Children of the Danned

They looked like insects, with no vibe coming from them. Like librarians on acid.****** 

Kenny Vance

The Book of the Music:

Did you see the "movie of the book"? (I don't really care. Just work with me on this, okay?)

I didn't name either a movie or book but you are nonetheless aware of the phrase and its meaning, which is when they (yeah, those bastards again) make a (usually shitty) movie out of a (pretty good) book.

I want to talk about the "book of the music". 

What's that, you say?

Quantum Criminals, by Alex Pappademas and Joan LeMay (2023)

The music in question is by Steely Dan. The text* [Note to self: remember to trademark any/all other coin-able phrases identified here for future monetezation.] is by Alex Pappademas, and the drawings* * are by Joan LeMay.

Pappademas seems to know everything Steely Dan-related, musical or personal. He is painfully aware of this level of his obsession. Yet, it pays off. He is insightful, imaginative, and (very) funny. LeMay draws pictures, not only of the members of Steely Dan (itself a slippery concept) but also - crucially - of the characters in the songs***.

In fact, the book is structured around those characters, whose names emblazon the chapter**** headings. Some are based on real people. Some are real people. The rest are products of Becker and Fagen's twisted imaginations, all intersecting with the lives of Becker, Fagen, et al in some unlikely fashion. LeMay's drawings capture them in all their seedy glory and absurdity, thus adding even more humor and pathos to the occasion. (Actual photos would have ruined the bad vibes.)

Thus, making this one of the best "books of the music" I've ever read. If you're an SD fan be prepared to pull out your old albums to listen along as Pappademas gives his take on Hoops McCann and the El Supremo, the latter of whom I first thought was a person, I then read it on a can***** of the coffee we drink and thought it was that, and now I'm back to it being a person. So, it's an educational experience, too. 

A pretty great book of undeniably great music.

A

The Blog of the Music:

Speaking of which, since you didn't ask, here's my incomplete list of Steely Dan albums in order of preference: 

1. Katy Lied (1975) 

I don't know anyone who puts Katy Lied first, but there you are. It's got everything: great rock guitar, transcendent sax by Phil Woods on "Dr. Wu", sweet and sour singing by Donald Fagen, with occasional help from troublemaker Michael McDonald, dark/heartfelt/both lyrics. And a lot of beautiful music.  

Even a lightweight song like "Everyone's Gone to the Movies" serves to balance out the more soul-wrenching stuff, like "Any World I'm Welcome To". SD with their heart on their rolled-up sleeves, which is a ridiculous thing to say. What can I tell you? My very favorite albums get me to say ridiculous things.  

Great production, too. The book talks about this album as a great attempt at a sonic experience not  quite achieved. I can't imagine what that could have sounded like. 

A+

2-4. A tie between Can't Buy a Thrill (1972), Countdown to Ecstacy,(1973) and Pretzel Logic (1974). All different. All wonderful. 

Thrill is a great early seventies commercial rock album with excellent production. The songs still hold up. A

 

Ecstacy leans more into jazz (and guitar!) and as far as I'm concerned it beats all their later forays into that genre. A

Logic somehow balances all of these elements while keeping each song short and to the point. A 

5-6. A tie between The Royal Scam (1976) and Aja (1977).

Scam, while quite good in terms of execution, is slightly lacking in all the other categories, making it less than compelling. Long on SD attitude, but a little short on SD magic. The only great moment is the guitar solo on "Kid Charlemagne". A-

Aja is their Pretender. a commercial breakthrough that's good but overrated, at least when compared to what they'd accomplished before. A-

7. Gaucho (1980)

Ah, Gaucho amigo! Lately, you've been touted on various internet sites as their real masterpiece. I'd like to attribute this phenomenon to how "art speaks differently to us over time". but it's really more about the internet's voracious appetite for content, which forces it to run the same music through a seemingly random-best-of-list-generater, and then leaving it to some poor schmuck to somehow justify the results. (How about Neil Young's masterpiece Everybody's Rockin'???)

