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Brian Kahanek - Thanks Thorn!

brian was in several of my classes at north texas.

just downloaded this a few months ago;

https://www.facebook.com/permalink.php?story_fbid=10153258339814271&id=173727604270

also the latest wayne krantz

feeling nostalgic;

Edited by Brooks
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Finally getting around to spinning this 2 LP set. All new songs written by Rod. Recaptures the pub rock vibe of his early Mercury albums.

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To celebrate the 35th annversary of 'ATCWR''s release as a single this week, I've been cranking WACF by VH.

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Reveling in nostalgia and my advancing age. It's a bright sunny day here in Seattle, so on an errand run I opened the sunroof and all the windows on the Town Car and blasted this from the CD changer in the trunk:

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It's all 27 of the Beatles' #1 hits.

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Ben Webster, See You at the Fair, recorded soon after the 1964 New York World's Fair. Webster is on the short list of legendary tenor saxes who made their mark in big bands, in there with Coleman Hawkins and Lester Young. Webster was discovered and featured by Cab Calloway. Webster has a big, fat tone and a melodic style that tends to explore the lower reaches of the tenor sax. He has a sound like a big warm blanket, and he's a very melodic improvisor.

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Of interest (to me) is that the primary pianist on this album is Roger Kellaway, who wrote a lot of TV and movie music, including the opening and closing songs in "All in the Family." Also, my first fiance babysat his kids when she was in high school. He had a collection of mid-'50s 2-seater Thunderbirds I saw when she took me on a tour of her old neighborhood.

From about the same era I later spun:

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I was 10 when the Beatles recordings hit the USA, but we didn't hear this album at the time. It was released March 1963, but we didn't hear The Beatles until December that year. By that time, The Beatles had already released two albums in the UK. Anyway, for a freshman effort, this is a very well-developed band with tight rhythm section, dense and accurate vocal harmonies, excellent original material, and mastery of interesting covers.

Best of all, finally. after 51 years EMI went back to the original ANALOG mono master tape and made a world class heavy vinyl reissue. I hear all kinds of richness and skill I missed in the thin sounding Capitol stereo pressings. As popular as the Beatles were anyway, I wonder how apeshit we would all have gone if we could have heard their recordings this way from the beginning. Great time.

Edited by JohnnyB
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Spun this one today, A Meeting by the River. It's Ry Cooder with East Indian VM Bhatt playing various acoustic slide guitar (or guitar-like instruments) augmented by drone and tablas. Bhatt brought his drone player from India, Cooder brought his table-playing son.

It's recorded with a very simply arranged (Blumlein) pair of microphones in real time, all improvised, and no edits or punch-ins AFAIK. The mic arrangement makes for a very 3-dimensional stereo presentation and I spun the 2 LP 45 rpm pressing. This is a great sounding album in any format, but especially the 45 rpm 200g LPs really put them in the room with you with the organic realness of an all-analog signal chain..

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Edited by JohnnyB
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Blues Karloff - Ready For Judgement Day. Classic blues rock stuff.

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I just took delivery of The Beatles in Mono this week and am rediscovering this crazy but brilliant road trip of an album.

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In mono the jet doesn't take off from right to left in Back in the USSR, but the mix and EQ on that song and the whole album, track by track, is fantastic. I hear lots more into the mix, the tonal balance is much more musical, and it better showcases The Beatles' creativity and artistry.

When it came out I never really got to know it other than the songs that got airplay or that I heard at parties. A double Beatles album was expensive, about $55 in today's money and I didn't buy one back then. So I never got a sense of the full sweep of this album. Now that I have a much better sounding one, it's a pleasure to work my way through it. I've done it once already and will probably spin through all four sides twice more before I've owned it for a week.

It parallels the turbulent '60s, with hard rock, fun songs, sentimental songs, raucous songs, and what sound to me like primal scream songs. In that sense I consider it iconic of the decade and specific year it came out.

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This came in the same shipment with my new mono white album. Got around to spinning it yesterday, which, speaking of, is the only Parlophone record where McCartney's "Yesterday" appeared.

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Of course it's a good album with some really good songs, but for density of quality songwriting on a soundtrack, I give the nod to the Parlophone (NOT the Universal Studios crap) "Hard Day's Night" soundtrack.

Edited by JohnnyB
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88 Basie Street

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Recorded in '83, released about when Basie died the next year. It has some small group numbers with Joe Pass on guitar.

Dennis Mackrel was the drummer for this one. He was 21 at the time, and is now the director of the continuing Count Basie Orchestra. He was the last musician in the band who was personally hired by Basie.

Followed it with "Fancy Pants." Recorded at the very end of 1983 when Basie was 79, about 4 mos. before he died. Dennis Mackrel on drums again, and another guitar legend, Freddie Green, the ultimate rhythm guitarist, who was 72 at the time. You'd never know the ages of these guys by the energy on this album.

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Any Basie is a study in tight ensemble, great sense of swing, and the most buttoned-down rhythm sections ever.

Edited by JohnnyB
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Crucified Barbara - In Distortion We Trust

Would this happen to be what awaits me on my kitchen table? Thanks Steve! Uber props on handwriting. Your return address reads way cool and my address looks like I wriote it myself.

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