This Monophonic Microgroove BlogCritics Post Is Playable On Monophonic And Stereo Phonographs. It Cannot Become Obsolete. It Will Continue To Be A Source Of Outstanding Sound Reproduction Providing The Finest Monophonic Performance From Any Phonograph.
It's been a while. Too much work, not enough time for diggin'. This past Saturday provided a nice big chunk of free afternoon. I did not hesitate: off to the bins I went.
Not as many abscurities this time around, but still, a big load of fun. Like a lot of pleasures in life, sometimes it's more about the process than the outcome.
Anthony Phillips - Private Parts & Pieces VII: Slow Waves, Soft Stars
A collection of composed and improvised work by one of the founders of Genesis. I'm a sucker for almost anything that features old analog-ish synthesizers - on this record he used a Roland Jupiter 8 and an ARP 2600 Polymoog.
Miles Davis - Tutu
Miles was very hit-or-miss with his latter career pop material. I can go either way with this album. Some tunes are great ("Splatch" and "Full Nelson") while others slide way too close to funkified smooth jazz. It's that danged mid-80's sound. Very cool photos of Miles inside and out though.
Bobby Hutcherson - Conception: The Gift of Love
Some pretty inspired stuff from vibist Hutcherson. Apparently, his wife was expecting at the time these compositions were put together. Kinda funny what love can do to a person.
Keith Jarrett - Standards Vol. 2
One among many of Jarrett's stellar albums of standards with Gary Peacock on bass and Jack DeJohnette on drums. This record just might contain the most annoying segment of "Jarrett-whining" ever committed to tape. Those vocalizations don't get in the way of some ultra-fine jazzifications.
The Howard Roberts Quartet - H. R. Is A Dirty Guitar Player
Back when I was taking guitar lessons my teacher turned me on to a whole pile of players like Jim Hall (my teacher was so into Hall that he actually attended a taping of the Merv Griffin just because Hall was in Griffin's band), Gene Bertoncini and Howard Roberts. I've still got the tape made from my teacher's record, but since I can't play the tape on anything anymore, this album had to come home. Great guitar trio+organ music.
Ornette Coleman - The Best of Ornette Coleman
I don't have much Ornette on vinyl (besides Body Meta and my prized copy of Free Jazz) so this sampler from Atlantic was a no-brainer: "Una Muy Bonita", "Embraceable You", "Blues Connotation", "Lonely Woman", "Ramblin", "C & D". Great music, plus some killer Nat Hentoff liner notes.
Branford Marsalis - Royal Garden Blues
An older Branford album with some crazy-good musicians guesting including Ellis Marsalis, Ralph Peterson, Ron Carter and Charnett Moffett.
Prince - Around The World In A Day
Never had this in my collection before. Dang, "Raspberry Beret" sounds fine on vinyl.
Leo Kottke - Ice Water, Chewing Pine
While I'm generally a bigger fan of Kottke's solo guitar records, there's always something of interest lurking on the rest of his albums. Ice Water has his version of Tom T. Hall's classic "Pamela Brown". Chewing Pine has "Regards From Chuck Pink" and the confessionally titled "The Scarlatti Rip-Off." Kottke's a funny guy and a beyond great guitar player.
(First posted on Mark Is Cranky)
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