I'll admit to loving "Time Out of Mind", "Third World Man", and to some extent "Gaucho", but    the rest sounds like a band SD might once have mocked. (The Little Feat phenomenon?) One       song can act as a meta-comment or parody. Three or four is a puzzling end-point in their                 misguided quest to sound "sophisticated" (whatever that word means anymore). 

They were fans of 1950s jazz but by the time they were of age only had 1970's jazz to work with. Bad fusion would have been a disaster, but Quiet Storm is just Easy Listening to me. SD               embalmed. And for all that, pretty good.

At least Aja had uniformly excellent solos and highlights like "Deacon Blues". It's a shame it        starts with the infernal electric piano that Donald insists on playing. Give me that good old            unplugged piano he played on albums 1-5.

          B+

As you can see, I'm into early Steely Dan, which they dismiss as "juvenilia". I'd politely tell them to f*ck off but they'd just smirk. Plus, Walter already did.

This all led me to their reunion album. (Everything Must Go is not on my to-do list, nor are their solo albums, except for Donald's wonderful Nightfly, which ranks alongside SD 1,2 and 3.

Two Against Nature (2000)

My first thought was that I wished Donald and Walter still loved rock 'n roll electric guitar as much as they seemed to love jazz electric piano. The jazzy-in-the-worst-way riff three minutes into "Gaslighting Annie" is not appreciated.

The good news is that the singing and playing here are quite good. I do, however, miss the days when you didn't have to wait for the lyrics kick in before liking it. The music would hook you for life and you'd have the rest of your life to get to the words, which here are pretty straightforward, anyway.

Fagen's singing is technically his most skillful. More emotionally remote but also more humorous, and Becker plays a nifty guitar throughout-ish.

It's not as immediately catchy as their best stuff. But at least they're trying here. And it's snappy, unlike Gaucho, which - even now - is still just getting up off its ass.

At the moment in Jaybeeland it has bested Gaucho - not its high points, but way better than its low ones - and is now fighting it out with Scam. I don't see it beating Aja let alone any of the first four albums.

Overall, I could have lived a full, happy life without it, but now that it's here in my house, I'm glad.

A-

"Cousin Dupree"

EXPLANATORY NOTES:

         * text of the book (TM)

       ** drawings of the book (TM)

     *** characters of the songs (TM) obviously

   **** drawings of the characters of the chapters of the book of the music (TM!!!)

 ***** can of the coffee (you can have this one for free)

******  Oh, yeah, that quote at the top is from the man who would become Jay 2.0 of Jay and the Americans, giving his first impression of our heroes when he first met them. Long story. But let's break it down into three parts and assess:

1. Okay, fair.
2. Unforgivable!
3. All is forgiven.

David and Neil's Excellent Adventures

                                                                                                                

"Live Music is Better" Bumper Stickers Should Be Issued!

    Neil Young, "Union Man"                                                                                                                

They might be better off I think the way it seems to me, making up their own shows, which might be better than TV.                                                                

    David Byrne, "Found a Job"                                                                                                    

It takes a lot for me to buy a live album. They're usually a waste. If they do familiar songs faithfully, who needs it? If they do them poorly who needs it? New songs are a plus but it's only rare instances when an entire album is made up of new songs (Running on Empty, Time Fades Away).

If you're lucky you'll run across a well-made live album by a band you're not into yet, so even though there exist studio versions of many of the songs, you haven't heard them, so it's like getting a brand new album that happens to be live. A defacto Time Fades Empty, which is what happened to me when I got the Fleetwood Mac record last year. (and Europe 72, Live Dead, Allmans at Fillmore, etc.)

But there are also those sloppy-as-shit live albums like The Song Remains the Same. And, no, I don't own it but the parts I heard sucked and I'm not gonna sit thru a twenty-six-minute "Dazed and Confused" unless Jake Holmes gets a royalty, and even then.... (Fully expecting Stupid-LZ-Fan-Hate-Mail now.)

