Evan Parker and Roscoe Mitchell

[Jazzis]

Who's next? The French?

This is a bit cryptic, but actually it was the British, who revolutionized Jazz in the late 1960s / early 1970s, the rest of the Continent followed, including the French, the Germans, the Dutch and the entire Eastern Europe behind the curtain (Iron or otherwise).

Forged in the white heat of Harold Wilson's technological revolution, no doubt!

That is a very interesting observation, worthy of a serious study. In the meantime I suggest some reading on the history of Jazz, especially European Jazz?

[mjazzg]

Who's next? The French?

This is a bit cryptic, but actually it was the British, who revolutionized Jazz in the late 1960s / early 1970s, the rest of the Continent followed, including the French, the Germans, the Dutch and the entire Eastern Europe behind the curtain (Iron or otherwise).

Forged in the white heat of Harold Wilson's technological revolution, no doubt!

Sure it wasn't forged in Harold Wilson's mac?

Wasn't Mac the end of the 50s?

Harold's Free Jazz Unit? now there's a thought

[A Lark Ascending]

Who's next? The French?

This is a bit cryptic, but actually it was the British, who revolutionized Jazz in the late 1960s / early 1970s, the rest of the Continent followed, including the French, the Germans, the Dutch and the entire Eastern Europe behind the curtain (Iron or otherwise).

Forged in the white heat of Harold Wilson's technological revolution, no doubt!

Sure it wasn't forged in Harold Wilson's mac?

Wasn't Mac the end of the 50s?

Harold's Free Jazz Unit? now there's a thought

The Winds of Change Quintet? First album 'You've Never Had It So Good'?

*****************

Back to 'Boustrophedon' - give Furrow 6 a go if you want to dip your toe in. Quite thrilling.

Really impressed with Craig Taborn on the record on this listen.

Edited January 27, 2012 by A Lark Ascending

[mjazzg]

Who's next? The French?

This is a bit cryptic, but actually it was the British, who revolutionized Jazz in the late 1960s / early 1970s, the rest of the Continent followed, including the French, the Germans, the Dutch and the entire Eastern Europe behind the curtain (Iron or otherwise).

Forged in the white heat of Harold Wilson's technological revolution, no doubt!

Sure it wasn't forged in Harold Wilson's mac?

Wasn't Mac the end of the 50s?

Harold's Free Jazz Unit? now there's a thought

The Winds of Change Quintet? First album 'You've Never Had It So Good'?

*****************

Back to 'Boustrophedon' - give Furrow 6 a go if you want to dip your toe in. Quite thrilling.

Really impressed with Craig Taborn on the record on this listen.

Taborn. Very impressive generally, suggest his Thirsty Ear recordings, Try his solo on ECM from last year - a very good example of Eicher's 'poison'

[Chuck Nessa]

Thank God the Europeans (and the English) stepped forward to continue the artform. Sorry we couldn't keep up our end.

[Face of the Bass]

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

Eicher does NOT twist great players' arms so that they record music they do NOT want to record. I spoke to Abercrombie about this very subject about a month ago. He lives in my neck of the woods, and I run into him occasionally. Get over the ECM bashing already. It is old and extremely close-minded.

Close minded? Listen to the difference between Marilyn Crispell on ECM versus Marilyn Crispell on other labels and for other projects. It's staggering.

Do you honestly believe that an artist of Crispell's stature is in someway manipulated to produce work she'd rather not so it can be released on ECM? I hope not ,because that shows very little respect indeed for an artist which your other statements suggest you admire. Maybe she wants to record in the style she does for ECM? is that a possibility beyond your view? I, for one appreciate her recordings for ECM and other labels.

As for the Parker/Mitchell - I've struggled to really enjoy the Mitchell (which has a line-up that i could take to a desert island) only because i find the first piece really doesn't stimulate me and puts a 'drag' on the rest of the album (I'm sure this is discussed on another thread elswhere). Maybe i should start at track two.

The Parker I haven't done justice to, listened a couple of times and shelved it which suggests it didn't grab me straight off. I've noted the comments that it's a recording that reveals itself over several listens so will use this thread as aspur to revisit.

Anyone got an antidote for Eicher's poison? It'd save me a lot of money.....

