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Super-Special-Ultra-Mega

Look at this and wonder: "Why doesn't Brother Stephen own this beautiful piece of art? It obviously has his name written all over it. What gives?"

I’ll tell you what gives: This version of Cold Cave's Death Comes Close EP is a pretty-much-impossible-to-get-super-special-ultra-mega-limited edition, and I just happened to blink while it was getting sold out.

What?! Don't look at me like that. Sometimes a dude has to blink. You'd think by now I would have people on the case for me, like a bunch of elves, or something, that would ease my weary mind and hook me up. But…

CMH

Even better than the STAX museum in Memphis however, is the Country Music Hall of Fame in Nashville. I had friends in Nashville give me the whole rap about… “You don’t have to even know the music to love the museum”…to which I rolled my eyes, but it’s actually true. The CMH integrates music so beautifully in the museum. It could be an utter disaster in there musically, with listening stations bleeding into each other until it’s just a cacophony of noise. But through the intelligent uses of curled Nautilus shell shaped listening booths that control the sound yet still allow the listener to…

John Surman's <I>Brewster's Rooster</I>

John Surman, a saxophonist of jazz, folk, church, and avant-garde influences, has been a longtime denizen in the ECM stable without gaining much renown. When he recently played at a New York club, leading a rhythm section of guitarist John Abercrombie, bassist Drew Gress, and drummer Jack DeJohnette, he acknowledged to the crowd that he was the only player who needed introducing.

The same band plays on Surman’s latest CD, Brewster’s Rooster, and it’s the ensemble mix that makes it such a diverting pleasure. On the album’s best tracks, including the opener, “Slanted Sky,” Surman (on…

Truth + Beauty + Jazz = Herman Leonard

Gracing the 5th floor lobby of Jazz At Lincoln Center for another few months is an exhibition of the great photographer Herman Leonard, whose images of jazz musicians at work deserve the overused term “iconic.”

At recording sessions, nightclub gigs, on stage, backstage, between cuts, or in the heat of the moment, Leonard captured the spirit, joy, and intensity of the music and its whole culture more evocatively and empathically than anyone else.

His classic work comes from the late 1940s and ‘50s, featuring the likes of Charlie Parker, Dizzy Gillespie, Duke Ellington, Louis…

Live Versus Recorded

A gang of Giyas prepare to stick it to a Steinway.

Friday–Saturday, November 6–7, 6pm: Stealth Audio (17600 Bowie Mill Road, Derwood, Maryland) will host a “Live Versus Recorded” music recital. In the “Live” corner, pianist George Vatchnadze will tickle the ivories of a Steinway Model D. In the “Recorded” corner, Stereophile editor John Atkinson will be packing the usual heat: mics and DACs and cables and stuff.

Vatchnadze will play and Atkinson will record. Guests will first be entertained by the live performance, then get to hear the recorded version through a hi-fi…

Atocha Design’s Autumn Sale

The people behind Atocha Design want you to get your records off the floor. Hmm, have they been snooping around my apartment? Have they seen the ever-expanding mess of vinyl propped up against footstools and bookshelves? I want to get my records off the floor, too. (Help.)

And, so, Atocha Design, maker of the prettiest LP cabinet I’ve ever seen, is having its first sale. From now until November 8, lucky customers will receive 15 percent off all cabinet orders.

Nick Atocha and Jennifer Levin Atocha are music lovers. When they went shopping for LP storage appropriate…

Love Comes Close Again

Photo: Jayme Thornton

Yesterday was the official Matador Records re-release of Cold Cave’s excellent debut LP, Love Comes Close. I attended the listening party at powerHouse Arena, a cavernous performance and retail space nestled between the mighty Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges in the cobblestoned and awe-inspiring DUMBO neighborhood of Brooklyn. It was a good time. Pabst Blue Ribbon tastes better than I’d remembered.

I didn’t pick up the new Matador re-release because I already own the Heartworm Press version. I did, however, purchase the “Death Comes Close” 12-inch…

The Chemistry of Common Life, Live

This dude, Patrick Duffy, does a good job of detailing last night’s Fucked Up show at the Brooklyn Masonic Temple in charming Fort Greene. On a tree-lined, brownstoned block, in an old and ornate shrine, Fucked Up, joined by New Jersey’s Vivian Girls on backing vocals and Andrew WK on synths, made a scene. I kept a safe distance from the anarchy, up in the urine-scented balcony, with the other parents.

(Note: I’m not really a father, readers; I’m just making a joke.)

It was a memorable performance, the band playing last year’s entire outstanding album, The Chemistry of…

Hola!

Transatlantic flights wipe me out. Chalk it up to being an old man I guess. But after a connection through a dark deserted Heathrow, I arrived in Barcelona for the 41st Barcelona Jazz Festival and within a couple of days, semi-disaster had struck. Not to me mind you but to American jazz saxophonist Joe Lovano who fell, not once but twice and broke an arm and a shoulder. He had to cancel his show here in Barcelona, his European tour and then had surgery with the chief orthopedic surgeon of Barcelona’s much beloved soccer team, FCBarcelona, presiding. I saw Lovano this morning as he was leaving…

Concha Buika

Back at the Barcelona Jazz Festival, after many espressos, a hunk of Cod, potatoes with olive oil mayo and tomato sauce, grilled mushrooms, and some of the best cookies I’ve ever had (thumb sized sugar cookies with chocolate centers), I made the trip to several record stores including Jazz Messengers, which has perhaps the finest collection of live jazz CDs and some LPs, in the world. If you’re feeling strong, pay down a credit card and then check out their website, www.jazzmessengers.com. They ship to the States, I checked. I picked up a CD of Clifford Brown’s final concert in…