And even worse are the ones with perfect renditions of studio cuts like The Eagles Live. They even do a perfect rendition of someone else's cover version of a song! Pathetic. It may be the point of a live show for some people (and to some extent I am one of those people), but a live album?? Never.

The Jaybee Gold Standard For Live Albums (or TJGSFLA, for short(er)) is one with exciting/improved versions of familiar songs - so that it all stands on its own as an album and the document of a live event. It's achieved more often on live jazz albums than rock/pop ones. On one hand, this makes perfect sense, since the jazz ethos is to create something new every time and they have the chops to do it. On the other, you'd think rock n' roll would give one more leeway to be sloppy, but it's surprising what a drag it is to hear your hero sing off-key. The original version of Live at Leeds, with its short tough rockers, and long power-chord-powered classics, works brilliantly. The expanded edition is even better overall, but Roger's better at shouting in this setting than singing the more melodic pop songs that are included.

So it took a long time for me to get these two live albums, which - oddly enough - were recorded around the same time, with Neil at his peak and Talking Heads approaching theirs.

But First, a Major Digression about a Major Digression (That is Still In Progress):

In 1978, I was getting tired of tracking down every last Little Feat album to ever-diminishing returns. I was ripe for something new when Talking Heads caught my attention. They had a cool name, their new  - their second - album had a very cool cover, and their single "Take Me to the River" got played on WNEW FM, the station that defined my horizons (and limitations, it would seem: I had no idea it was a cover of an Al Green song) for the 1970s. Punk seemed like a bridge too far but New Wave was definitely doable. 

I read various music magazines throughout the seventies: classic-rockish Hit Parader, usually, but sometimes the glitter-leaning Circus, which had naughty words (My dad found it and banned it from the house), and occasionally Creem, or even Crawdaddy, but never the Village Voice, which was just asking for trouble, a tabloid being hard to hide between the mattresses. (I can just see my dad picking it up thinking for maybe three seconds it was the Daily News, and then my then-short life flashing before my eyes...)

But I kept hearing about this guy Robert Christgau, who wrote for them who had the gall to NOT like Jackson Browne (actually it was worse than that. He found him boring). This made me very uncomfortable since I was a JB true-believer who nonetheless harbored secret nagging doubts about The Pretender, which is where all my friends jumped on the bandwagon, a little late alas. 

Eventually, my curiosity got the best of me and I bought a copy of The Voice and found a rave review for Talking Heads More Songs About Buildings and Food, by Christgau. His capsule review was - as I would learn - typically dense with ideas, but the phrase that stuck with me was "...so much beautiful (and funky) music...". How about that? I thought. Enthusiasm! (I'd come back for the ideas later.)

It was the push I needed, and hearing MSABAF was life-changing (if you consider music a big part of your life). The first listen was daunting. The first and last songs were fantastic, and each subsequent listen would shake loose another gem until I was a complete convert. (Yet, to this day I warn folks about David Byrne's vocals before giving my blessing.)

Like Little Feat, it wasn't their first album that was my first exposure. And that was a good thing, although I do think Talking Heads:77 is damn near as good as MSABAF, like how Little Feat was almost as good as Feets Don't Fail Me Now.

Fear of Music was a bit too much, though. Too much weird, not enough sweet. "Electric Guitar" and "Animals" were particularly annoying.

Remain in Light was a rebirth that I may only now be fully appreciating. 

This year is the 40th Anniversary of Stop Making Sense. Unless I can see it in a theater without a screaming baby, I'm not interested. When it came out, there was a screaming baby in the theater. Or at least I think it was in the theater. Maybe it was in the movie. (Interesting touch.)

Live and Let Live:

And as good as the movie was I had no desire to buy the accompanying live album. Especially since they had already put one out a couple of years before.

This one:

Talking Heads: The Name of this Band is Talking Heads Expanded (2004)

The earliest TH music, when they were a threesome, captured on video circa 1975 or so, is spare, tuneful, and a bit eerie. Imagine seeing David Byrne for the first time. Certainly interesting but maybe not built to last.

