king ubu Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 Hasn't Scofield always been a somewhat boring player? I have several of his discs (the BNs with Lovano, the one with Eddie who?, Groove Elation, Quiet, Shinola, Works for Me, ScoHoLoFo, maybe even more) and I occasionally even listen to some of them, but he never really "touched" me in any way. Sometimes his stuff is fun to listen, but most often it's not interesting enough for me. The Sco-Swallow-Stewart trio live (I've known it from broadcasts, from ca. 2000 to 2006) is another deal quite often, though. But there Scofield goes for a straighter approach and Swallow works perfectly with him, and Bill Stewart is a great drummer, too... Quote
David Ayers Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 By the way if you are in the UK BBC radio 3 play a few ecm artists on late Junction Mon-Thur at around 10.30pm You don't need to be in the UK! You can stream it from far far away, on demand, for a week after transmission!! Quote
Guy Berger Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 "ohhhh andy!" "you can name so many ECM albums!!!!" "name some more andy!!!" "now just whisper them to me" Who is Andy? Guy Quote
rockefeller center Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 Who is Andy? Guy andybleaden - veteran groover Quote
Guy Berger Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 What's sad is that we're all wasting our time in this thread refuting yet another idiotic statement from Chewy. Amen. Guy Quote
tonym Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 By the way if you are in the UK BBC radio 3 play a few ecm artists on late Junction Mon-Thur at around 10.30pm Does the lovely (of voice and face) Verity Sharp still present this show? Or has she moved on to TV ? Quote
andybleaden Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 Who is Andy? Guy andybleaden - veteran groover never 'eard of 'im as for the bbc radio 3 streaming thing...do not tell everybody....they all might listen! I wish they would podcast it as its waaaaay beyond my sleepy time some nights.would love to catch all of em. As for verity VS fiona there is always a debate between me and my mate as to why they have to do extremes of one ultra nordic ECM freak VS afternoon tea is Marakesh ...never a little of both. They do do some lovely folk stuff too...sometimes even "english"...Love it too bits actually ....got me back into ecm stuff when realised how much of it I had or had heard elsewhere. It was them who got me into Yann Tiersen...(non ECM artist who did Amelie soundtrack) Quote
king ubu Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 ok clem, I see what you're saying, but then I assume the music black folks tended to produce was rather not what ECM was ever looking for? There are many others, Lester Bowie's own albums, their first release which was a Mal Waldron album, a couple of never yet on CD things by the likes of Sam Rivers or Julian Priester (or has "Love, Love" finally ended up on CD?), and there was a Dewey Redman album, too? Also a Marion Brown... I guess that's in the end just not the stuff that fits the image ECM wants to have, and maybe it won't sell enough - I don't know if that's true. And in the end I don't really care - I would never nominate ECM as my favourite label or anything close to, but I still think they do worthwhile releases nowadays, just as they did in earlier years. In the end I give props to Eicher for doing his thing, for creating his own niche and being much more successfull than one (he?) could have hoped for. There's not much more I have to say about this... there are plenty of labels releasing plenty of discs, and we can lucky enough make our picks without having to endorse a whole catalogue - it's not just thumbs up or down, luckily! Quote
king ubu Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 Maybe Enja Weber was the guy who did for the black musicians what Eicher could have done in the 70s and 80s if he wanted, over here in Europe? I don't know... Quote
mandrill Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 IT IS THE MOST PRETENTIOUS CATALOG EVER. THE FRONT COVER IS BRIGHT WHITE, WITH A BLACK AND WHITE PIC OF A SIDEWALK AND SOME KIDS FEET. THEN, ON THE INSIDE, IT LISTS IN ABC ORDER, THE MOST OBNOXIOUS JAZZ ALBUMS EVER RECORDED IN THE HISTORY OF JAZZ. THEN THERE ARE SOME MORE PHOTOS, INCLUDING A VERY INSPIRING BLACK AND WHITE PHOTO OF A TREE. Snatch that catalog before it goes out of print & sells on e-bay for a price that only Mosaic sets & Tina Brooks Lps can challenge. Dead Sea Scrolls in Japanese Gospel of Manfred Quote
king ubu Posted January 28, 2007 Report Posted January 28, 2007 (my reply to the hillbillswaps, that is... ) Quote
mandrill Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Seems that chewy and I hit a raw nerve! I might reconsider my opinion on ECM when they release something in this vein I believe this one is a close match: Quote
