Blue Train (Deluxe Edition)

[Scott Dolan]

I doubt they are looking to replicate any experience. If so, they may want to try out the VR market, potentially. 

They’re just looking to cash in with the completists, and/or those that haven’t previously heard these versions. 

[JSngry]

Now...if they could do VR of a jazzclub with a jukbox, and really do it right, then I'd say yeah, let's do this. But then you gotta trust the programmers to talk to somebody besides Wynton-types, and see, that' where it all goes bad,

People should just buy a jukebox, fix it up, and fill it with 45s. That's the sensible way to approach 45s these days.

[Scott Dolan]

Though not the most fiscally responsible/viable way, I suspect...

[JSngry]

No, it's not. I play my 45s on a crappy stereo with bullshit speakers. Close enough. But I'll be damned if i get excited about digital versions of 45 mixes. Unless there's edits, BFD most of the time.

[Scott Dolan]

The only thing that gets me about sets like this, or “complete” box sets, is the sequencing. 

I mean, Blue Train is a wonderful tune, but who the fuck needs it five times in a row?! Parker’s Complete Savoy & Dial was a huge offender in that regard. (11 Marmaduke’s on disc 7!!!)

Jesus, give us the shortest false start, and then choose the best of the alternate takes by consensus, and move the fuck on! 

 

Edited December 20, 2017 by Scott Dolan

[JSngry]

I like complete session documents. Then again, I have a sense of how a recording session can go in real time, so maybe that's why I don't get immediately bored by that.

The Sinatra boots of Reprise session tapes are a total gas in that regard. I've actually had Sinatra skeptics listen to them and become convinced that Sinatra really was all the musician he was claimed to be just from hearing how he worked a session. That cat heard everything everybody did and wasn't bashful about getting corrections made, especially with himself. The Ring-A-Ding-Ding session in particularly amazing in that regard.

I don't know that I need to hear the session tapes of every damn record ever made, but for special record and/or special people, it pleases me to get a better sense of the "real time" music that brought forth the record which is almost never a document of the "real time" music played, it's selected and presented excerpts. As "product", that's completely legit. As "honesty" though, it's at best, incomplete, and on occasion dishonest (as documentation, not as product).

My "complaint" with the Bird Savoy set was that they stopped the recording as soon as the take broke down. If there had been tape, they might have just let it run. I'd love to hear what happened after one take broke down and before the next one began. This last Bird With Strings thing hac some of those discussions, and once or twice is enough, but still, I enjoy it those few times and am glad to have them "on file".

That's just me, though. I know plenty of people who would not share this notion for anything.

[Scott Dolan]

No, that I can see as a point of interest. Still, it would be fleeting, for me anyway. 

Like the recent big box blowout of everything, and we mean it!, from the Sgt. Pepper sessions. Trying out songs before buying, chatter, changes here, chatter, more changes, sometimes unrecognizable variations on what became the final product. Fascinating stuff! 

But there’s a good chance I may never revisit any of it. Maybe I will once a decade, who knows? But it’s never going to be a primary, secondary, or thirdary draw for me. 

[JSngry]

Yeah, there's a reason why most of that "deep" session stuff comes out via bootleg first, if ever. But there's also a reason why people go there.

I think I stopped with Beatles Purple Chick after Sgt. Pepper. But if I got in the mood again, I could see finishing it out. The White Album sessions I can see being endlessly fascinating or wholly tedious. But that's Purple Chick, and nobody's asking me for crazyass money to hear it, and because of that, "official" releases of it with cleaned up sound for studio chatter and track laying...just not worth it, imo, unless you get something REALLY special/interesting, and I think they took care of most of that on the Anthologies.

[Scott Dolan]

Sgt. Peppers was my first album ever. Got it while I was in the third grade, and pretty much had their entire catalog by my tenth birthday. Those cats kept this 10 year old boy company while he dealt with the divorce of his parents, and moving away from his home town. 

So they have a very special place reserved in my heart, which is the only reason I gladly paid triple digits for a big box blowout of the very first album I ever owned. 

[JSngry]

Have you done the Purple Chick thing yet? No idea if they're still available as commonly as they used to be, but that's a truly exemplary series as far as bootlegs go.

I guess they also did a Beach Boy series, and there was a parallel project...some color frog, Blue Frog? that offered all kinds of non-musical Beatles items. I took one of John and Ringo have a stoned improv session, piano and "vocals" and it was so...meaningless that I stopped there. I mean, greatness at work is one thing, off-hours stoned rambling is too, uh... "personal" for me to too much of a fuck about. But obviously not everybody feels that way! Something like Clifford Brown and his wife reading the news is sweet, but that's jsut one item, not an entire subset of collectability.

 

[Scott Dolan]

No, I was completely unfamiliar with the Purple Chick material until you mentioned it some time back on the Sgt. Pepper’s thread. Haven’t taken the time to seek it out. 

[JSngry]

I really don't know where to look for it/them these days. Some of it, (a little) has been made obsolete by the Mono Box, but geez, the making of With The Beatles, the raw studio cuts before all the overdubs...that band genuinely rocked. Paul & Ringo were deep in it in a way that the post-production obscured, imo. Neither George nor John were particualrly great in section roles, but this stuff opened me up to the greatness that both Paul & Ringo were bringing in those days. George Martin clezaned the music up in an agreeably "poppy" way, but damn, just those four guys playing alone...two guys really, but still...up until the Rubber Soul sessions, these raw tracks/session tapes are worth hearing more than once, imo.