This set picks things up in 1977, after multi-instrumentalist Jerry Harrison (formerly with The Modern Lovers), has joined. His contributions both on guitar and keyboards add a crucial breadth to their sound. This is also the year their first album was released.

The original version of this record was 2 LPs and had 17 tracks. This expanded 2-CD edition has 33! It still covers the same 1977-81 time frame and includes about 75% of their catalog at that point. And the ommissions make sense.

With my vinyl versions of those albums gathering dust in the basement, and their old songs popping up in cover versions all over the place, I was, yes, nostalgic for what originally mesmerized me. So I caved and got this record. It is wonderful.

First, the band - especially the original foursome is tight, and Tina's bass is tuneful as hell. The later 10-piece incarnation is a little sloppier, and I'll admit SMS may have superior versions of the Remain in Light songs.

In those old videos, David Byrne/his character was tentative. But here, he leans into the weirdness and is a monster. (In a good way.)

The songs from Fear of Music (The Pretender of their albums) are an improvement. The music is, well, funkier and David Byrne sings his balls off. And quite a trick for someone who sounded like he had already done that.

So this is a far more comprehensive set than the single CD Stop Making Sense soundtrack. The only thing SMS has that TNOTBITH doesn't is a few songs from Speaking in Tongues. 

A-

"Love ---> Building On Fire"

Neil Young: Live Rust (1979)

This one is less successful than TNOTBITH because of the issues I cited above. Neil's singing is not always on the mark, which matters less as you get to the rock and roll part, but it's still an annoyance. 

Plus what I'd call "unnecessary" songs, like "Comes a Time" and "Lotta Love" which were just fine on the great Comes a Time, and the live versions of songs that were live to begin with just a few months prior on Rust Never Sleeps: "My My Hey Hey" (and vice versa), "Sedan Delivery", "Powderfinger".

I'm glad I have a live version of "Tonight's the Night", "I Am A Child" and "Sugar Mountain", but to be honest, none are superior to their prior versions.

Another issue is that a lot of these songs are staples of Classic Rock Radio so many are overplayed as it is. So it's not surprising that on my first play, I was meh. 

But the 2nd listen, when I was in the mood for Neil, (and Mrs Jaybee was in the mood for a murder show) I put on my headphones and settled in. Pretty soon Mrs. Jaybee is telling me to stop stomping my foot. It was getting in the way of the murders I think. Go Figure.

Which all goes to show how f*ckin' great these songs are. 

But I'm playing Talking Heads more.

B+

"Tonight's the Night"

Live and Let Die:

Christgau was right about something else, too: Running On Empty is better than The Pretender.

The 13th Annual Jaybee-bies: 23 and Me

Alex G, Not Jesus C

Executive Summary:

Music: Pop good.  Jazz and Blues great.

Music/Personal: Still striving for competence on guitar. 

Personal: I'm a grandfather now, and getting close to retirement.

Politics: Too many wars, dictators, climate deniers, and general assholery.

Abstract:

Pop in a holding pattern.

Jazz strikes back. 

The Blues never went away.

Oldies make a comeback. 

Fascists making a comeback, too, and way too many people are okay with it.

(Note: Shouldn't abstracts be longer than executive summaries??)

Humans:

Best:

The same group as last year but with one addition:

• An ex-President - Jimmy Carter

Worst:

And the bar just keeps getting lower:

• Jim Jordan
• Tucker Carlson/Jesse Watters/Marc Levin/Laura Ingraham (what's plural for despicable?)
• Elise Stefanik
• An ex-President. You Know Who.
• The Usual Suspects

Best Books:

• The Underground Railroad by Colson Whitehead - Pre-Civil War slavery with a bit of fantasy thrown in. 
• The Known World by Edward P. Jones - Pre-Civil War slavery with no fantasy, or illusions, for that matter.
• Say Nothing by Patrick Radden Keefe - The Troubles. F*ck you, Gerry Adams. 
• Quantum Criminals by Alex Pappademas and Joan Lemay - Steely Dan, for better or even better than that.