clifford_thornton Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Why, why, why did I read all five pages of this? Hit-or-miss like any other label, indeed. The aesthetic vis-a-vis Af-Am musicians is interesting to contemplate, chalk it up to a lack of interest in putting out much music from a blues perspective (with exceptions like AEC, Redman/Old and New Dreams, etc). European sensibilities also drove FMP, Incus & Enja (tho theirs certainly encompassed Black music - Waldron, Cecil, Dollar), and you wouldn't fault these labels for not having enough black music in their catalogues. Quote
clifford_thornton Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 (edited) Good point on Black Saint/Soul Note. Calig also put out some great sides with Marion Brown as well as some serious Euro-free shit, tho ceased relevance pretty quickly (if they ever had it). I can't answer for Manfred Eicher's reasoning and would hope it's more aesthetic than otherwise biased. Dunno. You're right, though: ECM sound could do a lot for somebody like Matt Shipp (if he were to avoid the trip-hop crap or whatever the fuck)... As for Braxton and Muhal - interesting idea. It's a drag that 90% of that material is on import-only labels that are a bitch to find in, say, a "store" somewhere other than NYC/CHI/SF. The EP Electro-Acoustic shit is weak, and I wholeheartedly agree that the world doesn't need another EP record (nor another KJ record) in theory. But of course, people will continue to release records if so inclined, and there's obviously an audience. Better EP and KJ than a lot of other crap out there... Brotzmann/Moholo/Miller def. needs a proper reissue; I love Brotz and concur on the Patchen bit. Mike Pearson's reading a bit more theatrical than KP's dustiness (for me) requires, but still very good. Edited January 29, 2007 by clifford_thornton Quote
Swinger Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 I've always enjoyed You are not the only one. Fantastic music! Quote
Jim Alfredson Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Seems that chewy and I hit a raw nerve! I might reconsider my opinion on ECM when they release something in this vein Yes, let's rehash what's been done before on countless other organ records. Hasn't Scofield always been a somewhat boring player? Not in my book. Quote
Hot Ptah Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Jack DeJohnette recorded a lot of ECM albums, with his New Directions band and in his own name, into the mid-1980s. One of the best ones, "Inflation Blues", has not been reissued on CD. "Special Edition", "Tin Can Alley" and "Inflation Blues" do not have the stereotyped "ECM sound." In the context of the discussion on this thread, they have the sound of black avant garde albums of the time period, and they are representative of his live shows of that time (1980--83). Lester Bowie's solo albums and early Brass Fantasy albums on ECM also do not have the light, spacey "ECM Sound". Looking at ECM's website, I am struck by the vastness of its catalogue, and the futility of trying to lump all of it into one stereotype. Quote
neveronfriday Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Looking at ECM's website, I am struck by the vastness of its catalogue, and the futility of trying to lump all of it into one stereotype. Exactly. Quote
porcy62 Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Looking at ECM's website, I am struck by the vastness of its catalogue, and the futility of trying to lump all of it into one stereotype. Exactly. Count me in the number. Quote
andybleaden Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Well now we all started being agreeable I might start being awkward! Only joking. What gets me is the diversity of what is on offer from the New Music to New World type of stuff.Mind boggling and very interesting if you have the time but even I do not like some of em. Mind there are a few Blue Notes and Prestige records that did that too! If in doubt try it out Quote
Guest youmustbe Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 Yes it's vast and ONLY what Manfred likes! As I've said, even though I don't care for 99% of it, it's a magnificient achievemnt! Manfred has always been wise about the biz end, and contrary to some gripes, rightous about royalties...Charles Lloyd told me he has gotten royalties from every record he has done for Manfred. Just because he doesn't overpay on budgets, doesn't mean he's 'cheap'...just realistic, which is why he's still doing his thing, while almost everyone else has fallen by the wayside. Quote