[Scott Dolan]

That’s a point few seem to realize about their early material. I Wanna Hold Your Hand and Love Me Do got all the air time, but dive deeper into those albums and it becomes quite clear that I’m Down was a more common approach. Those cats kicked ass far harder than most realize. 

The Ringo thing is an excellent observation, as well. It wasn’t until I spent some quality time with the remastered box that I realized just what a rock solid force he was behind the kit. 

[jdw]

I pre-ordered the Blue Train Deluxe Edition and CD Japan sent me an e-mail on January 26:

"We are sending you this email to let you know that we just received an update from the Universal Music informing us that the release of the item below will be cancelled, unfortunately.
Blue Train [Deluxe Edition] [UHQCD] [Limited Release]
John Coltrane
Release Date: February 21, 2018
Catalog Number: UCCQ-9358 

end quote

 

Did anybody else get the same announcement from CD Japan (or wherever they pre-ordered from)? 

 

 

 

[jazzbo]

My order was also canceled. I did not get this email, I just got a refund and had to look up the fact that my order had disappeared.

[jdw]

Thanks for the confirmation Lon.

John  Vancouver BC

[Late]

On 1/31/2018 at 10:27 PM, jdw said:

We are sending you this email to let you know that we just received an update from Universal Music informing us that the release of the item below will be cancelled, unfortunately.
Blue Train [Deluxe Edition] [UHQCD] [Limited Release]
John Coltrane
Release Date: February 21, 2018
Catalog Number: UCCQ-9358

And now, more than four years after this release was canceled, the "deluxe" edition, with 12 tracks over two discs, is scheduled for release again. 

Google Translate sez:

 

"The only leader work that Coltrane recorded in 1957 and left on Blue Note, the eternal masterpiece "Blue Train". One of the most popular works in jazz history, but to commemorate the 65th anniversary of recording, the complete version "Blue Train: Complete Masters" which includes the latest remastered original album and 7 other takes. Release is decided. This is a historic excavation that this is the first time that 4 of the 7 other takes recorded have been recorded. The monaural version of the original album will also be released at the same time with the latest remastering. This release is part of Blue Note's recent reissue series, Tone Poet. Under the supervision of John Harley, a producer nicknamed "The Poet of Sound," virtuoso Kevin Gray carefully remastered from the original analog master.

 

Coltrane was at the bottom of his life when Miles Davis Quintet was fired for heroin addiction in 1957. However, after a long-term co-starring with Thelonious Monk at Five Spot Cafe, he cut off heroin and began to perform passionately again. "Blue Train" is a rare work created by Coltrane who has achieved such a miracle revival, and it became an eternal masterpiece that remains in the history of jazz as well as an early masterpiece that he himself is deeply proud of. This excavation is likely to be a historic event that reveals the whole picture of such a masterpiece for the first time.

[jazzbo]

CDJapan shows UHQCD for the "Complete Masters" and an UHQCD mono disc as well, and SHM-SACD for both stereo and mono versions.

[felser]

I already have two versions of this ("Ultimate" and RVG) on my shelves.  That's good enough for me.  BTW, anyone know how to play the Ultimate bonus content on modern 64-bit PC's?

[mjzee]

Just got the July Newsletter from Blue Note.  It includes:

JOHN COLTRANE BLUE TRAIN TONE POET VINYL EDITIONS OUT 9/16

John Coltrane’s 1st masterpiece Blue Trainwill be released in 2 all-analog Tone Poet Vinyl Editions on Sept. 16: a 1-LP mono pressing of the original album & the 2-LP stereo collection Blue Train: The Complete Masters which includes a 2nd disc featuring 7 alternate takes, none of which have been released previously on vinyl. The Complete Masters comes with a booklet featuring never-before-seen session photos by Francis Wolff& an essay by Ashley Kahn. Both Tone Poet Editions were produced by Joe Harley, mastered by Kevin Gray from the original analog master tapes & pressed on 180g vinyl at RTI. The Complete Masters will also be released as a 2-CD set & digital collection.

[Bluesnik]

Have that and there's no way I'm getting it again.

[Rooster_Ties]

17 hours ago, Bluesnik said:

Have that and there's no way I'm getting it again.

Blue Train is definitely mostly a pretty good session, but it's nowhere near the end-all and be-all of records that some people make it out to be.

I'm always a tad disappointed when I put it on, not because I'm expecting it to be something it isn't -- but given its notoriety (and sales over time), I think its 'sales success' (and the bit of mystique that surrounds it) has exceeded its critical success (imho) by a bit.

Maybe "mystique" is too strong a word -- but I could probably think of half-a-dozen similar Blue Note albums from that year (and the year before, and after) that I probably like just as much or more.

Edited July 29, 2022 by Rooster_Ties

[danasgoodstuff]

IMHO Blue 'Trane is something special, I will most likely get the mono LP and the stereo + outtakes on CD. I currently own a Liberty era pressing that I've had for ages.

[Pim]

Not the best Blue Note session nor Trane’s best record. But i still like it a lot! Says it all about the quality of Tranes output. This was one of the first jazz cd’s I bought myself. I must have been 15 years old or something like that.

I still needed this on vinyl and this is a great opportunity to get it in high resolution. Of course I could make some cynical remarks about the ridiculous price but I’ll get it anyway.

[RiRiIII]

The prices at udiscover german store are high: £62/75EUR + £46/55EUR + £12 for EU shipping

Edited July 29, 2022 by RiRiIII