Best Movies:    

• Poor Things
• Oppenheimer

I'm sure there were other good ones, but I don't get out much.

Best TV:

• Ted Lasso
• The White Lotus
• The Bear
• Baby J
• Slow Horses
• Reservation Dogs
• Catastrophe

Suddenly I'm a couch potato.

Best Concerts:

None. I'm still waiting for one that's worth time/trouble/$.

Music Awards:

Most Work (But Worth it): 

• Various Artists: The Music of Erik Satie

Most Work (And Possibly Not Worth It): 

Educationally worth it, musically, not so much: all that time spent on Lou Reed, and specifically his first five solo records. Granted, it was wonderful to re-listen to the VU albums, and the good LR solo-ish records. But I was hearing those first five from scratch. And none of them cracked my top ten. Some way to spend the summer, huh?

Most Surprising (and Not Necessarily in a Good Way): 

But this year it is in a good way! (Lou Reed doesn't count, because I didn't have high hopes to begin with. Thank god for the Steely Dan book. I finally got to it after Christmas. I should have read it sooner. It reminded me of how they produced way more great music in the 1970s than Reed managed. They weren’t exactly summer breezes either but at least they had something to show for it.

Most Disappointing: 

The Dismemberment Plan: Emergency & I

Best Nostalgia:

Talking Heads: The Name of this Band Is Talking Heads - They really were a great band with great songs, just like I thought.

Best Artist: 

Miles Davis, due to sheer volume. 

I got ten (eight new) albums by him, and aside from Bag's Groove and Aghartha, I haven't gotten to the bottom of any of them yet.

The eight new ones came from two "Four Classic Album" collections. Here they are:

• Cookin'
• Steamin'
• Workin'
• Relaxin'
• Miles Ahead
• Sketches of Spain
• Porgy and Bess
• Elevator to the Gallows

I will get to this before I die.

Best Albums of My Year:

At first, I felt like I had to split genres this year because it seemed ridiculous to put Alex G ahead of Roots of Jazz Funk. But because I lean pop-centric, I'm enjoying Alex more right now. In a couple of years, though, who knows if that'll still be true? 

But goddamn it, my pop-democratic brain decided to mix them back up. The only true genre is Good, and that's subjective anyway.

1. Alex G: God Save the Animals
2. The Beths: Expert in a Dying Field
3. Various Artists: Roots of Jazz Funk
4. Galaxie 500: On Fire
5. Duke Ellington Orchestra: At Newport
6. Talk Talk: Spirit of Eden
7. The Smile: A Light for Attracting Attention
8. Miles Davis: Bag's Groove
9. Fleetwood Mac: Live at the Boston Tea Party, Vol. 1.
10. Thelonious Monk: Genius of Modern Music, Vol. 2

Honorable Mentions/Also-Rans/Tieds for Tenth: John Coltrane: Africa Brass, Forlorne: Daydream Hangover, Sun Ra: Lanquidity, Alvvays: Blue Rev

Oh, and Mrs. Jaybee's Favorites:

• The National: The First Two Pages of Frankenstein
• boygenius: the record

What can I say? She's way better at staying current than I am.

Best Compilations:

1. Ella Fitzgerald
2. Coasters
3. Billie Holiday

Album I listened to the most but had the least to Say About (Due to Density – Mine, not the music's.)

Erik Satie: The Music of Satie

Some of the best songs - including some great jazz - I heard this year can be found here.

Conclusions:

A new granddaughter has pushed my musical concerns back to somewhat normal proportions. A positive development I think.

Pop was good but not great, a crucial difference. It does make me wonder if I'm all Popped out. Maybe I'm at that point where I get off the fence and stick to finding great older records and give up on current stuff. I've felt this way before and what typically happens is that someone puts out a pop album that completely dominates my imagination. I hope it happens. I'd like to avoid geezerdom if possible.

Jazz and blues filled the gap. The former via new records and the latter by dipping into ones I already had, more or less. (Sorry that BB and Sonny Boy count as 2022 records I just hadn't gotten to yet.)

