Robert Baird

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Vintage Vinyl In San Francisco
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Oct 25, 2017  |  6 comments
An Afternoon on Haight Street...
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The Rolling Stones: Their Satanic Majesties Request 50th Anniversary Edition
Music and Recording Features
Robert Baird  |  Oct 24, 2017  |  12 comments
While it may elicit shakes of the head, nasty, distasteful looks, or vociferous yawps about its being nothing more than a load of warmed-over psychedelic pandering, the time may have come to listen again to Their Satanic Majesties Request, the much-maligned 1967 album by the Rolling Stones—and perhaps think of it in a slightly more humane light. Few records from that or any other era have been as widely savaged. It's easy to make the argument that any record with such a pretentious title deserves to be ridiculed. The music itself is scattered and feels unfinished in spots. Then there's that cover image.
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Recording of November 2017: Marseille
Recording of the Month
Robert Baird  |  Oct 17, 2017  |  1 comments
Ahmad Jamal: Marseille
Ahmad Jamal, piano; James Cammack, double bass; Herlin Riley, drums; Manolo Badrena, percussion; Abd Al Malik (track 4), Mina Agossi (track 8), vocals
Jazz Book/Jazz Village [PIAS] JV 33570142.43 (2 LPs). 2017. Ahmad Jamal, Seydou Barry, Catherine Vallon-Barry, prods.; Vincent Mahey, eng. ADA? TT: 59:33
Performance *****
Sonics *****

While cities like New York, Detroit, and Philly all get more press for their jazz history and connections, Pittsburgh has a rich history as the birthplace of many notable swing and bebop jazz players. Bassist Ray Brown, drummers Art Blakey and Jeff "Tain" Watts, tenor saxman Stanley Turrentine, trumpeter Roy Eldridge, and the one and only Billy Strayhorn, famed collaborator of Duke Ellington and composer of "Take The 'A' Train," all came from The Burgh.

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Ry Cooder's Finest
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Oct 06, 2017  |  6 comments
The highlight of an incomparable career, reissued on LP by Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab . . .
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Murray Head: Nigel Lives Again
InterviewsMusic and Recording Features
Robert Baird  |  Oct 05, 2017  |  0 comments
Seeing your album in a record store's cutout bin meant one thing. Despite the label execs' wide smiles, warm handshakes, and earnest promises to the contrary, once the record jacket had a hole punched in it, or its corner clipped, it meant your record label had lost faith and moved on.

Record collectors felt differently. The prices of cutouts were right—usually, from 99õ to a penny under two bucks. And cutouts were better than digging through crates because the records were still sealed . . . even if the jackets were a bit mangled. The beauty of cutouts was that they were so cheap, you could afford to be lavish, and go home with anything that caught your fancy.

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Tom Petty (1950-2017)
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Oct 03, 2017  |  3 comments
Another Rock Legend gone...
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Hefner, Hi-Fi, and Jazz
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Sep 29, 2017  |  3 comments
Hugh Hefner relentlessly promoted Hi-Fi gear in the pages of Playboy because it was hip and cool and part of living the good life.
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Life is Fine: Paul Kelly Goes Electric
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Sep 23, 2017  |  1 comments
An old hand from Down Under returns to rock . . .
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Fairport Convention at 50
Robert Baird
Robert Baird  |  Sep 16, 2017  |  1 comments
A Completist's Dream
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Recording of October 2017: Never the Same Way Once: Live at the Boarding House May 1974
Recording of the Month
Robert Baird  |  Sep 12, 2017  |  4 comments
Doc and Merle Watson: Bear's Sonic Journals, Never the Same Way Once: Live at the Boarding House May 1974
Owsley Stanley Foundation (7 CDs). 2017. Hawk, exec prod.; Starfinder Stanley, Jeffrey Norman, Pete Bell, project coordinators; Owsley Stanley, orig. eng.; Jeffrey Norman, CD mastering, tape archivist; John Chester, Jaime Howarth, digital transfers. ADD? TT: 5:33:17
Performance *****
Sonics *****

The late Owsley "Bear" Stanley spent his life raising consciousness. Whether it was mixing up jars of LSD, building his famous Wall of Sound PA system for the Grateful Dead, or supervising the creation of an incredible library of live recordings, Bear Stanley was after a certain purity, a higher level of quality, epiphanies.

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