Epinions Recent Reviews for artdeco73

MOVED: Treasure from the Back of the Fridge: Coopers Best Extra Stout

Tue, 15 Jul 2003 12:51:58 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Note: Thanks, Bruguru,
for pointing out that this beer is actuall...

If I Play, They Will Listen... Maybe

Mon, 16 Jun 2003 21:45:44 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - For a musician, few pleasures compare to that of acquiring a new instrument. The desire to lock you...

The Real McCoy?.. I hope not

Wed, 14 May 2003 02:09:24 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - To hear a sub-par performance by an artist who not only plays music you enjoy but who was instrumental in your discovering and growing to love an entire genre is a disappointing experience. To realize that such mediocrity may have become the...

Voices From the Not So Distant Past

Wed, 30 Apr 2003 01:13:06 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Retro is a funny concept, at least in music. While intended to evoke, and frequently even imitate, the music of an earlier age, retro recordings in fact appeal to a generation that in most cases has little or no awareness of the original. By...

Go North, Young Man

Wed, 9 Apr 2003 02:18:43 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Even the most optimistic observers of the current war in Iraq are under no illusion that even under the best possible scenario rebuilding the country politically and economically will be wrought with perils and pitfalls at every turn. What is certain,...

Not Your Father's Big Band

Mon, 31 Mar 2003 19:45:00 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Anyone who believes that big band music is dead or, worse, irrelevant, needs only to listen to Dave Holland’s What Goes Around (ECM, 2002). Originally formed the way most groups are these days -- as a live attraction for the summer jazz...

A Shadow of Its Former Self

Fri, 28 Mar 2003 01:32:57 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - No jazz fan, however casual, either in the US or abroad, is completely unfamiliar with Downbeat. Along with the long-defunct Metronome, it had once been the most influential jazz magazine in the world. Winning a Downbeat poll meant...

Clear and Present Danger

Wed, 19 Mar 2003 23:32:37 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - As U.S. forces are poised on the Iraqi border, ready to invade the country and overthrow its dictator Saddam Hussein, public opinion about the war in the U.S. and abroad falls all over the spectrum. It is not my goal either to advocate or criticize the...

Oh! It's Another Supergroup!

Fri, 14 Mar 2003 03:12:06 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - In the liner notes to Oh!, the first album by the “supergroup” ScoLoHoFo – John Scofield (“Sco”), guitar; Joe Lovano (“Lo”), saxophones; Dave Holland (“Ho”), bass and Al Foster (“Fo”), drums –...

The Trio Never Sleeps

Fri, 7 Mar 2003 02:09:49 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Fred Hersch is a remarkable musician for a number of reasons. He has created a large body of unaccompanied work, both live and in the studio, in a genre that prizes interplay and communication between musicians, yet this track record has not dulled his...

Good things in small (and expensive) packages

Wed, 5 Mar 2003 02:18:34 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - When the CD format first hit the market, portability was not a primary concern, perhaps not a concern at all. Good old cassette has been available for over a decade and provided all the portability listeners wanted. CD had a singular goal – to...

Thinking with His Organ

Mon, 27 Aug 2001 01:00:35 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - More than any other instrument, more than the electric guitar even, the Hammond organ's reputation is its own worst enemy. Mention the Hammond B3, and nightmares of larger-than-life, self-indulgent classic rock bands of the seventies spring immediately...

The sound of blankets

Thu, 2 Aug 2001 22:25:52 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - It can be successfully argued that the glory days of the two-channel receiver are past. The two-channel world is alive and well despite the onslaught of surround sound formats geared towards video reproduction, but while there is no shortage of...

More Than Skin-Deep (But Not Much More)

Sat, 21 Jul 2001 02:06:55 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Surround, surround, surround. Dolby Digital, DTS, DVD-A, SACD, 5.1, 6.1, 7.1, Matrix, yadda-yadda. Right? Maybe. Multi-channel audio formats, more of them every day, it seems, are the talk of the audio community these days, and home theatre...

The Future of Mediocre Jazz Writing

Sun, 15 Apr 2001 19:44:15 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Future events such as these will affect you in the future --Criswell

When a book titled Future Jazz by no less a name than Howard Mandel comes out, it is perfectly reasonable to expect that one, it will be about the future of...

Fiddler on the Steps

Mon, 12 Mar 2001 22:11:37 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - In an era when musical eclecticism is more fashionable than bell-bottoms in 1977, resulting in some appallingly incongruent recordings, British vocalist/songwriter/fiddler Eliza Carthy acquits herself better than most. On her latest release Angels...

The Devil Is in the Sidemen

Sun, 4 Mar 2001 23:24:34 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - One of the wonderful things about the world of jazz is that fascinating surprises await even the most seasoned fan around every corner. For me, one of the great discoveries of last year was Joe Locke. The California-born, New York-bred vibraphonist has...

It's Only a Theory

Tue, 30 Jan 2001 00:52:20 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - There is a good reason why so many excellent musicians I know have not become professionals. It is just too much of an uphill battle. The competition is so strong and the ways of record companies, both major and independent, are so mysterious and...

Grand Scam?

Sun, 17 Dec 2000 21:38:02 GMT

rating: 2/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - In a recent editorial in the Down Beat magazine (December 2000), the great jazz pianist Chick Corea remarked that "every individual has the native right to their own tastes. What each person sees as being beautiful is beautiful to them." This...

Back with a Vengeance

Mon, 11 Dec 2000 23:00:00 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Losing the ability to create is the worst tragedy that can befall an artist. It is worse than death. Even those that recover are frequently so demoralized that they never regain their talents or alter the flow of their creativity in fundamental ways...

All The Right Places

Mon, 4 Dec 2000 23:20:02 GMT

rating: 5/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Jazz music, although reasonably healthy and not really lacking in artistic vitality, is afflicted by numerous problems in this day and age. The most obvious is the expendability of young talent. Record companies seem to view up-and-coming jazz...

From Hippie Icon to Chamber Stylist

Fri, 17 Nov 2000 00:03:46 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - From capacity crowds at San Francisco's legendary Fillmore West to the rarefied atmosphere and crystalline sound of the studios at ECM records seems like an unlikely journey, but it is precisely one that Charles Lloyd took over the last thirty-odd years,...

A Musical Revolutionary in The Hands of His Demons

Fri, 10 Nov 2000 01:03:31 GMT

rating: 4/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - The best author of a musician's biography is another musician unless, of course, you are looking for dirt and gossip about the subject's personal life. Writing about a colleague, assuming he or she can write, a musician will offer an analysis of the...

Space-challenged Audio Skinflints, Step This Way

Thu, 2 Nov 2000 00:59:54 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - Ahh, the Weekend System. Those of us who read audio equipment reviews in any number of print or online publications frequently see those golden-eared purveyors of purportedly unbiased hi-fi wisdom mention their weekend systems and talk about how the...

MIDItations on The Art of Piano Playing

Thu, 26 Oct 2000 23:36:41 GMT

rating: 3/5 by: Epinions Author artdeco73 - On some level, solo piano recordings are the quintessence of jazz. More so than the polyphony of early twenties New Orleans, the big bands of the Swing era, or any other style. The first records that can in any way be construed as jazz, or at least its...