Still nice to still have a democracy. But I'm worried.

Meh-ry Christmas

Okay, so the title is opportunistic and misleading since the actual meh-ness occurred in the fall. And it's possible I've used it before but it's our duty to recycle, so...

I've been listening to so much great jazz this year it muscled out pop music, which has been merely good. And just as the perfect is the enemy of the good, the good can also the enemy of the bad, which is at least good for a laugh.

But no one's laughing now.

Primal Scream: Screamadelica (1991)

This UK psychedelic/dance/dub and sometimes rock record starts off well enough but drags from there on, so nothing here really sticks to your ribs.

Loud and proud like Spiritualized, with (slightly) shorter (but still too long) songs. I want to say they're more focused, but when they repeat the title phrase of "Come Together" (Yeah, they're not great at coming up with original titles) for eight minutes, I realize there's such a thing as being too focused. 

Excellent production by Jimmy Miller of Stones fame, and great backup singing, but I only put it on out of curiosity.

B+

"Movin' On Up" (see what I mean?)

Laura Marling: Song for Our Daughter (2020)

Another UK artist. And like Primal Scream, it starts off great and then drifts a bit.

She's a little bit Joni, a little bit Judee Sill, a little bit Weather Station. I’m embarrassed to admit it but I prefer the recent girly (and thus potentially sarcastic) voices to the serious ones, which can be mocked.

I do not not like this record - I'm not suffering when it's on (that William Faulkner quote may be applicable) but it's not one I get excited about. Expert singing and songwriting. Down-to-earth folkish music. And I want to listen to the lyrics. Perhaps a little more change of pace and dynamics would have made it better? 

Given the choice, though, I'll put it on before I put on Primal Scream.

B+

"Alexandra"

Tame Impala: Currents (2015)

This time out Kevin Parker's melodies ride a wash of dance beats and synths.  I miss the sloppy psychedelia of Lonerism, though. I guess I would prefer to hang out with a stoner for an hour than a car salesman.

Perfectly listenable, though.

B+

"The Moment"

Wednesday: Rat Saw God (2023)

This record is so f*cking intense, it can be too hard to take. There's an eight-minute cut where the female singer sounds like she's being murdered, for instance. (I am not exagerrating.)

 After that, things calm down a bit and the melodies and guitars really ring out. Then I hear a pedal steel guitar and I realize they're playing country rock and roll, like early seventies Neil Young.

Sort of the opposite of Laura Marling.

When they're good they're fantastic, which may entice me to give the murder songs another try. 

B+

"Chosen to Deserve"

Genesis: Selling England By the Pound (1973)

One of the better prog-rock albums I've heard. The last time I tried PR was King Crimson, which was pretty good but oh so serious. Luckily Peter Gabriel is more modest than pretentious and is thus easier to take than Robert Fripp.

Here, they make sure there are melodies to accompany the keyboard histrionics. (As much piano as organ thank god.) Some actual guitar, too!  

Of course, I have no idea what the story is about. Figuring that out might ruin the fun.

B+

"I Know What I Like (In Your Wardrobe)"

Galaxie 500: On Fire (1989)

Kinda slow, but if you're tired it comes as a relief. Three then-young people are playing simple, familiar chord progressions and melodies (because that's all they know?) and slow them down so you get their full majesty. 

But just to make it strange, the band - which does have a female member - uses one of the guys to sing the higher parts. It's like listening to "Cortez the Killer" with Neil singing it in his "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" voice.

The guitar solos are pretty rudimentary but get the job done. And on their cover of New Order's "Ceremony", they damn near improve it.

A-

"Tell Me"

Coasters: 50 Coastin' Classics (1992)

I used to hate '50s music. I was born in 1957, so, to me, the Beatles were the real Big Bang, not Elvis, and all good music started in 1963, etc.

And I was at the height of my anti-anti-rock snobbery - where I equated seriousness with quality - when people started listening to oldies stations. I was outraged! There was nothing wrong with current music! As Carly Simon said, these are the good old days! You don't need to feel nostalgic for another time. 