ep1str0phy Posted January 29, 2007 Report Posted January 29, 2007 And hell, there's always Afternoon of a Georgia Faun, which is probably one of the best albums of its era/kind. Re: Scofield... he's not the kind of player I'd like to listen to all the time, but I've always been impressed by playing. He's got fine phrasing and a phenomenal groove, and even if he isn't the sort of dyed-in-the-wool experimentalist that this music often demands, he's still one of the more articulate voices in the modern mainstream. IMO, anyway. Quote
Niko Posted January 30, 2007 Report Posted January 30, 2007 somehow, i tremedously enjoy the idea of "Manfred" playing a record such as Jan Garbarek's Rites to Wynton Marsalis and saying "this is roughly what i had in mind" - don't know if Marsalis would do a second album Quote
king ubu Posted January 30, 2007 Report Posted January 30, 2007 ... Re: Scofield... he's not the kind of player I'd like to listen to all the time, but I've always been impressed by playing. He's got fine phrasing and a phenomenal groove, and even if he isn't the sort of dyed-in-the-wool experimentalist that this music often demands, he's still one of the more articulate voices in the modern mainstream. IMO, anyway. I was being a bit harsh, but had to do, I guess, with the Sco vs. ECM comparison (I know, I know, he's on ECM, too, now... but it's DeJohnette actually who was the leader, I think). Anyway, I really, really enjoyed a recent (2006, spring, I think) live broadcast of Sco's Ray Charles programme - must be the one thing of his that immediately connected to me. Bluesy, basic stuff. And I never wanted to really put him down, I am sure he's a very able musician, to say the least - it's just not that I can connect to most of his stuff that easily (and I'm used to connecting with lots of "difficult" things, see funny rat...) Regarding the sound of ECM, it seems to me that from the older (80s) albums, those done in NYC often don't have the "ECM sound". Also there might be differences between Ludwigsburg things and the Oslo stuff (their house studio by now? But then again Stanko did his latest at La Buissonne in France and it seems it sounds different again - La Buissonne is the great studio where most if not all of the gone and regretted Sketch releases were recorded). Of am I mixing things up and Ludwigsburg is Enja only? By the way, a funny thing about ECM / Enja is, that in my opinion, Enja Winckelmann, after the split with Weber (Enja Weber) has got the far more interesting catalogue by now, not just as far as size is concerned, but he does (did?) all those "mediterranean" projects with WDR and SWR radio stations, La Banda, Trovesi's Midsummernight Dream, Michel Godard's two "Castel del Monte" discs, Pino Minafra etc., plus stuff like Johannes Enders, Rabih Abou-Khalil, Dhafer Youssef, while Enja Weber has mainly a "great black music" catalogue (his new releases go beyond that, too, though, with Charlie Mariano, Aki Takase or - also, I think - Michel Godard). Of course the "great black music" or black avant stuff needs to be documented, but by 1980 it was often just some old trad stuff and not really where things where happening. So in the end while it may be worthwhile, I don't look at it as a mistake on anyone's side not to focus mainly on that kind of music after say 1980. And another thing is that of course a label's owner often just records what he likes himself - so did Alfred Lion, so do Uehlinger (hat hut records) and Eicher. That's perfectly legitimate, although it may be hard on musicians of a lesser demanded style, but such is life. Now keeping ones old catalogue in print or doing the occasional reissue (hello, Mr. Weber!!! and to some lesser extent of course Uehlinger and Eicher, too!) I think should be done more often - sort of taking responsability for ones own catalogue and keeping to spread it, instead of turning it into collectors' stuff (as happens with hat releases, but Uehlinger simply hasn't got the means to reissue all his stuff AND do new releases, and - again, that's perfectly legitimate - he does by no account want to turn his label into a reissue label, but still sees his main focus on documenting new music and producing new releases). Quote
brownie Posted January 30, 2007 Report Posted January 30, 2007 It seems to go on and on... all this after criticizing the recent ECM catalogue! All I had in mind was to dissent with ECM's tendency to the pretentious! Look at covers of recent ECM albums: Pretentious might no be the exactly appropriate word but it's cold and arty (in its worst meaning)! I posted the cover of a BN Jimmy Smith album with its living colors for a contrast. The ECM discs these days tend to bring angst. much too often Yes, I long for the joie de vivre that exploded from the cover and music of so many albums not too long ago. There is enough angst in real life to avoid it in music! Or at least keep it as low as possible! Now I'll go back to that 'Afternoon of a Georgia Faun' LP, one of several ECM albums I continue to enjoy! Quote
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