I don't think Crispell is being manipulated. I just think her work becomes A LOT less interesting on ECM, and I happen to notice that the work of many artists becomes less interesting once they reach ECM. Isn't this the label that basically keeps trying to recreate the ambience of In A Silent Way? It gets old after awhile.

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

I've heard a lot of "strange" statements in my life, but this one is truly bizarre...?

As already mentioned in this thread and of course everywhere else, ECM's contribution to contemporary Jazz aesthetic, the development of the Jazz Art Form, the individual admancement of hundreds of Jazz Artists and many, many other virtues attributed to ECM and its owner are beyond discussion.

I have witnessed the birth of the label from day one, followed it closely for over 40 years now, both on a personal and professional level and I must say that although many independent Jazz labels are crucially important, none of them comes close to ECM on any level.

Of course I can understand that some American Jazz fans have trouble admitting that a non-American Jazz activity could overshadow everything done by American Jazz, but hey, that is a fact....

This is really unintentionally funny to me. I have almost no interest in "American jazz" today, just as I have almost no interest in most of the music being put out by ECM. If you asked me to name the most vital jazz labels of the last 40 years, I'd put FMP number one, easily, and then after them probably Black Saint/Soul Note and Leo. Notice that NONE of those are American labels. So your lazy assumptions are completely off base.

Also to everyone who keeps repeating my use of the word "poison," please note that in my original post I noted that I was engaging in rhetorical excess. Obviously ECM does not "poison" everything. I like some of their recordings, even. But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary. And that's through experience with too many polished works that represent, for me, the musical embodiment of the worst excesses of the Baby Boomer narcissism that is the New Age movement.

It's just all so very, very bourgeois.

Edited January 28, 2012 by Face of the Bass

[JSngry]

But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary.

From a generation ago, the same wariness arose via Sam Rivers & George Adams. Good records, but...

[JETman]

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

Eicher does NOT twist great players' arms so that they record music they do NOT want to record. I spoke to Abercrombie about this very subject about a month ago. He lives in my neck of the woods, and I run into him occasionally. Get over the ECM bashing already. It is old and extremely close-minded.

Close minded? Listen to the difference between Marilyn Crispell on ECM versus Marilyn Crispell on other labels and for other projects. It's staggering.

Do you honestly believe that an artist of Crispell's stature is in someway manipulated to produce work she'd rather not so it can be released on ECM? I hope not ,because that shows very little respect indeed for an artist which your other statements suggest you admire. Maybe she wants to record in the style she does for ECM? is that a possibility beyond your view? I, for one appreciate her recordings for ECM and other labels.

As for the Parker/Mitchell - I've struggled to really enjoy the Mitchell (which has a line-up that i could take to a desert island) only because i find the first piece really doesn't stimulate me and puts a 'drag' on the rest of the album (I'm sure this is discussed on another thread elswhere). Maybe i should start at track two.

The Parker I haven't done justice to, listened a couple of times and shelved it which suggests it didn't grab me straight off. I've noted the comments that it's a recording that reveals itself over several listens so will use this thread as aspur to revisit.

Anyone got an antidote for Eicher's poison? It'd save me a lot of money.....

I don't think Crispell is being manipulated. I just think her work becomes A LOT less interesting on ECM, and I happen to notice that the work of many artists becomes less interesting once they reach ECM. Isn't this the label that basically keeps trying to recreate the ambience of In A Silent Way? It gets old after awhile.

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

I've heard a lot of "strange" statements in my life, but this one is truly bizarre...?

As already mentioned in this thread and of course everywhere else, ECM's contribution to contemporary Jazz aesthetic, the development of the Jazz Art Form, the individual admancement of hundreds of Jazz Artists and many, many other virtues attributed to ECM and its owner are beyond discussion.

I have witnessed the birth of the label from day one, followed it closely for over 40 years now, both on a personal and professional level and I must say that although many independent Jazz labels are crucially important, none of them comes close to ECM on any level.

Of course I can understand that some American Jazz fans have trouble admitting that a non-American Jazz activity could overshadow everything done by American Jazz, but hey, that is a fact....