Plus, '50s music was silly. The sound quality sucked, guitars were not prominent, and guys sang like girls.

Okay this seems a bit overboard, but then again 50s music made me feel a bit over-bored (see what I did there?)?(??)

I've come around a bit since then. Reluctantly exploring Chuck Berry, Elvis, Buddy Holly, and the Everly Brothers. The turning point came with History of New Orleans R&B, Vol. 1, which is such a terrific record I began to see the whole era in a different light.

So from that point, I was willing to explore other lesser-known (to me) artists of the era. I'm up to C.

From the get-go, the songs are tuneful and funny - and silly!!! - the band is committed and the singing is right on the mark every time. Plus Leiber and Stoller wrote almost all of these songs and produced most of them, too.

Any record that packs in "Riot in Cell Block", "Smokey Joe's Cafe", "Youngblood", "Yakety Yak", "Along Came Jones" and "Poison Ivy" (I could go on...) all in one place is really special.

A delight.

A

Some of That Jazz

Ah, Jazz. You only take up 5% of my record collection, but lately, you've been taking up half of my listening. 

Rock 'n roll got a fifteen-year head start on you in my house. And you could never make up that ground as long as pop would remain my default setting. I'd only visit the Jazz section of the record store after having thoroughly combed the Pop bins. 

But you were never an afterthought. You were always there, just over the horizon, beckoning, reminding me that if I truly was the music lover I imagined myself to be, I'd need to broaden my horizons. 

I was one of those very serious teenagers. At least as annoying as the Zeppelin-loving potheads. I had to prove to my parents - but mostly myself - that "rock music" was as good as, or better than, any other kind of music, So I pulled away from anything simplistic or hedonistic, preferring the Allman Brothers and the Dead, probably because I could point to their virtuosity as proof of their superiority. 

I also dabbled in prog rock. It's harder to play so it must be "better" right?

Luckily, for me, rock had a way of flipping the script. As I got older that very serious-sounding prog rock began to come off as a bit pompous and silly, whereas unpretentious records like "Louie Louie"  became a source of joy. 

All it really took was a sense of humor. Once I got one of those I embraced the joy wherever I could find it while still shunning the downright stupid. 

Once I found my way, it opened up whole new vistas and old ones I had previously dismissed. And as long as I kept exploring things would never have time to get stale. And while rock is the greatest thing, it's not the only thing. Eventually, I'd make my way outside of rock altogether. 

The most obvious places to go were Classical and Jazz, the latter being more welcoming because it had - scoff if you will - some similarities to rock music. Melodies, rhythm, passion, and blues, to name a few. So there was a way in.

But Jazz, you could still be work. Your songs came from the pre-Beatles era, and your chords were rarely just major or minor, thus your solos were for a time unfathomable. Also, your sound quality really didn't get good until the 1950s, which is why I latched onto small combos (like the Beatles, Jaybee?) rather than big bands. It wasn't simple, but I persisted.  

Okay, I'll stop talking to Jazz at this point. (He/she never does answer.)

Perhaps I needed to convey that my expertise in Jazz is very limited (Not that I can be trusted with Pop, where my taste tends to skew weird. What till I tell you about that Galaxie 500 record I just got...) so it takes me a while to get my head around most Jazz records. 

Add to that my propensity to deep dive where I barely have the right to dip my toe, and it can take forever. I have a long, meandering unpublished post on three multi-album collections (Bill Evans, John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk) adding up to, oh, 28 f*cking albums. 

But very occasionally I slow down and focus. I'll get less voluminous collections and actually pay attention to them. 

Ella Fitzgerald: Sings the Cole Porter Songbook

A while back, Mrs. Jaybee picked up the Ella Fitzgerald 75th Birthday Celebration to teach her students about scat singing. While it's a perfectly good collection, I was already completely obsessed with the Magnetic Fields' 3-CD 69 Love Songs which we got at the same time. So there goes Pop shoving Jazz out of the way again.

