I really love some Mal Waldron, so I decided to open it up and give it a listen. That era of Prestige was pretty much just blowing session after blowing session, but this leans more toward the bluesy laidback style, which is a nice change of pace. It's a keeper.
Continuing with Gene Ammons today. Today, it's one of his more famous albums, Boss Tenors. It pairs him up with Sonny Stitt and they plow their way through some standards. Makes for good breakfast music. This is a mid-70s Japanese pressing of a 1962 album, and I highly recommend going that route with jazz albums whenever you can. They're usually pretty affordable, sound good, and I've yet to find one that wasn't in great condition. No idea why; my guess is that by the mid-70s jazz fans had figured out that they should take care of their records. Or maybe they just didn't get played as often as rock albums did.
The other Ammons/Stitt collaboration in my collection was recorded in late 1973, about six months before Gene died. Even though I own the album I didn't have it in my discogs collection, nor did I have it marked as owned in RYM. It also doesn't seem to be available on Spotify or Tidal. Seems sad, as this music deserves to be acknowledged. Looks like you can get copies of this for less than $10 on discogs right now, actually. Maybe give it a shot, it's fun music with Junior Mance, Sam Jones and Duke Person also involved.
One more Gene Ammons before I switch artists, genres, and advance several decades. I think this is Gene's best known album. My particular copy is an Analogue Productions pressing from early 2016. Gene's in fine form here with one of my favorites Tommy Flanagan on the piano backing him up.
Next we have Arcade Fire's debut, one of the absolutely masterpieces from my college years that still holds up. I'm singing along (loudly) with Neighborhood #1 as I'm typing this. I have the 2009 reissue and it appears to be available and affordable. You should pick up a copy.
Arcade Fire avoids the sophomore slump on Neon Bible by putting out some real solid songwriting. I don't think of this as a concept album the way I do Funeral, but even without that thematic structure this album has a lot of high points. Keep The Car Running might be my most listened to AF song.
Edit: It'd been a while since I'd listened to the whole thing, and to be honest the middle of the album doesn't really do a lot for me. I enjoy Ocean of Noise, but Well and Antichrist are almost filler for me. Disappointing. I think it's still a keeper, but it's closer than I would have thought 12 hours ago.
Edit again: What am I doing here? I gave this a 3/5 compared to a 4.5/5 for Funeral. I'm making the tough call and moving on from this one.
With the third of my three Arcade Fire albums I'm going to try listening to it before passing judgement instead of relying on hazy memories. A wild idea, I know. I will say that the "emperor wears new clothes" lyric in Ready to Start has always irritated me and I don't know why.
Edit: I'm ready to declare Modern Man the best song in their first three albums simply because it's catchy as hell without sound like any of their other songs.
Edit: I'd say this is a 3.5/5. Quite a bit better than NB, but at a whopping 65 minutes there's just too much going on. I think between the two albums I could make a solid 45 minute spotify playlist called Neon 'Burbs that would be plenty for me. Maybe I'll work on that this afternoon.
1. Month of May 3:50
2. No Cars Go 5:43
3. The Suburbs 5:15
4. We Used To Wait 5:01
5. Ocean of Noise 4:53
6. Modern Man 4:40
7. Ready to Start 4:16
8. Sprawl II (Mountains Beyond Mountains) 5:26
9. Keep The Car Running 3:29
There, that's 42 tight minutes; an LP that would get a lot of play for me. This was a completely unnecessary thought experiment that likely ruins two albums that a lot of people like, but now I feel better letting The Suburbs go to someone that will enjoy it more than I do.
Next on my vinyl tour is one of my favorite hard rock/prog albums, Atomic Rooster's 1970 release Death Walks Behind You. America got a raw deal with a cover featuring a steampunk chicken. I bought it, but I knew there were other versions out there.
Thumbnail. Click to enlarge.
The UK version, and the much rarer Singapore/Malaysia/Hong Kong version that I recently obtained look like this:
Sometimes I feel like I'm saying hello to an old friend while going through these records, and sometimes I feel like I'm putting the record on the spot and making it justify its position on my shelf. The latter is the case with Chet Atkins. The albums always have appealing cover art, and they're always well priced, and Chet was an influential guitar player. However, I've never once finished a hard day at work and said "man, I need to pour myself a beer and hear Chet's take on "A Summer's Place" one more time." That hasn't happened, and while listening to Chet's Workshop right now I believe I'm ready to open up two slots on my record shelf for new material. So this will be the last time I hear these albums, instead passing them on to their next hopefully more enthusiastic owner.
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grogg