This is really unintentionally funny to me. I have almost no interest in "American jazz" today, just as I have almost no interest in most of the music being put out by ECM. If you asked me to name the most vital jazz labels of the last 40 years, I'd put FMP number one, easily, and then after them probably Black Saint/Soul Note and Leo. Notice that NONE of those are American labels. So your lazy assumptions are completely off base.

Also to everyone who keeps repeating my use of the word "poison," please note that in my original post I noted that I was engaging in rhetorical excess. Obviously ECM does not "poison" everything. I like some of their recordings, even. But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary. And that's through experience with too many polished works that represent, for me, the musical embodiment of the worst excesses of the Baby Boomer narcissism that is the New Age movement.

It's just all so very, very bourgeois.

Your statements get more and more insane as we go along. Didn't realize the air was so fucking thick upstate!

[A Lark Ascending]

Also to everyone who keeps repeating my use of the word "poison," please note that in my original post I noted that I was engaging in rhetorical excess. Obviously ECM does not "poison" everything. I like some of their recordings, even. But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary. And that's through experience with too many polished works that represent, for me, the musical embodiment of the worst excesses of the Baby Boomer narcissism that is the New Age movement.

It's just all so very, very bourgeois.

The problem lies in taking a personal antipathy and projecting it as a universal absolute. Not 'the approach of ECM most of the time does not appeal to me' but 'most of ECM repeats a formula from 1969 and makes musicians who record well elsewhere produce less interesting work'.

I know this approach is the currency of 'criticism' but I tend to find it a bit passée and ever so, well, bourgeois (if not aristocratic in its hauteur).

Edited January 28, 2012 by A Lark Ascending

[A Lark Ascending]

Taborn. Very impressive generally, suggest his Thirsty Ear recordings, Try his solo on ECM from last year - a very good example of Eicher's 'poison'

Yes, I'm aware of Taborn but will dig back in my collection today to revisit. Recall seeing him in very impressive form with Dave Douglas a few years ago at Cheltenham. I'll also whip that solo album from ECM off e-music.

[David Ayers]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

[Face of the Bass]

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

Eicher does NOT twist great players' arms so that they record music they do NOT want to record. I spoke to Abercrombie about this very subject about a month ago. He lives in my neck of the woods, and I run into him occasionally. Get over the ECM bashing already. It is old and extremely close-minded.

Close minded? Listen to the difference between Marilyn Crispell on ECM versus Marilyn Crispell on other labels and for other projects. It's staggering.

Do you honestly believe that an artist of Crispell's stature is in someway manipulated to produce work she'd rather not so it can be released on ECM? I hope not ,because that shows very little respect indeed for an artist which your other statements suggest you admire. Maybe she wants to record in the style she does for ECM? is that a possibility beyond your view? I, for one appreciate her recordings for ECM and other labels.

As for the Parker/Mitchell - I've struggled to really enjoy the Mitchell (which has a line-up that i could take to a desert island) only because i find the first piece really doesn't stimulate me and puts a 'drag' on the rest of the album (I'm sure this is discussed on another thread elswhere). Maybe i should start at track two.

The Parker I haven't done justice to, listened a couple of times and shelved it which suggests it didn't grab me straight off. I've noted the comments that it's a recording that reveals itself over several listens so will use this thread as aspur to revisit.

Anyone got an antidote for Eicher's poison? It'd save me a lot of money.....

I don't think Crispell is being manipulated. I just think her work becomes A LOT less interesting on ECM, and I happen to notice that the work of many artists becomes less interesting once they reach ECM. Isn't this the label that basically keeps trying to recreate the ambience of In A Silent Way? It gets old after awhile.

ECM poisons everything it touches. Okay, that's not quite true but they do have a habit of making great players sound a little bit boring sometimes.

I've heard a lot of "strange" statements in my life, but this one is truly bizarre...?

As already mentioned in this thread and of course everywhere else, ECM's contribution to contemporary Jazz aesthetic, the development of the Jazz Art Form, the individual admancement of hundreds of Jazz Artists and many, many other virtues attributed to ECM and its owner are beyond discussion.

I have witnessed the birth of the label from day one, followed it closely for over 40 years now, both on a personal and professional level and I must say that although many independent Jazz labels are crucially important, none of them comes close to ECM on any level.