Years passed and I felt no compunction to get anything more from Ella Fitzgerald. I'd gotten her best of, didn't I? 

But whenever I'd peruse various GOAT Jazz Album lists, there she'd be with her Cole Porter songbook. I only knew Porter from what I heard on Red Hot and Blue. No need for more, right? Right?

25 years later...

As much pop as it is jazz, The Cole Porter Songbook is a delight throughout. The clever lyrics and cleverer melodies turn out to be a perfect fit for that incomparable voice, and these thirty-five delightful songs glide by in no time at all. 

A

"Anything Goes"

Duke Ellington: At Newport 1956 Complete

In a case of deja vu all over again, I'd gotten the very fine 3-CD DE Centennial Edition (1927-1973) which should have been enough, right? 

But as with Ella another Duke album kept popping up that for decades I had convinced myself I had no need for. Boy was I wrong.

I opted for the expanded 2 CD version, which includes the entire concert including the between-song patter and the band opening with a perfectly good "Star Spangled Banner". (Hendrix rules, though.) So things aren't as compact as I'd like them to be, but I can live with that.

It's one thing to listen to the original recordings of these songs on Centennial and enjoy them despite the relatively poor sound quality. But to hear his band dig into these songs with such gusto live, well that's another thing entirely.

And yes, "Diminuendo in D" is everything you heard it was.

A

Billie Holiday: Ultimate Collection (2005)

Many years ago, I inadvertently banished Billie Holiday from my day-to-day play choices when she committed an unpardonable sin. Drugs or some other immoral behavior, you ask? Worse, she kept distracting me and Mrs. Jaybee as we engaged in our weekly Sunday Jumble competition. 

In her defense, we were listening to a single LP best-of (which is a ridiculous notion) which threw together all kinds of styles that didn't naturally flow together. So it was very detrimental to our ability to determine that OIAPN was in fact PIANO.

But really, the issue was that Billie forced you to listen, and I wasn't prepared to do that at the time. She was just too damned intense. 

I knew I'd eventually have to replace that single LP with something more cohesive and comprehensive. I did investigate it, checking Consumer Reports and the ever-reliable user ratings on Amazon, and I finally landed on this one.

Two CDs (and a DVD I haven't even bothered viewing yet).  Honestly, at first, I gave it a few listens and left it for a while. (I was in my Blues period.) It was only this past week when I caught a bad cold that I found myself spellbound. I think it was because I didn't have the strength to do anything else, so I just gave myself over to it, and well, wow. An embarrassment of riches, even if some fanatics think it could have been better. It is just fine as it is.

A

"I'm a Fool to Want You"

Miles Davis: Bags Groove

I wish I could say I needed another Miles Davis record. I think I just keep chasing the original high from Kind of Blue and A Tribute to Jack Johnson. Alas, he's always Miles Ahead of me. I'll never catch up, but I keep trying.

Recorded in 1954 but only released in 1957 - a year when he released six(!) albums.

This is a remarkably smooth and often brilliant record. The band includes Sonny Rollins and Thelonious Monk, just not on the same songs. But everyone brought their A-game, and this is a thrill. The only issue is that the title cut(s) is so great, that the remaining excellent ones have to catch up.

I'll wait.

A-

"Bag's Groove"

Miles Davis: Agharta (1975)

Again? Yeah. I couldn't help it.

Everyone more or less came around to Miles' controversial electric period in the early 1970s. This record is one of several live double albums he released at the time and is considered the best.

And it sure is better and more focused than that overrated "classic" Bitch's Brew. More rhythmic, more intense. More soloing, less dicking around.

A-

"Prelude, Part 1" (Because who but Miles would title a 30-minute cut "Prelude"?} 

At this point, I'll pause because I'm still listening to Miles Davis: Four Classic Albums. 

Narrator: And yet, this was overheard at the Jaybee Thanksgiving dinner table:

"Hey honey, I noticed there's another "Four Classic Albums" by Miles Davis on Amazon. How about that, huh?"