1". Up to that point I was still hoping that Wynton would be a consistently interesting player. I had liked his work in Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers when I saw them live, and thought that his 1982 gigs with his own first quintet were promising. I listened to the first several solo albums, giving him the benefit of the doubt, finding virtues in some cuts off "Black Codes" and the others. But then "Standards, Volume 1" came out and it was so dull. I remember that my wife and I both felt that it was a real dud upon the first listen.

Have you tried The Marciac Suite? IMO, that's the best album Wynton ever put out.

The Village Vanguard set is also very well played.

[Guest the mommy]

hottah, that was a pretty fallow period in general though for high quality jazz and jazz fusion, no?

this was responding to the electric dreams post.

Edited January 25, 2007 by the mommy

[Guest the mommy]

just curious-what did you think of mclaughlin's next thing with him and his wife(girlfriend?) and tommy campbell and the french dudes? i think it was cute. they seemed to have fun. not sure the music is great. i saw a live video and it had a bit more pep.

[clifford_thornton]

Lot of good records from the 80s, though maybe not of "fusion."

[Hot Ptah]

I must add that Al Hirt's series of solo, unaccompanied trumpet recordings never moved me. His attempt to cover the AACM songbook, while interesting in conception, just never really came off for me. The volumes of his Ornette interpretations were somewhat better, but to me, not as great as everyone seems to think. When he went on for 47 1/2 minutes with his variations on the head of Miles Davis' "Jean Pierre", he lost me.

Edited January 25, 2007 by Hot Ptah

[Hot Ptah]

I was also disappointed in Wynton Marsalis' "Standards, Volume 1". Up to that point I was still hoping that Wynton would be a consistently interesting player. I had liked his work in Art Blakey's Jazz Messengers when I saw them live, and thought that his 1982 gigs with his own first quintet were promising. I listened to the first several solo albums, giving him the benefit of the doubt, finding virtues in some cuts off "Black Codes" and the others. But then "Standards, Volume 1" came out and it was so dull. I remember that my wife and I both felt that it was a real dud upon the first listen.

Have you tried The Marciac Suite? IMO, that's the best album Wynton ever put out.

The Village Vanguard set is also very well played.

Marciac is my favorite album of his in recent years.

[Hot Ptah]

hottah, that was a pretty fallow period in general though for high quality jazz and jazz fusion, no?

this was responding to the electric dreams post.

Actually, I think that the 1978--82 period was a great period for jazz recordings, but not for electric fusion jazz. But those were the great days when there were regular new releases by the Art Ensemble of Chicago, Arthur Blythe, Air, Chico Freeman, James Newton, Sun Ra, and many others, together with vital work by mainstream musicians including Johnny Griffin, Dexter Gordon, McCoy Tyner and many others. I thought it was an exciting time overall, but again, not for electic fusion.

[Hot Ptah]

just curious-what did you think of mclaughlin's next thing with him and his wife(girlfriend?) and tommy campbell and the french dudes? i think it was cute. they seemed to have fun. not sure the music is great. i saw a live video and it had a bit more pep.

Do you mean "Belo Horizonte"? I liked it when it came out. I was not blown away by it, but I found it appealing, which by then was something for McLaughlin.

[sal]

so you guys don't like the original lifetime. i don't like the new one. it is not a big deal.

i don't know why i need to hear it to say that i have no interest in hearing scofield and goldings play music "inspired by and going beyond" tony williams lifetime, which i am pretty sure they don't. and isn't extending songs from "turn it over" for many minutes missing the point, anyway? i made no comment on the quality of the music. just said it sounded like a commercial venture. i have no interest in hearing it. if i saw it in a store i would not look at it twice. i will never have any interest in anything scofield or goldings do. i think they stink. scofield used to be pretty fine. with cobham and cobham/duke and miles...through the gramavision years i got no beef. but in 2006 i don't need to hear this junk. sorry.

That's fine that you feel that way. But the topic of this thread was "what albums disappointed your expectations", not "what albums will you think will suck so bad, that you're not even going to listen to them". The key difference being, that you actually will listen to the music.