Of course I can understand that some American Jazz fans have trouble admitting that a non-American Jazz activity could overshadow everything done by American Jazz, but hey, that is a fact....

This is really unintentionally funny to me. I have almost no interest in "American jazz" today, just as I have almost no interest in most of the music being put out by ECM. If you asked me to name the most vital jazz labels of the last 40 years, I'd put FMP number one, easily, and then after them probably Black Saint/Soul Note and Leo. Notice that NONE of those are American labels. So your lazy assumptions are completely off base.

Also to everyone who keeps repeating my use of the word "poison," please note that in my original post I noted that I was engaging in rhetorical excess. Obviously ECM does not "poison" everything. I like some of their recordings, even. But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary. And that's through experience with too many polished works that represent, for me, the musical embodiment of the worst excesses of the Baby Boomer narcissism that is the New Age movement.

It's just all so very, very bourgeois.

Your statements get more and more insane as we go along. Didn't realize the air was so fucking thick upstate!

A nice, content-free attack. Well done. I gather that, on this board, the moment one stops slobbering over the numbers of limited edition box sets, people get prickly.

Also to everyone who keeps repeating my use of the word "poison," please note that in my original post I noted that I was engaging in rhetorical excess. Obviously ECM does not "poison" everything. I like some of their recordings, even. But if I see that a player like Evan Parker or Roscoe Mitchell is on ECM, I become wary. And that's through experience with too many polished works that represent, for me, the musical embodiment of the worst excesses of the Baby Boomer narcissism that is the New Age movement.

It's just all so very, very bourgeois.

The problem lies in taking a personal antipathy and projecting it as a universal absolute. Not 'the approach of ECM most of the time does not appeal to me' but 'most of ECM repeats a formula from 1969 and makes musicians who record well elsewhere produce less interesting work'.

I know this approach is the currency of 'criticism' but I tend to find it a bit passée and ever so, well, bourgeois (if not aristocratic in its hauteur).

Yours is also a statement of criticism. We all know that what I say is my own opinion. To reiterate that in everything I write would be a waste of time.

Anyway, I'm enjoying the responses. Seems like I struck a nerve, which I regard as a good thing.

Also, I don't think I should have to point it out but the influence of In A Silent Way on the ECM aesthetic has been well documented elsewhere.

[A Lark Ascending]

Yours is also a statement of criticism. We all know that what I say is my own opinion. To reiterate that in everything I write would be a waste of time.

Criticism of criticism. Not of someone's creative output that is not to one's taste.

I wouldn't congratulate yourself too much for having stimulated debate. This happens every time ECM is mentioned ('I'm too cool to like ECM' is a pose only marginally younger than the label itself).

For your next trick, try telling the world that K%$£* J%$*&& isn't very good. You might...just possibly...strike a nerve.

Edited January 28, 2012 by A Lark Ascending

[JETman]

You want producers that force American jazzers to record things they do not necessarily want to record? Try Teekens at Criss Cross or Tetsuo Hara (in conjunction with an American, Todd Barkan) of Venus Records to name just two.

Manfred Eicher exists on a whole other plane --- adventurous, probing, always looking for something new. These other producers are just looking to recreate Blue Note's glory days. Now, THAT's boring.

[Guy Berger]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

I don't know how much this will apply to the two records in question, but on the most recent Motian album (which I liked a lot) there was a highly unrepresentative selection of performances, tilted toward (surprise surprise) ballad tempos. So the ECM aesthetic, whatever you feel about it, can sneak into live recordings too.

[JETman]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

I don't know how much this will apply to the two records in question, but on the most recent Motian album (which I liked a lot) there was a highly unrepresentative selection of performances, tilted toward (surprise surprise) ballad tempos. So the ECM aesthetic, whatever you feel about it, can sneak into live recordings too.

That was NOT the ECM aesthetic. That was the Motian aesthetic.

[jeffcrom]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

I don't know how much this will apply to the two records in question, but on the most recent Motian album (which I liked a lot) there was a highly unrepresentative selection of performances, tilted toward (surprise surprise) ballad tempos. So the ECM aesthetic, whatever you feel about it, can sneak into live recordings too.

That was NOT the ECM aesthetic. That was the Motian aesthetic.

And I never thought that criticism of the Motian album was very accurate. Yeah, most of the pieces start at a slow tempo (or slow free non-tempo), but many of them go somewhere else entirely. Try playing drop-the-needle in the middle of one of those "ballads" and see what it sounds like.

Edited January 28, 2012 by jeffcrom

[Face of the Bass]

Yours is also a statement of criticism. We all know that what I say is my own opinion. To reiterate that in everything I write would be a waste of time.

Criticism of criticism. Not of someone's creative output that is not to one's taste.

I wouldn't congratulate yourself too much for having stimulated debate. This happens every time ECM is mentioned ('I'm too cool to like ECM' is a pose only marginally younger than the label itself).

For your next trick, try telling the world that K%$£* J%$*&& isn't very good. You might...just possibly...strike a nerve.

I just find it interesting that people get very hostile (and their attacks often very personal) when someone raises an opinion that is not adulatory towards the label. As for the history of ECM-bashing...I don't know of it and you don't see it on these forums that often. But I DO know that there are many out there who share my opinion, and it's not because they are trying to establish how cool they are. It's because they think the label's output is mostly boring and repetitive. I'm several years younger than the ECM label is and post 1970 jazz for me is best summarized by the EFI movement that has been well documented on the European labels I mentioned earlier. Again, ECM puts out the occasional fine record but the overall impression of the music recorded on ECM is that it is bourgeois and indulgent.

[David Ayers]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

I don't know how much this will apply to the two records in question, but on the most recent Motian album (which I liked a lot) there was a highly unrepresentative selection of performances, tilted toward (surprise surprise) ballad tempos. So the ECM aesthetic, whatever you feel about it, can sneak into live recordings too.

That was NOT the ECM aesthetic. That was the Motian aesthetic.

And I never thought that criticism of the Motian album was very accurate. Yeah, most of the pieces start at a slow tempo (or slow free non-tempo), but many of them go somewhere else entirely. Try playing drop-the-needle in the middle of one of those "ballads" and see what it sounds like.

Yes a great record and full of musical life. I think it is true in that case that Motian decided the compositions he wanted to feature, but it also can be acknowledged that editing choices can in principle affect the aesthetic of even a live record. The Evan Parker CD I mentioned is presented whole, and the Roscoe material is edited down (there was too much I suppose, or not all good enough) and presented out of sequence (to make more musical sense of what was left, I suppose). I don't get the impression that Eicher was there chanting 'It must schving!' or equivalent. Where would we be without German record producers - and their engineers, photographers and cover designers creating a memorable product identity?

[Guy Berger]

The two records I was talking about, FWIW, were live recordings taken from a specially comissioned festival. So it is hard to argue that the music itself is geared to become an ECM commodity (in any case no-one slamming ECM seems to have heard these records). So only the engineering could be objected to, and I'd say that it is still possible to listen through the engineering to the music, if you don't like the engineering, and we are all accustomed to doing that, sometimes with recordings of very inferior quality.

I don't know how much this will apply to the two records in question, but on the most recent Motian album (which I liked a lot) there was a highly unrepresentative selection of performances, tilted toward (surprise surprise) ballad tempos. So the ECM aesthetic, whatever you feel about it, can sneak into live recordings too.

That was NOT the ECM aesthetic. That was the Motian aesthetic.

It has a very different feel than albums recorded under Motian's name for Winter & Winter, or for that matter the live performance I caught at the Vanguard around the same time (with Greg Osby subbing for Chris Potter). Again, this is not a criticism, just a fact.

[A Lark Ascending]

I just find it interesting that people get very hostile (and their attacks often very personal) when someone raises an opinion that is not adulatory towards the label.

Nonsense. It's the blanket dismissal that makes your stance come across like posturing.

ECM has been around for as long as I have listened to jazz and was one route way in for me. Like most listeners who value the label overall, I don't like everything it does. The Italian musicians it records - Trovesi, Bollani, Rava - I generally much prefer elsewhere. And some of the Nordic stuff is just too detached for my ears. But I have no problem seeing that people listening from other contexts will hear it differently.

As for the history of ECM-bashing...I don't know of it and you don't see it on these forums that often.

Just do a search on ECM - there are always people falling over themselves to declare to the world how much they dislike ECM. Almost as popular a posture as Kenny G, Wynton or KJ bashing.

..but the overall impression of the music recorded on ECM is that it is bourgeois and indulgent.

Out of interest, are you dismissing it as bourgeois as a card carrying member of the proletariat? Or is your dismissal of it as bourgeois from a more aristocratic background - the music of parvenus and shopkeepers who should really know their place in the social hierarchy?

In this day and age 'bourgeois' is utterly meaningless as criticism. And in what way is the music on ECM any more indulgent than any 'art' music that exists for the 'artist' to express themselves rather than serve a social purpose? Sound like you are hurling accusations you have picked off a shelf somewhere.

Edited January 28, 2012 by A Lark Ascending

[David Ayers]

I just find it interesting that people get very hostile (and their attacks often very personal) when someone raises an opinion that is not adulatory towards the label. As for the history of ECM-bashing...I don't know of it and you don't see it on these forums that often. But I DO know that there are many out there who share my opinion, and it's not because they are trying to establish how cool they are. It's because they think the label's output is mostly boring and repetitive. I'm several years younger than the ECM label is and post 1970 jazz for me is best summarized by the EFI movement that has been well documented on the European labels I mentioned earlier. Again, ECM puts out the occasional fine record but the overall impression of the music recorded on ECM is that it is bourgeois and indulgent.

I'm not hostile and I can see where you are coming from. I am trying to look inside this label a bit more and I am reminding myself (1) how many good and interesting recordings there are even if I do not especially like either the music or the engineering (2) how many good records they did and do which I do actually like - I mean when you study the list there are a lot, actually (3) I am also thinking how much they contributed to engineering of jazz or jazz-derived records back in the day when mixing standards often came from jazz rock and were garish and also when most vinyl (especially US vinyl) was pretty poor (4) I am taking stock too of how much variety they generated and how many new aesthetics they have promoted (5) and how they presented many artists I do really like to a large public under a commercially secure umbrella. Middle of the road? But less so than almost any of the hard bop LPs and labels we love here. Much less so, really: Evan Parker's performance at the Huddersfield festival (an avant-garde hardcore gathering) on Moment's Energy would never have made it to any jazz label, major or minor. What hasn't ECM done - yes, their Coltrane was Jarrett, so not quite there on that front, and some big names are absent - Brotzmann entirely, I think, same for Cecil Taylor, Braxton never under his own name, and very few of the FMP set. Etc.

[JSngry]

Where would we be without German record producers - and their engineers, photographers and cover designers creating a memorable product identity?

In the world of Chuck Nessa & Nessa Records?

Not a bad place to be...

I'll say this about ECM - many, many great records over the years, none of which "changed my life" or anything, but still quite a distinguished catalog.

And a lot of stuff that I really don't, won't, and can't give even a clean rat's ass about. Oh well. Now that we're at 2012, probably more of those than the other, and by a comfortable margin.

And a few "WTFs", like the Sam Rivers & George Adams mentioned earlier. I'll never believe that Eicher never exerts producer's influence. I'm not that big a chump....

However...

If I could have my choice between hearing the music on a great ECM record presented without the ECM recording/production/EQ/whatever/etc "sound", I'd jump at that opportunity like Bob Beamon in Mexico City, even if it means losing the time-defying slooooow decay that puts Lester's version of "I Only Have Eyes For You" into another time-space continuum altogether. That's the exception that more than proves the rule. Besides, that groove don't need no mechanical assistance to be that groove, if you know what I mean.

As far as the music on the many non-great ECM records, the best thing IS silence, and there's no shortage of that. So why settle for next-best?

Edited January 28, 2012 by JSngry

[A Lark Ascending]

As far as the music on the many non-great ECM records, the best thing IS silence, and there's no shortage of that. So why settle for next-best?

Delete ECM from that quote:

As far as the music on the many non-great records, the best thing IS silence, and there's no shortage of that. So why settle for next-best?

The trouble is, with us all coming from such different listening contexts, we'll never agree on what records are non-great.

Best to show some respect for the different listening preferences of others and avoid blanket dismissals.

[JSngry]

No, best not to scold those who know their preferences & state them as such. That shows both respect and understanding.

Respect by itself is for toadies, understanding by itself for catatonics and/or manipulators.